In the case of El Paso & Southwestern Railroad Company v. Eichel & Weikel, 1912, the U.S Supreme Court was tasked with determining whether a contract for land purchase between two parties could be enforced despite one party's failure to comply with certain conditions stipulated in the agreement. The dispute arose when Eichel and Weikel failed to construct buildings on purchased railroad property within an agreed timeframe as per their contract with El Paso & Southwestern Railroad Company. The company sought to rescind the sale and reclaim possession of its land due to this breach of terms. However, it was ruled by lower courts that although there had been non-compliance from Eichel and Weikel regarding construction deadlines, they were still entitled to retain ownership because they had made significant improvements on other parts of the property which demonstrated good faith effort towards fulfilling their contractual obligations. On appeal, however, this decision was overturned by the Supreme Court who held that partial performance or efforts did not excuse complete fulfillment of all contractual terms; thus ruling in favor of El Paso & Southwestern Railroad Company.

In the dissenting opinion for El Paso & Southwestern Railroad Company v. Eichel & Weikel, it was argued that the court majority erred in its interpretation of Texas law regarding land grants and mineral rights. The dissent contended that under Texas law, a grantor who conveys land but reserves mineral rights retains an interest in those minerals even if they are not yet discovered or extracted at the time of conveyance. Therefore, when a railroad company acquires such lands through eminent domain proceedings, it does not automatically acquire all underlying mineral rights unless specifically compensated for them to their rightful owners. The dissent further maintained that this principle should apply regardless of whether or not these reserved minerals were known to exist at the time of acquisition by eminent domain; thus disagreeing with the majority's ruling which held otherwise.