McFadden v. George C. Wetherbee & Co.

29 N.W. 881, 63 Mich. 390, 1886 Mich. LEXIS 681
CourtMichigan Supreme Court
DecidedOctober 28, 1886
StatusPublished
Cited by6 cases

This text of 29 N.W. 881 (McFadden v. George C. Wetherbee & Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Michigan Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
McFadden v. George C. Wetherbee & Co., 29 N.W. 881, 63 Mich. 390, 1886 Mich. LEXIS 681 (Mich. 1886).

Opinion

Morse, J.

This cause was originally commenced in justice’s court. The plaintiff claimed that the defendant, a corporation doing business in Detroit, had refused to carry out a certain contract, by which refusal he had suffered damage. He declared orally, as appears from the justice’s return, in an action of assumpsit upon the common counts,—

“Claiming damages for a violation of special contract, by which defendant agreed to buy of plaintiff a quantity of wooden blocks at $1.50 per load, which defendant violated, and plaintiff was obliged to sell said blocks to other parties at a less price, to plaintiff’s damage of $300 or under.”

Defendant pleaded the general issue, and gave notice of set-off and recoupment.

The justice gave judgment for the defendant.

Plaintiff appealed to the circuit court for the county of Wayne, in which. court, upon a trial before a jury, the1 plaintiff recovered a judgment of $236.87.

The contract established by the evidence of the plaintiff upon the trial was to the effect that plaintiff was to sell to defendant, to be delivered during the sawing season of 1883, all the-white pine blocks» of a specified kind and quality, that the mill of Moffat, Eatherly & Co. produced during such sawing' season, at $1.50 per load. The blocks were to be at least ten inches in length.

The defendant admitted the contract, in substance, but claimed that plaintiff was told that the blocks were to be used for pail and tub staves; that the white pine was tobe selected from the ends of logs; that the blocks were to be delivered as fast as the mill cut them; and that, when the contract was made, plaintiff said the mill would run for a couple of weeks* on Norway pine, and not more than that on Norway.

[392]*392. As to the breach of the contract, plaintiff testified as follows:

That the blocks delivered were of the kind called for by the •contract, and that he had been paid for what blocks he had delivered; that he commenced delivering within a day or two, and continued to deliver until about the fourteenth or middle of July, when they shut down the mill to put in a new gang; that when the mill got to cutting white pine again he commenced delivering again, and delivered about four or five weeks, when defendant stopped him, in the latter part of October, — about the twentieth ; that plaintiff was informed by defendant’s only authorized agent that defendant had made other arrangements, and would not receive any more blocks; that after plaintiff found that defendant would not receive any more of the blocks, he sold them to other parties, for the best prices that he could obtain, peddling them around the streets; that he was obliged to split most of the blocks, at an extra expense, and obliged to cart a large quantity of them to a lot he had obtained for that purpose, and to store them until he could sell them, when he again had to cart them to his customers; that it was difficult to sell them at that time, whereas he could have sold them readily at the time he made the contract with defendant, and that by reason of such extra splitting, carting, etc., and by being obliged to sell for less than $1.50 per load, plaintiff lost upwards of $230; that plaintiff, was ready and willing to deliver the blocks to defendant, but defendant would not receive them.

Defendant introduced testimony tending to show that the plaintiff first delivered twenty loads of blocks, as a sample lot, before the contract was made. Afterwards he delivered twenty-four loads in June,-and thirty-three* loads in October, for all of which he was paid. He delivered no others. No blocks were delivered in July, August, or September; that plaintiff did not deliver all the blocks he received from the mill of Moffat, Eatherly & Co. during the sawing season, up to October; that defendant refused to receive any more blocks because plaintiff had waited so long between June and October in delivering blocks that the defendant thought he was not going to deliver any more, and had procured stave timber elsewhere; that the blocks delivered in October were so de[393]*393livered in the absence of the foreman of the defendant, who, when he saw them, told plaintiff that they were defective, many of them being shorter than ten inches, and others knotty, shaky, or rotten.

It is claimed by the defendant’s counsel that the charge of the court practically excluded the defense, which was—

1. That from the first of July up to the thiivl of October no blocks were delivered, when there was abundance of evidence to show that the mill produced blocks during that time; that, the contract being to deliver as fast as cut by the mill, this failure to deliver was a breach of the contract, which precluded the plaintiff from recovering upon it.
2. That the blocks actually delivered were not of the character contemplated by the contract.

In accordance with his theory of the case, he requested the court to instruct the jury, in substance, that if no blocks were delivered in these three months, when they could have been obtained at the mill, the defendant had a right to terminate the contract.

This was properly refused. The plaintiff’s evidence of the coniract only required the delivery to be made during the sawing season. Such a charge was not proper, unless the jury were first instructed that they must also find the contract of delivery to be, as claimed by the defendant, as fast as the blocks were cut.

But the fact is, as appears from the record, that the court adopted the defendant’s theory of delivery, and expressly charged the jury that they must find that the plaintiff delivered the blocks as fast as he could obtain them from the mill in order to entitle him to a recovery; saying:

“Now, if you should be satisfied that no blocks were sawed in July or August, or any other month, so the plaintiff could get them, why, that would establish the plaintiff’s claim under the contract, because he was to deliver them as fast as he could get them from the mill. Therefore, if you believe the plaintiff delivered these blocks during the sawing season as fast as he could reasonably get them from Moffat’s mill, — or [394]*394if he didn’t deliver them, but offered to deliver them, and defendant refused to accept them, — then he would be entitled to a verdict.”

It is complained that the court further said:

“If you believe that the plaintiff delivered the blocks, as called for by the contract, as soon as and as fast as cut, during the sawing season, — as fast as he could get them from the Moffat mill, — then the plaintiff is entitled to recover,, whether he made delivery of them at the end of one month, two riionths, or at the end of three months.”

It is argued that the words italicized in this opinion were misleading, and gave the jury to understand that it was not necessary'to deliver any of the blocks in July, August, or September, even if the mill was sawing blocks in those months. We do not think this claim is correct. There was evidence upon the part of the plaintiff that the mill did no-sawing of white pine in those months, after about the middle of July; and the direction of the circuit judge could only be construed as a charge that it was only necessary to deliver the blocks as fast as they were sawed, which, under the defendant’s own theory, was all it could ask.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
29 N.W. 881, 63 Mich. 390, 1886 Mich. LEXIS 681, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/mcfadden-v-george-c-wetherbee-co-mich-1886.