Should I have encountered agrees with earlier than today? Perhaps. But today was the day, so allow me to consign agrees with to oblivion.
Where does agrees with occur? Let me count the ways.
First, it occurs in the lead-in. No thanks—I’ll stick with The parties therefore agree as follows.
Second, it occurs as a redundant dual verb structure in language of declaration: The Company represents and warrants to the Subscriber and agrees with the Subscriber as follows.
Third, it occurs redundantly in introductory language saying that the statements of fact or obligations that follow apply during a specified period. An example: Seller covenants and agrees with Purchaser and Purchaser covenants and agrees with Seller that during the period from the date of this Agreement to the Closing Date for each Business Unit. I’d say instead, The following obligations apply from the date of this agreement to the Closing Date for each Business Unit.
Fourth, it’s used as throat-clearing. That’s my term for a redundant verb structure used before the main verb structure. Here’s an example:
I have yet to see a valid use of agrees with. So agrees with joins agrees to and agrees that on the Forbidden List.
Postscript: Wordpress added -2 to the title of this post, showing me I’d written about agrees with before. Sure enough, I did this post about it six years ago, then forgot all about it. This post is better, so I decided to keep it.
