sued for a discharge from employment al leged to have been wrongful. He was employed for one year, the con tract providing that the employer might ter minate it at any time for any conduct on the salesman's part reflecting discredit on the employer or injury to his business. The salesman had previously associated with a woman of bad character and it was for the purpose of breaking off this association that this provision was inserted in the contract. After the contract was made the plaintiff renewed his association with the woman and with other persons of ill-repute, and the court holds that this conduct was a sufficient ground for discharge. The court also holds that the contract does not contravene public policy.
SPOTTER. (AGREEMENT WITH PROSECUTING AT TORNEY— PROSECUTION FOR GAMING— DEFENSE.) TEXAS COURT OF CRIMINAL APPEALS.
In Gaines v. State, 78 Southwestern Re porter 1076, the defendant, who was prose cuted for gaming, defended on the ground that he had a prior agreement with the county attorney by which he was to induce other parties to engage in gaming, himself participating with any one who would play, and report them to the county attorney, and appear as a witness against them in prose cutions for the offenses. A Texas statute releases from punish ment, in prosecutions for gaming, witnesses who turn State's evidence, but the court says that this applies only where the offense has been committed. It finds no case and is cited to none based on a previous agreement to engage in the violation of lav. The agree ment in question is not within the statute. The county attorney and witness cannot enter into an agreement to bring about vio lations of law, and the witness plead the agreement in defense. The county attorney, by reason of his official position, has no right
to induce parties to commit crimes, and neither he nor the party engaging in the crime by virtue of the agreement would be exempt from punishment. WILLS. (WIDOW'S ELECTION—CONDITIONAL CHAR ACTER.) MASSACHUSETTS SUPREME JUDICIAL COURT.
In Sterns v. Bemis, 70 Northeastern Re porter 44. it is held that under Rev. Laws, ch. 135, § 16, providing that the surviving spouse may file a writing waiving any provi sion made for him or her in decedent's will, or claiming that portion of the estate he or she would have been entitled to if decedent had died intestate, a widow's election must be unconditional; and one which is made to depend on the construction and legal effect to be given to the will, is insufficient. The court says: "The surviving husband or widow is in as good a position to know the legal effect of a waiver as any one. If the law is plain in regard to the questions raised by a waiver, he ought to determine whether to file an effectual waiver. If the law is doubtful, he ought to resolve the doubt as well as possible for himself, and not to create a condition which gives rise to uncertainty, and then decline to act definitely until a suit has been brought by others, and the doubt dispelled by a decision of the court. . . . The statute contemplates a writing whose meaning is clear, and whose effect is to waive the provisions of the will, it assumes that the executors will know whether the estate is to be settled according to the law appli cable when a waiver has been filed. . . . The writing filed in the present case does not purport to be an absolute waiver. It is a claim of a right to file a writing which shall leave undetermined the question whether the widow will waive the provisions of the will until it shall be decided what the law appli cable to this will would be if an absolute waiver were filed. The filing of this writing was therefore of no effect.
