## Facts

- The Henrys purchased a home in Pawtucket, Rhode Island, in 1922; the Daltons acquired the adjoining property soon after.
- The space between the houses was narrow; only part of the strip was on the Henrys’ land, with a boundary fence later replaced by a hedge jointly funded by both households.
- In 1938, William Henry asked William Dalton for permission to remove the hedge and use the strip between the houses as a shared driveway so the Henrys could build and access a two-car garage behind their home.
- Dalton gave oral permission; the hedge was removed, the Henrys filled and graded their portion of the strip, and they constructed a two-car garage.
- The parties used the area as a common driveway for years.
- In the mid-1950s, the Daltons attempted to restrict access (including posts and a chain).
- The Henrys, seeking to sell their home, requested a written easement; Dalton refused and later died in 1957.
- The Henrys filed a bill in equity to establish an irrevocable right to use the driveway over the Dalton property, alleging reliance on the 1938 oral permission and also asserting an adverse-use theory.

## Issues

1. Whether an oral license to use another’s land as a driveway becomes irrevocable based on the licensee’s expenditures and improvements made in reliance on the permission.
2. Whether long-term use of the driveway created an easement by adverse use when the use began with the owner’s permission.
3. Whether equity should prevent revocation as fraudulent notwithstanding the statute of frauds.

## Decision

- The Rhode Island Supreme Court affirmed the decree dismissing the Henrys’ bill in equity and remanded for further proceedings consistent with its opinion.
- The court held the 1938 arrangement created only a parol license, which remained revocable and could not be converted into an easement without a writing satisfying the statute of frauds.
- The court rejected the claim that reliance expenditures (grading and garage construction) made the license irrevocable.
- The court held no prescriptive easement arose because the driveway use originated permissively and was not shown to have become hostile or adverse.
- The court found no actionable fraud in the licensor’s revocation of permission that would justify overriding the statute of frauds.

## Legal Principles

- A parol (oral) license to use another’s land is revocable at the licensor’s option and does not become an easement merely because the licensee spent money or made improvements in reliance on the permission.
- An easement or other continuing interest in land generally must be created by a written instrument consistent with the statute of frauds.
- Use that begins by permission does not ripen into an easement by prescription absent a clear change to open, notorious, and hostile use under a claim of right.
- Equity will not treat revocation of a permissive license as fraud, by itself, sufficient to defeat the statute of frauds.

## Conclusion

The court refused to recognize an irrevocable driveway right based on an oral permission and reliance improvements, holding that the arrangement was a revocable license and that permissive use could not support a prescriptive easement without proof of a later adverse claim.


Henry v. Dalton, 151 A.2d 362 (R.I. 1959)