Opinion by
The plaintiffs in this proceeding sought to enforce the specific performance of two contracts. Under the provisions of the first contract Semmira Eisenhauеr, one of the defendants, had agreed to resign as executrix of the will of her deceased husband, Henry Eisenhauer, and to waive all right to commissions as said executrix. The court below found as a fact, upon abundantly sufficient and uncontradicted evidence, that Semmira Eisenhauer always had been willing to perform these covenants, and had offered to do so before the bill was filed. It is therefore manifest that as to that contract there was no warrant for the filing of the bill and putting costs upon the de
The real question at issue arises out of another contract, relating to the sale of a judgment held by the estate of Henry Eisenhauer against Williаm S. Eisenhauer, his son. William S. Eisenhauer was at the date of the death of his father indebted to the latter to a considerable amount, $900 of which was in the form of a judgment, in the’ court of common pleas, of Union county. William S. Eisenhauer was insolvent, and the only property, real or personal, possessed by him out of which the money could be made on the judgment held by the estate was a farm upon which that judgment was alien. The parties plaintiff and defendant met, in December, 1903, and William H. Spotts, acting executor of Henry Eisenhauer, with the consent of the other plaintiffs, the legatees and devisees under the will, agreed to sell the $900 judgment held by the estate against William S. Eisenhauer to Semmira Eisenhauer, his mother, and to release William S. Eisenhauer from liability for his entire indebtedness to the estate, in consideration of which Semmira Eisenhauer agreed to release to the estate $900 out of a legacy of $1,300 which she took under the will of her deceased husband, Henry Eisenhauer, and William S. Eisenhauer agreed to release аll his rights as a legatee under the will. There was some delay in the execution of the papers necessary to carry the contract into effect, and about two months later, or early in February, 1904, Semmira Eisenhauer, through her attorney, notified the other parties that her offer was withdrawn and she declined to carry the arrangement intо effect. The plaintiffs subsequently filed this bill to compel the specific performance of the contract. The thing which it is proposed to compel Mrs. Eisenhauеr to do is to buy from the estate a judgment which it holds against her son, William S. Eisenhauer, who is also the son of the decedent, and pay for that judgment its full face value by releasing $900 of the legacy which she took under the will of her deceased husband. We must not lose sight of the fact that this is not an action
The learned judge of the court below made the question of the right of plaintiffs to equitable relief turn upon the sufficiency of the consideration to support the contract. There can be no question that the сonsideration was sufficient to support the contract as a binding obligation in a court of law. The contract related to a sale of personal proрerty and was wholly executory. The sufficiency of the consideration to support the contract was not the determining question in this case. The cases in which equity will deсree a specific performance of a contract for the sale of personal property are exceptional, although the powеr to do so unquestionably exists : McGowin v. Remington,
We are of оpinion that this contract was upon the part of the widow so exceedingly improvident that a chancellor ought not to be called upon to enforce it according to its terms; the parties should be left to their remedy at law.
The decree is reversed and the bill is dismissed at the costs of the plaintiffs, without prejudice to their right to raise the same question in an action at law, or upon distribution of the estate of Henry Eisenhauer in the orphans’ court.