13 N.M. 331 | N.M. | 1906
OPINION OF THE COURT.
That proposition, we think, is not sustained by the authorities and is not sound in principle. The plaintiffs, cite in support of it, Ryer v. Stockwell, 14 Cal. 134, which does adopt that view, basing its decision however, on cases which do not sustain it but only hold that the acceptance of such an offer by performance according to its terms, creates a valid contract, which unquestionably is the ease. The opposite, and, as we hold, the true’view of the law is well expressed by Worden, J., in Board of Commissioners of Marion County v. Shipley, 77 Ind., 553: “A contract cannot be said to be in writing * * * so as to run twenty years, unless the parties thereto, as well as its entire terms and stipulations, can be gathered'from the instrument itself or from some other written instrument referred to therein, without the aid of parol evidence to ascertain either. If parol evidence has to be resorted to in order to ascertain the parties to a contract or its terms, the reason for extending the period of limitation for twenty years fails; and though the contract be partly in writing, yet, as it rests partly in parol, the six-year period of limitations'applies, as well as if the contract had rested entirely in parol.”
That case, which explicitly overruled a former decision of the same court, has since been followed in that state in several cases which are referred to in Hachelman v. Board of Co. Commissioners &c., 94 Ind. p. —. See also Sulbert v. Atherton, 59 Iowa, p. 91; Loving v. City of Boston, 48 Mass. p. 412.
Judgment of the district court affirmed.