Glass Contractors, Inc. v. Target Supply & Display, Inc.

152 Misc. 2d 305, 578 N.Y.S.2d 1000, 1991 N.Y. Misc. LEXIS 741
CourtCivil Court of the City of New York
DecidedNovember 26, 1991
StatusPublished

This text of 152 Misc. 2d 305 (Glass Contractors, Inc. v. Target Supply & Display, Inc.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Civil Court of the City of New York primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Glass Contractors, Inc. v. Target Supply & Display, Inc., 152 Misc. 2d 305, 578 N.Y.S.2d 1000, 1991 N.Y. Misc. LEXIS 741 (N.Y. Super. Ct. 1991).

Opinion

OPINION OF THE COURT

Bernard Fuchs, J.

Plaintiff’s motion for summary judgment in lieu of complaint (CPLR 3213) is based on a Nebraska judgment obtained by default for goods sold and delivered. Defendant’s objection [306]*306that the copy of the judgment submitted with the moving papers is not authenticated in accordance with CPLR 4540 is mooted by another copy served in reply. Plaintiff has also shown satisfactorily that Nebraska law permits the certified mail service it relies on. (Neb Rev Stat § 25-505.01.)

A more substantial issue raised by defendant is whether the Nebraska court’s exercise of jurisdiction over defendant was permissible under the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. (US Const, 14th Amend, § 1.) If it was, this court must accord it full faith and credit and grant the motion. (US Const, art IV, § 1; see, Matter of Farmland Dairies v Barber, 65 NY2d 51 [1985].)

Plaintiff is a Nebraska corporation with no place of business in New York. Defendant is a New York corporation with its only place of business in Brooklyn. It has no agent in Nebraska and conducts no business there.

On July 18, 1990, defendant’s purchasing manager telephoned plaintiff from its Brooklyn office and ordered certain articles of glass to be delivered in Philadelphia by August 1, 1990. Plaintiff promised that delivery although the goods were to be custom cut, finished and boxed. Defendant’s written confirmation specified, "must be in store August 1, 1990”. Timely delivery was critical to defendant because its customer was to open a store on that date. The agreed price was to include the cost of delivery.

During a succession of telephone conversations between plaintiff’s sales manager and defendant’s operations manager, plaintiff gave repeated assurances of timely delivery. On July 30, 1990, plaintiff stated its readiness to ship immediately by motor truck freight. Defendant’s operations manager was certain, however, that truck delivery from Omaha to Philadelphia would require 4 to 5 days. He informed plaintiff that air freight was required and, with plaintiff’s consent, dispatched a carrier to collect the merchandise by truck and deliver it air freight. The cost was $5,200 and that is the unpaid amount of plaintiff’s claim and of its judgment.

Plaintiff’s sales manager insists that plaintiff intended to complete delivery to Philadelphia by August 1, 1990 and could have done so because it "contracts its own truck” exclusively for its own goods. But his telephone assurances to defendant on July 30, 1990 that plaintiff would deliver on time were not accepted and he did not resist defendant’s demand to send an air freight carrier for the goods. Plaintiff insists, however, that it did not agree to pay the cost.

[307]*307The Nebraska State court acted under that State’s "long-arm” statute which permits jurisdiction over a person as to a cause of action arising from his "[transacting any business in this state.” (Neb Rev Stat §25-536 [1] [a].) The question is whether an application of that statute in the present case offends the "traditional [notions] of fair play and substantial justice” embodied in the Fourteenth Amendment’s Due Process Clause. (International Shoe Co. v Washington, 326 US 310, 320 [1945].)

This in turn requires a determination of whether defendant has established "meaningful 'contacts, ties or relations’ ” with the State of Nebraska such that defendant should " 'reasonably anticipate being haled into court there.’ ” (Burger King Corp. v Rudzewicz, 471 US 462, 474.) Defendant could reasonably anticipate that result if it " 'purposefully avail[ed] itself of the privilege of conducting activities within’ ” Nebraska, thereby "invoking the benefits and protections of its laws.” (Burger King Corp. v Rudzewicz, 471 US 462, 475 [1985], supra.)

The sum of defendant’s "contacts, ties or relations” with Nebraska consists of a telephoned purchase order confirmed by an apparently mailed writing for custom prepared goods to be delivered in Philadelphia by plaintiff at plaintiffs risk and expense. The planned completion of this purchase was altered by defendant’s concern that the purpose of the transaction would be defeated by late delivery.

Defendant adopted the remedy of altering the delivery plan by sending an air freight carrier to plaintiffs plant to take delivery there. Nothing in the papers suggests any connection of defendant with the State of Nebraska, existing or planned, other than the transaction in question.

The mere agreement to the sale contract did not, of itself, subject defendant to the Nebraska court’s jurisdiction. (Burger King Corp. v Rudzewicz, 471 US 462, 478, supra; see, Agrashell, Inc. v Sirotta Co., 344 F2d 583 [2d Cir 1965].) If the agreement had been carried out as originally planned, the Nebraska court would clearly have had no power over defendant. (Agrashell, Inc. v Sirotta Co., supra.) Plaintiff would have borne the entire risk of loss of the goods until delivery in Philadelphia and defendant would have been no more than a passive purchaser. (Neb Rev Stat, ch 91, UCC 2-509 [1] [b]; see, Gladding Corp. v Balco-Pedrick Parts Corp., 76 AD2d 1 [4th Dept 1980]; Whittaker Corp. v United Aircraft Corp., 482 F2d 1079 [1st Cir 1973].)

[308]*308The fact that the goods were to be custom prepared should not tip the scale of fairness or reasonableness toward sustaining jurisdiction and plaintiff cites no authority which would give it that weight. Gladding Corp. v Balco-Pedrick Parts Corp. (supra, at 5) refers to the absence of "specifically manufactured” goods in refusing to recognize a Florida judgment but that reference is no more than obiter dictum. Nor does the Gladding court cite any authority which would accord the consideration any significance. Had defendant sent its agents to assist or participate in the manufacture or preparation of the goods that could well justify the Nebraska court’s jurisdiction. (Whittaker Corp. v United Aircraft Corp., 482 F2d 1079 [1st Cir 1973], supra.)

Plaintiff appears to place its principal reliance on Fashion Two Twenty v Steinberg (339 F Supp 836 [ED NY 1971]). There, the court sustained its jurisdiction over Indiana and Massachusetts corporations under CPLR 302 because defendant corporations had made substantial purchases from plaintiff amounting to some $30,000 plus additional purchases after the motions before the court were instituted; the "relationship” of the parties and "ensuing sales [were] continuing and [would] probably grow in the future” and defendants had sent "their own trucks for pick-ups” (supra, at 841).

The present case, in contrast, involves an isolated sale for a price of $6,250.50 as shown on the purchase order (20 inflationary years after Fashion Two Twenty v Steinberg, supra). The one similarity to the present case is that defendant, as in Steinberg, sent a truck. But this defendant’s truck was not its own. An air freight carrier provided it.

In Agrashell, Inc. v Sirotta Co. (supra, at 588) the third-party defendant, a Missouri corporation, "shipped ten truckloads of * * * walnut shells to Sirotta in New York, over a period of about eighteen months”, allegedly f.o.b. New York in trucks "owned or leased by” it. The latter two allegations were denied by third-party defendant which insisted that the terms were f.o.b. Missouri by common carrier.

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

Related

International Shoe Co. v. Washington
326 U.S. 310 (Supreme Court, 1945)
Burger King Corp. v. Rudzewicz
471 U.S. 462 (Supreme Court, 1985)
Fashion Two Twenty, Inc. v. Steinberg
339 F. Supp. 836 (E.D. New York, 1971)
Electric Regulator Corp. v. Sterling Extruder Corp.
280 F. Supp. 550 (D. Connecticut, 1968)
Gladding Corp. v. Balco-Pedrick Parts Corp.
76 A.D.2d 1 (Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of New York, 1980)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
152 Misc. 2d 305, 578 N.Y.S.2d 1000, 1991 N.Y. Misc. LEXIS 741, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/glass-contractors-inc-v-target-supply-display-inc-nycivct-1991.