Duffield v. Hue

Citations

• 136 Pa. 602
• 20 A. 526
• 1890 Pa. LEXIS 1054

Syllabus

<p>1. Under a lease which grants to the lessee for oil producing purposes a certain described tract of land, with the exclusive right of boring for oil thereon, but restricts the operations of the lessee to certain specified sites, the lessee has no right of possession, such as will support ejectment, as to any land outside the designated sites: Duffield v. Hue, 129 Pa. 94.</p> <p>2. The lessee, however, has the protection of the entire premises, and equity has jurisdiction to restrain the lessor, or others acting under him, from drilling wells thereon outside of such designated sites, and thereby lessening the production of wells drilled by the lessee, such injury being destructive of his rights and incapable of adequate remedy at law.</p> <p>3. A court of equity may entertain a bill for an injunction against such an interference with the lessee’s rights, notwithstanding that the boundaries of the demised premises are disputed, the defendant, who also is in possession under the lessor, denying that the land upon which he is drilling was included by the lessor in the leasehold granted to the plaintiff.</p> <p>4. The lessor of an oil lease being dead, in a controversy between one who had succeeded to his title and an assignee of the lessee, as to whether the leasehold estate had been forfeited, the lessee and liis assignee were incompetent, both before and after the passage of the act of May 23, 1887, P. L. 158, to testify to a waiver of forfeiture by the lessor.</p>