300 STATE BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



years in a certain direction until finally some man of common sense and 

 superior genius will discover that it works injustice in certain cases and will 

 demonstrate it by a course of reasoning which is irresistible that it is liable 

 to work injuriously. This result will be a change in the opinion of courts 

 and eminent writers. For more than two hundred years it was held in all the 

 courts, both in England and this country, that if one hired a man for a cer- 

 tain time and he quit before his time was out without good cause, he could not 

 recover wages for what time he had actually worked ; that having broken his 

 contract he could recover no compensation. 



Some fifty years ago a farmer in New Hampshire hired a man for a year. 

 The man worked eleven months, and quit; the farmer refused to pay him 

 anything. He brought suit for his eleven months' work. According to the 

 common law, as it had been held for generations, he was not entitled to 

 recover anything. The case was taken to the supreme court, and there Judge 

 Parker gave it as his opinion that the man was entitled to recover the value 

 of his eleven months' saving, deducting the damage to the farmer in conse- 

 quence of his quitting before his time was out. The whole subject was fully 

 and ably examined by Parker, and the court came to the following conclusion, 

 which has since been regarded as manifestly just and sensible : 



When a person undertakes to pay upon a special contract for the perform- 

 ance of labor, he is not liable to be charged upon such special contract until 

 the money is earned according to the terms of the agreement, and where the 

 two parties have made an express agreement the law will not imply and raise 

 an argument different from that which the parties have entered into. In case 

 of a failure to perform such special contract by the fault of the party con- 

 tracting to do the service, if the money is not due, by the terms of the special 

 agreement, and the nature of the contract is such that the employer can reject 

 what has been done, and refuse to receive any benefit from the past perform- 

 ance, he is entitled to do so, unless he has before assented to and accepted of 

 what has been done, and in such case the party performing the labor is not 

 entitled to recover, however much he may have done. But if upon a contract 

 of such a character a party actually receives useful labor, and thereby derives 

 a benefit and advantage over and above the damage which has resulted from 

 the breach of the contract by the other party, the labor actually done and the 

 value received furnishes a new consideration, and the law thereupon raises a 

 promise to pay to the extent of the reasonable worth of the excess. If in such 

 case it be found that the damages are equal to or greater than the value of the 

 labor performed, so that the employer has not upon the whole case received a 

 beneficial service, he can not be made to pay for such service. Such is now 

 the well settled rule of the common law on this subject. 



I have thus deviated, for the time being, from the course I was pursuing, in 

 order to explain very briefly and as clearly as I could what we understand by 

 the common law. Having thus endeavored to explain, I shall resume the course 

 which I have indicated in former conversations. 



