Caldwell & Drake v. Schmulbach

175 F. 429, 1909 U.S. App. LEXIS 5754
CourtDistrict Court, N.D. West Virginia
DecidedDecember 23, 1909
StatusPublished
Cited by8 cases

This text of 175 F. 429 (Caldwell & Drake v. Schmulbach) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, N.D. West Virginia primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Caldwell & Drake v. Schmulbach, 175 F. 429, 1909 U.S. App. LEXIS 5754 (N.D.W. Va. 1909).

Opinion

DAYTON, District Judge

(after stating the facts as above). Records like this, weighing over 100 pounds, consisting of over 3,200 typewritten pages of evidence (which counsel with commendable industry have sought to abstract within a limit of 800 pages), books of accounts, plans, specifications, drawings, correspondence, contracts, stipulations, and agreements, all of which must receive careful study and consideration, may possibly throw some light upon the vexed question o i the law’s delays and failure of the courts to expedite business. It seems clear to me, after having read this record, that a reference to a master will be absolutely necessary, no matter how much the delay is to he regretted, unless I take the time to state an account between these parties involving more than 200 items, on the one hand, ranging from 20 cents to over $0,000 for extras, and, on the other hand, for similar items of omitted and defective work. It does seem to me, however, that I should, in order to expedite this work before a master, indicate that sufficient evidence in my judgment lias already been taken to fully enable him to state such account, and that, unless special reasons be shown to the contrary, he should be limited1 to the record as it now stands. Further, it seems to me that I may very well pass upon matters of principal dispute herein involving legal propositions, leaving him thus unembarrassed, to make the necessary calculations as to such items.

It becomes necessary, therefore, to consider first the claim of defendant for $29,150 damages for delay in the completion of the contract. It is claimed by defendant that this contract was a West Virginia one, and that the Supreme Court of Appeals of West Virginia in the recent case of the Charleston Lumber Co. v. Friedman, 64 W. Va. 151 61 S. E. 815. lias determined that a provision similar to the one here fixing a specific sum to be paid per day for delay in the execution of the contract is enforceable, not as a penalty, but as liquidated damages. And the cases of Wheeling Mold & Foundry Company v. Wheeling Steel & Iron Co., 58 W. Va. 62, 51 S. E. 129, and Sun Printing & Publishing Association v. Moore, 183 U. S. 642, 22 Sup. Ct. 240, 46 L. Ed. 366, are cited in support of this contention. There can be no question of the soundness of this position where delays in execution of such a contract are wholly occasioned by the default of the contractor, but this I perceive to be the full extent to which these decisions go. In the Dumber Co. v. Friedman Case the contractor undertook to erect complete a store building by a fixed date, and to pay $10 per day for each day thereafter that the building remained incomplete and unfinished. The enforcement of this clause was resisted on the ground that it was a penalty, and equity would not enforce it. Reversing the court below so holding', the Supreme Court of Appeals held such sum per diem for delay not to be a penalty, hut to be liquidated damages for which the owner could recover. In the Foundry Company Case the contractor agreed to manufacture and deliver by a fixed date certain machinery, and, in default, $50 was to be deducted for each day’s delay. The Supreme Court of Appeals, reversing the lower court, held this provision to provide not a penalty, but a liquidated sum for damages, and that the contractor could not [434]*434excuse the delay “by showing merely that it (plaintiff) proceeded in good faith and with due diligence, with the use of all means in its power and at its command, to perform the contract.” And this for the very cogent reason that/‘under such contract the plaintiff was required to furnish sufficient means and ability to perform the contract on its part, according to its terms.” In the case of the Sun P. & P. Association v. Moore a yacht was chartered for a specified period upon conditions that it should be returned within the time fixed or the sum of $75,000 should be paid. It was wrecked within the time and not returned!, and the hirer was held responsible for the fixed value of it.

The principles here established have no application to cases where, under such contracts for liquidated damages for delays, such delays have arisen from (a) the fault of the owner; or (b) that of his agents and independent contractors; or (c) by the joint and mutual default of owner and contractor. Such cases must be governed, I conceive, by the rulings in such cases as Jefferson Hotel Co. v. Brumbaugh (C. C. A., 4th Ct.) 168 Fed. 867; Vilter Mfg. Co. v. Tygart’s Valley Brewing Co. (C. C.) 168 Fed. 1002; Stewart v. Keteltas, 36 N. Y. 388; Heckmann v. Pinkney, 81 N. Y. 211; Weeks v. Little, 89 N. Y. 566; Lilly v. Person, 168 Pa. 219, 32 Atl. 23; Focht v. Rosenbaum, 176 Pa. 14, 34 Atl. 1001; Wilkens v. Wilkerson (Tex. Civ. App.) 41 S. W. 178. In the Jefferson Hotel Case, supra, the Circuit Court of Appeals for this circuit fully considered this very question, and determined that the courts would not undertake to “apportion” the damages occasioned by mutual delays and I think very clearly set forth some of the pertinent reasons why it would not do so. In this case there can be no question that the delays were the result of mutual default. It is not denied that the ground upon which this building was to be and was erected was hemmed! in by other buildings; that in the very start wholly unexpected and extraordinary measures, not contemplated by the contract, had to be taken to protect these adjoining buildings from damage and destruction; that the architects by some strange error by their plans and specifications provided for a larger building than the lot of ground would contain; that a number of additional contracts were let to contractors wholly independent of plaintiffs, who delayed the work; that a very great number of changes were made, so many, in fact, that the original specifications could hardly describe the final result. Under such circumstances, I am clearly of the opinion that this case, like the Jefferson Hotel one, presents a very striking example of how impossible it would be for a court to attempt to determine and apportion the cause of delay between the owner and contractor, both of whom are in default. But it is insisted that the contract itself here provides in express terms for such apportionment of delay, and in this particular differs from the terms of the one in the Jefferson Hotel Case. It seems to me that this cannot change the situation. The law is that courts by reason of the very uncertainty, the impossibility to fairly and justly determine the causes of such mutual delays and their effects will not attempt to apportion. This being true, no private contract by its terms can change the law or compel them so to do. For these reasons the defendant’s claim for $29,150 damages for delays must be wholly disallowed.

[435]*435But it is insisted by defendant that the contract required the work to he completed and to be satisfactory to architects and owner before final payment could he required, that such work was not so completed, and therefore plaintiffs’ hill must be dismissed as prematurely brought, and the three case.s of Barrett v. Coal & Coke Co., 51 W. Va. 416, 41 S. E. 220, 90 Am. St. Rep. 802, Plumber Co. v. Carr, 54 W. Va. 212, 46 S. E. 458, and Lunsford v. Wren, 64 W. Va. 458, 63 S. E. 308, are cited in support of this proposition.

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Bluebook (online)
175 F. 429, 1909 U.S. App. LEXIS 5754, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/caldwell-drake-v-schmulbach-wvnd-1909.