Page:North Dakota Reports (vol. 1).pdf/174

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150
NORTH DAKOTA REPORTS.

the former to the latter. The theory on which defendant would be bound to account to the plaintiff for the profits realized on sale after he had taken the title in his own name is that the property remained partnership property, in the eye of the law, notwithstanding the transfer of the title from the partnership to the defendant through a third person. The reason lying at the foundation of the doctrine that one partner cannot sue a co-partner on account of partnership matters is the impossibility of settling the accounts of the partners in a legal action, and therefore, the impossibility of determining in that action whether the defendant partner is at all indebted to the plaintiff partner on a full settlement of their accounts. The law will not pick out an isolated partnership transaction, and predicate a liability on that alone when it is possible that on a full accounting between the partners the balance is the other way. This principle applies with full force to this case. There have been numerous and complicated partnership transactions between the parties. It does not in any manner appear that the partners have ever had a full settlement of their accounts. Their minds have never met on the basis of a conceded balance. It does not even appear that all matters save this particular Bismarck deal have ever been adjusted. The complaint is fatal to such a theory of the case, and the evidence does not change the situation of the parties in this respect. It is, undoubtedly, thoroughly established, that, where there is only a single transaction, no accounting is necessary, but suit may be brought at law by one of two partners against the other to recover the amount due him arising from the single venture. 2 Bates, Partn. § 865, and cases; Pettengill v. Jones, 28 Kan. 749; Sikes v. Work, 6 Gray, 433; Wheeler v. Arnold, 30 Mich. 304; Kutz v. Driebelbis, 17 Atl. Rep. 609. The decision in Clark v. Mills, (Kan.) 13 Pac. Rep. 569, while an extreme case, will not sustain this action. In that case the dealings between the partners embraced only a few items, and there were no such transactions as to make a settlement difficult. There were no firm debts or credits, and all the affairs of the partnership had been adjusted except an accountting between them.: The rule in Thompson v. Lowe, (Ind.) 12 N. E. Rep. 476, certainly is not favorable to plaintiff,