In the case of Furrer v. Ferris in 1891, the U.S Supreme Court dealt with a dispute over land ownership. The plaintiff, Furrer, claimed that he had purchased a piece of property from one Mr. Haight who was acting as an agent for Mrs. Ferris (the defendant). However, Mrs. Ferris denied authorizing any such sale and maintained that she still owned the land in question. The court ruled in favor of Mrs. Ferris based on two key points: First, there was no written evidence to prove that Mr.Haight had been authorized by her to sell the property; secondly even if verbal authorization had been given it would not be legally binding due to Statute of Frauds which requires certain contracts including those related to real estate sales must be made in writing. This decision reaffirmed legal principles regarding agency relationships and contract law specifically pertaining to real estate transactions emphasizing importance of written agreements.

The dissenting opinion in the case of Furrer v. Ferris argued that the majority's decision to uphold a lower court ruling, which found Mr. Furrer guilty of fraud and ordered him to pay damages, was incorrect. The dissenting justices believed that there were significant issues with how evidence was presented and interpreted during the trial. They felt that certain pieces of evidence should not have been admitted due to their questionable relevance or reliability, while other potentially exculpatory evidence was improperly excluded by the trial judge. Furthermore, they disagreed with how some testimony had been interpreted by both the jury and appellate judges - particularly regarding whether Mr. Furrer had knowingly deceived his business partners or merely made honest mistakes in managing their shared investments.