Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, & St. Louis Railway Co. v. Heck

50 Ind. 303
CourtIndiana Supreme Court
DecidedMay 15, 1875
StatusPublished
Cited by17 cases

This text of 50 Ind. 303 (Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, & St. Louis Railway Co. v. Heck) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Indiana Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, & St. Louis Railway Co. v. Heck, 50 Ind. 303 (Ind. 1875).

Opinion

Worden, J.

This was an action by the appellee against the appellant, upon contract. The complaint was in two paragraphs, not materially unlike. It alleged, in substance, that an agreement was entered into between the plaintiff and the defendant, by which the plaintiff was to furnish, cut, haul, and pile along the line of the defendant’s railroad a quantity of firewood, which the defendant was to measure, receive, and pay the plaintiff for, at a specified rate per cord; that, in pursuance of the contract, the plaintiff did furnish, cut, haul, and pile along the line of the defendant’s road a large quantity of firewood as stipulated for, of which the defendant had notice; that the defendant measured, received, and paid for some portions of the wood, but as to other portions thereof, viz., seven thousand six hundred and sixty-seven cords thereof, the defendant refused to measure, receive, and pay for the same according to the agreement, though the plaintiff often requested the defendant to measure, receive, and pay therefor; that while the defendant thus failed and refused to measure, receive, and pay for the last-mentioned wood, a large part thereof viz., thirty-one hundred and fifty-three cords thereof, were, on, etc., without the fault or negligence of the plaintiff, destroyed by fire, to the damage of the plaintiff, etc.

Issues were made up, and the cause was tried by a jury, resulting in a verdict and judgment for the plaintiff for seven thousand four hundred dollars.

The main question in the cause arises upon the refusal of the court to give the following charge asked by the defendant, viz.:

[305]*305Under the contract sued on in the first and second paragraphs in the complaint, the wood by the plaintiff cut, hauled, and piled up along the line of the defendant’s railroad was not the property of the defendant until measured and received by the defendant, and if you find that it was destroyed by fire before it was received, the loss was the plaintiff’s and not the defendant’s.”

There are no facts averred in the complaint that made the wood the property of the defendant at the time it was burnt. Nor does it appear in evidence that the plaintiff, at any time before it was burnt, did anything showing that he regarded the wood as the property of the defendant, or at her risk. On the contrary, he insured it as his own after it should have been received by the defendant in accordance with the alleged contract. The cause was tried, and the verdict evidently found, upon the theory that the measure of damages was the contract price of the wood. If this was legally correct, the charge ought not to have been given, because the loss in such case would be the loss of the defendant and not the plaintiff. But if the true measure of damages in such case is the difference between the contract price and the market value of the wood at the time and place when and where it should have been accepted by the defendant, the charge should have been given, because, in such case, the loss would be that of the plaintiff. Mr. Chitty lays down the rule in the following terms:

In an action for not accepting goods, the measure of damages is the difference between the contract price and the market price, on the day when the vendee ought to have accepted the goods.” Chitty Con. 1331711 Am. ed.

This rule is sustained by a large number of cases, among which are the following: Williams v. Jones, 1 Bush, 621; Haskell v. McHenry, 4 Cal. 411; Allen v. Jarvis, 20 Conn. 38; Northrup v. Cook, 39 Mo. 208; Gatling v. Newell, 12 Ind. 118, 125; Beard v. Sloan, 38 Ind. 128; Ganson v. Madigan, 13 Wis. 67; Gordon v. Norris, 49 N. H. 376.

In the case last cited, the distinction is pointed out between [306]*306contracts for the sale of goods then in existence, and agreements to furnish materials and manufacture articles in a particular way and according to order, in respect to the statute of frauds and otherwise. The rule of damages is the same in contracts for the sale of real estate. Old Colony Railroad Corporation v. Evans, 6 Gray, 25; Griswold v. Sabin, 51N. H. 167; Porter v. Travis, 40 Ind. 556.

It is conceived that in all cases of contracts for the sale of personal property, where it has any market value, the vendor, before he can recover of the vendee the contract price, must have delivered the property to the vendee, or have done such acts as vested the title in the vendee, or would have vested the title in him, if he had consented to accept it; for the law will not tolerate the palpable injustice of permitting the vendor to hold the property and also to recover the price of it.

In the case of Bement v. Smith, 15 Wend. 493, which has been cited by counsel for the appellee, the defendant had employed the plaintiff to make a sulky. The plaintiff made the sulky and took it to the residence of the defendant, and told him that he delivered it to him, and demanded payment in pursuance of the terms of the contract. The defendant denied having agreed to receive it. The plaintiff told him that he would leave the sulky with a person in the neighborhood, naming him, which he did, and commenced suit. It was held that the plaintiff had performed his part of the contract, and was entitled to recover the contract price for the sulky. The case went upon the theory that there had been a delivery of the property to the defendant, as is shown in the case of Gordon v. Norris, supra.

So, in the case of Ballentine v. Robinson, 46 Penn. St. 177, the plaintiff agreed to build an engine according to directions of defendant, and furnish the necessary materials for it. The plaintiff was held to be entitled to the contract price, the court holding that, upon the facts shown, the title to the property-had vested in the defendant.

In the case of Girard v. Taggart, 5 S. & R. 19, 33, Gibson, J., in delivering his opinion, said:

[307]*307The damages recovered are not the price of the goods ■sold, but a compensation for the disaffirmance of the contract; and the difference on the resale is merely the measure of the ■damages actually suffered. Properly speaking, the seller cannot recover the price, where he has retained the goods in consequence of the buyer’s refusal to comply with any part of the -contract,” etc.

In Ganson v. Madigan, supra, the court held, that where the vendor has actually taken all the steps, necessary to vest the title to the goods sold in the vendee, he may sue for goods sold and delivered, and the rule of damages would be the contract price. But where he is ready and willing to perform, •and offers to do so, but the vendee refuses, even though the title is not vested in the vendee, the vendor still has his action -on the contract for damages. But the rule of damages in such case would be the actual injury sustained, which is ordinarily the difference between the value of the property at the time •of the refusal, and the price agreed on.”

As the property had not passed from the vendor, the plaintiff, at the time it was destroyed, he must bear the loss. The destruction of the property was not caused by, nor was it the consequence of, the breach by the defendant of her contract. The case of McConihe v The New York and Erie R. R. Co., 20 N. Y.

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50 Ind. 303, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/pittsburgh-cincinnati-st-louis-railway-co-v-heck-ind-1875.