Burr v. Redhead, Norton, Lathrop Co.

72 N.W. 1058, 52 Neb. 617, 1897 Neb. LEXIS 164
CourtNebraska Supreme Court
DecidedNovember 18, 1897
DocketNo. 7519
StatusPublished
Cited by8 cases

This text of 72 N.W. 1058 (Burr v. Redhead, Norton, Lathrop Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Nebraska Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Burr v. Redhead, Norton, Lathrop Co., 72 N.W. 1058, 52 Neb. 617, 1897 Neb. LEXIS 164 (Neb. 1897).

Opinion

Harrison, J.

This action was instituted in the county court of York county by the defendant in error, hereinafter designated the “company,” to recover an amount alleged to be its due from the plaintiffs in error on account of a number of bicycles sold by the company to plaintiffs in error. The balance claimed to be due on the account after the deduction of a payment of $100, was $443.75. The case was in the course of the litigation appealed to the district court of York county, where, in the petition filed, the claim was set forth of the amount due on the account as we have just stated it. The answer admitted the purchase of the bicycles and asserted that there was an overcharge in the account of $41.75; and it was further pleaded therein as follows:

“And these defendants further allege that prior to, and at the time of, the purchase of the said bicycles, and as a part of the contract of purchase Thereof, and as an inducement to enter into said contract, the plaintiff represented and warranted said property to be well and properly made, and of good materials, and to be of the highest possible grade, and that the said bicycles would give the purchasers thereof every satisfaction; and these defendants, relying upon the said warranty, purchased the said bicycles, which otherwise they would not have done. Defendants say that said bicycles were not well and properly made, and were not of good materials and of the highest possible grade, but, on the other hand, were of poor workmanship and made of poor material, and were of poor grade and inferior machines. And these defendants sold several of said machines to different parties and the same did not give the purchasers satisfaction, but failed in their construction and materials and other respects, as above stated, and were not of greater value than $150.
“4. And at the time of entering into said contract, these defendants were engaged in the implement business, and were dealing in bicycles at York, Nebraska, and had a [619]*619large business and patronage in said business, and by-reason of the failure of the said bicycles, as represented and warranted, these defendants were compelled to purchase and make repairs to said bicycles to the amount of $35, and were compelled to, and did, lose a large amount of time of themselves and their employes in their attempting to repair said bicycles and make them work as warranted, to the amount and value o'f at least $100, and were compelled to, and did, pay a large amount "of express charges, to the amount of $15, and were greatly injured and damaged in their said business by reason of the said failures of the said bicycles as warranted.
“5. The defendants sold said bicycles to various of their customers, and the same failed and were not good machines, and the said customers refused to keep the same but returned them and refused to pay therefor, and the customers and patrons of said defendants learning of the said failure of the said machines, refused to purchase bicycles of the said defendants so that defendants lost sales of bicycles which they otherwise would have made, to the amount and value of at least $500, and the commissions lost the defendants on such sales were at least of the value of $100, so that these defendants had been damaged in the premises in the sum of $250.”

For the company there were interposed motions that the allegations of damages claimed to have accrued in favor of plaintiffs in error in the sum of $35, by reason of their being compelled to purchase repairs for, and to repair, the bicycles bought of the company, the one in which the claim in the sum of $100 was made for loss of time of plaintiffs in error and their employes in repairing the bicycles and trying to make them as warranted, also the averment of damages to the amount of $15 express, and other charges, and the further claim for $100 loss of profits on sales of machines returned to plaintiffs in error by purchasers because unsatisfactory and defective, and not as warranted, should all be stricken out of the answer. The grounds of these motions were that the allegations [620]*620attacked were not of proper elements of damages; also that they raised issues which were not of those tried in the county court. The motions were sustained. A reply was filed, and in a trial of the issues before the court and a jury the company received a verdict in the sum of $-, on which judgment was rendered. The unsuccessful parties have prosecuted error to this court.

The first question to be settled is whether the company made any warranty of the machines sold to plaintiffs in error. The warranty of the property sold, if any was •shown, consisted of statements in letters written by, or for, the company and forwarded to plaintiffs in error in the course of the correspondence between the parties which resulted in the purchases by plaintiffs in error. These particular letters were written at or about the time of the purchases and in their terms may be said to have been parts of the contract of sale. We think, under a fair construction of these letters, it may be stated that they contained positive affirmations of the qualities and conditions of the bicycles, as facts, and not as mere opinions, which if accepted and relied upon by the plaintiffs in error in making the purchases, were sufficient to constitute a warranty.

Other points to be discussed relate to the action of the trial court in sustaining the motions to strike from the answer certain portions thereof with reference to elements of damages, and to which we have hereinbefore specifically called attention. With this may be considered the assignments of error in regard to the exclusion of evidence offered for plaintiffs in error on each branch of the subject of damages included in the parts of the answer which were stricken out. Of the rule of damages, speaking generally, it may be stated as in Hadley v. Baxendale, 9 Exch. [Eng.], 341: “Where two parties have made a contract, which one of them has broken, the damages which the other party ought to receive in respect to such breach of contract should be such, as may fairly and reasonably be considered either arising naturally, — i. e., ac[621]*621cording to the usual course of things, — from such breach of contract itself, or such as may reasonably be supposed to have been in the contemplation of both parties at the time they made the contract, as the probable result of the breach of it.” The substance of this statement has been adopted as the rule in this state. (See Sycamore Marsh Harvester Mfg. Co. v. Sturm, 13 Neb., 210; Aultman v. Stout, 15 Neb., 586; Deering v. Miller, 33 Neb., 654; Omaha Coal, Coke & Lime Co. v. Fay, 37 Neb., 68.) To afford damages which will compensate the party aggrieved by the breach of the contract is the intent of the law. “The damages recoverable for a breach of warranty * * * include all damages which, in contemplation of the parties, or according to the natural or usual course of things, may result from the wrongful act.” (Dushane v. Benedict, 7 Sup. Ct. Rep., 696.) Under this general rule, ordinarily the measure of damages is the difference between the actual value of the article and its value if it had been as warranted. (28 Am. & Eng. Ency. of Law, 837; Young v. Filley, 19 Neb., 545.)

The plaintiffs in error were in business in York, Nebraska, and desired the bicycles purchased, for sale in their trade, all of which was known to the company.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
72 N.W. 1058, 52 Neb. 617, 1897 Neb. LEXIS 164, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/burr-v-redhead-norton-lathrop-co-neb-1897.