Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

Contracts Commons™

Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

University of Michigan Law School

Discipline
Keyword
Publication Year
Publication
Publication Type
File Type

Articles 661 - 690 of 1067

Full-Text Articles in Contracts

Contracts - Beneficiaries - Injured Party As Beneficiary Of Public Liability Insurance Policy May 1935

Contracts - Beneficiaries - Injured Party As Beneficiary Of Public Liability Insurance Policy

Michigan Law Review

Plaintiff recovered judgment against the insured for injuries received in an automobile accident. The judgment being unsatisfied, plaintiff sued the insurer on its public liability policy. Held, the policy by implication intended a benefit to the injured person and he may sue as a creditor-beneficiary. Ohio Casualty Ins. Co. v. Beckwith, (C. C. A. 5th, 1935) 74 F. (2d) 75.

Go to article

Special Assessments - Constitutionality Of Legislation Modifying Means Of Enforcement Of Special Assessment Liens May 1935

Special Assessments - Constitutionality Of Legislation Modifying Means Of Enforcement Of Special Assessment Liens

Michigan Law Review

An Arkansas statute, affecting the mortgage securing certain special assessment bonds, provided, inter alia, for the extension of the interval between default in payment and sale under foreclosure from sixty-five days to at least two and a half years, reduced the penalty for non-payment from twenty per cent to three per cent, and provided that the possession of the delinquent property owner be undisturbed for four years after sale on foreclosure, thus modifying the law existing at the time the bonds were issued. The United States Supreme Court held the statute to be invalid as violating the constitutional prohibition …

Go to article

The Effect Of Inflation On Private Contracts: United States, 1861-1879, John P. Dawson, Frank E. Cooper Apr 1935

The Effect Of Inflation On Private Contracts: United States, 1861-1879, John P. Dawson, Frank E. Cooper

Michigan Law Review

The Northern inflation coincided almost exactly in its early stages with the inflation in the South, and was produced by the same basic factor - a budgetary deficit due to war expenditure. The financial mobilization of the North was handicapped at the outset by a deficit inherited from the previous administration and by an impaired national credit. The prompt response of the Northern banks enabled the Treasury to overcome this initial handicap and to finance the greatly increased expenditure through the early months of the war. How long orthodox methods of borrowing would have sufficed has been ever since a …

Go to article

Torts - Inducing Breach Of Contract Apr 1935

Torts - Inducing Breach Of Contract

Michigan Law Review

The recognition of inducement of breach of contract as a tort came only in comparatively recent times, its first clear enunciation being in Lumley v. Gye in 1853. Prior to that case there had been an accepted doctrine that interference with the relation of master and servant was an actionable wrong. Sayre finds the roots of the liability for enticement of servants in the Ordinance of Labourers passed after the Great Plague, and in a confusion of the action based on that statute and the action for forcibly interfering with the servants of another. In Lumley v. Gye the action …

Go to article

Contracting By Reference To Price Indices, John P. Dawson, James Will Coultrap Mar 1935

Contracting By Reference To Price Indices, John P. Dawson, James Will Coultrap

Michigan Law Review

The commodity price index number has been defined as a "figure which shows the average percentage change in the prices of a number of representative goods from one point of time to another." In the preceding article it has been argued that the use of the index number in private contracts as a method of expressing stable values is not prohibited by the gold-clause resolution of June 5, 1933; that in the decisions of the United States Supreme Court sustaining this legislation there is nothing to indicate that such contracts would run counter to the Government's policies in the control …

Go to article

The Effect Of Inflation On Private Contracts: United States, 1861-1879, John P. Dawson, Frank E. Cooper Mar 1935

The Effect Of Inflation On Private Contracts: United States, 1861-1879, John P. Dawson, Frank E. Cooper

Michigan Law Review

The American Civil War provides ample material for studying the legal consequences of currency depreciation. The sudden demands of war on government budgets made it necessary in both North and South to issue a large volume of paper money, which produced a general rise in prices, a premium on gold, and all the other indices of major monetary inflation. American history had already illustrated the dangers in the use of unstable monetary standards and in too rapid an expansion of the monetary supply. The period of the Civil War is of peculiar interest to lawyers, however, because the record of …

Go to article

Taxation-State Taxes Upon Federal Instrumentalities-Who May Raise Question Of Unconstitutionality Mar 1935

Taxation-State Taxes Upon Federal Instrumentalities-Who May Raise Question Of Unconstitutionality

Michigan Law Review

In connection with the performance of a contract with the federal government, the plaintiff corporation was required to pay a state sales tax on lumber, cement, steel and other materials used in the construction work. An action was brought to enjoin the collection of the tax and to have it declared unconstitutional as impeding and hampering the federal government in the performance of its governmental functions, and as depriving the plaintiff of its property without due process of law. Held, the plaintiff is not a proper party to raise the question of the constitutionality of the tax: first, because …

Go to article

Corporations-Trust Indenture-Notice To Security Holders Of Contents Of Indenture Feb 1935

Corporations-Trust Indenture-Notice To Security Holders Of Contents Of Indenture

Michigan Law Review

Ever since corporate bonds made their appearance more than a century ago, there has been a steady increase in difficult problems relating thereto. Not the least interesting of these problems pertains to the matter of notice to holders of the bonds and other securities of the contents of the indenture under which they are generally issued. The question becomes acute when one of these bondholders starts suit in law or in equity, and is met by the proposition that his right to so sue is limited by the trust indenture. There are two aspects to the matter, and it is …

Go to article

Corporations-Creditors' Right To Avoid Contract Between Holding And Subsidiary Corporations Feb 1935

Corporations-Creditors' Right To Avoid Contract Between Holding And Subsidiary Corporations

Michigan Law Review

In an ancillary proceeding, the receiver of a subsidiary corporation sought inter alia to recover from the parent corporation, which had owned for about thirteen years all of the stock of the subsidiary except shares necessary to qualify directors, fees paid under contracts during that period for management and engineering services. Held, the court will read just the consideration paid for these services and permit recovery against the parent corporation for the excess. Grand Rapids Trust Co. v. United Light and Power Co., (D. C. W. D. Mich. 1931) 7 F. Supp. 511.

Go to article

Domestic Relations - Infants - Right Of Insurer To Deduct For Protection Furnished On Infants Disaffirmance Of Policy Jan 1935

Domestic Relations - Infants - Right Of Insurer To Deduct For Protection Furnished On Infants Disaffirmance Of Policy

Michigan Law Review

An infant sued by his next friend to disaffirm a contract of insurance on his own life, in which his mother and sister were named as beneficiaries, and to recover premiums paid. The insurance company claimed the right to deduct for the protection furnished insured during the continuance of the policy, but there was nothing in the record to show what this protection had cost the company. Held, the Chief Justice dissenting, the insured was entitled to recover the full amount paid. Mutual Life Ins. Co. of New York v. Schiavone, (App. D. C. 1934) 71 F. (2d) …

Go to article

Evidence - Admissibility Of Parol Evidence Showing That Contract In Writing Was Executed Only As Sham, John E. Tracy Jan 1935

Evidence - Admissibility Of Parol Evidence Showing That Contract In Writing Was Executed Only As Sham, John E. Tracy

Michigan Law Review

An individual is sued on a written contract or, suing on an alleged oral agreement, is confronted by a written contract which he has signed. He offers testimony that, although he executed the instrument which bears his name freely and with full knowledge of its contents, he is not to be held liable thereon because the agreement between the parties was that it should never be legally enforceable, the sole purpose of its execution having been to deceive some third person into a belief that the parties to the instrument had contracted together as in the instrument set forth.

Go to article

Quasi-Contracts --Torts -- Quasi-Contract As An Alternative Remedy For Interference With Contract Relations Jan 1935

Quasi-Contracts --Torts -- Quasi-Contract As An Alternative Remedy For Interference With Contract Relations

Michigan Law Review

An action in tort for damages against a defendant who has induced a third person to breach his contract with plaintiff is permitted in most states today, although the action is of comparatively recent origin. The basis of the action is the obligee's interest in the performance of the contract, which is thought to deserve protection against the third-party interference. The invasion of this right must, as the cases now stand, be an intentional invasion, although there seems to be no reason for excluding negligent invasions subject to the usual limits of foreseeability. The motives of the tort-feasor, suggested by …

Go to article

Effects Of Inflation On Private Contracts: Germany, 1914-1924, John P. Dawson Dec 1934

Effects Of Inflation On Private Contracts: Germany, 1914-1924, John P. Dawson

Michigan Law Review

The German experience with inflation is unique not only in the magnitude of the ultimate disaster but in the wealth and variety of the record which it left behind. From that experience we may still learn much. The problems presented at successive stages of the German inflation differ in degree but not in kind from those which appear in any major shift in the general level of prices. The devices, legal and economic, for restoring an equilibrium thus destroyed must be essentially the same in any great country organized, as Germany was, for specialized, large-scale production. From a study of …

Go to article

Contracts - Assignment- Unsealed Assignment Of Sealed Instrument Dec 1934

Contracts - Assignment- Unsealed Assignment Of Sealed Instrument

Michigan Law Review

Defendants sold and conveyed their grocery business by a bill of sale under seal and covenanted not to engage in a like business within a one-mile radius for a period of three years. The purchaser assigned the bill of sale by an instrument not under seal to the plaintiffs. When the defendants opened a competing business in violation of their agreement, the plaintiffs filed a bill in equity asking that the defendants be restrained. Held, that an injunction should issue, notwithstanding the bill of sale was sealed while the assignment was not. Adamowicz v. Iwanicki, (Mass. 1934) 190 …

Go to article

Contracts--Change Of Circumstances-Constructive Promise Dec 1934

Contracts--Change Of Circumstances-Constructive Promise

Michigan Law Review

In 1921 plaintiff and defendant entered into a contract whereby defendant agreed to give plaintiff "one-half of all moneys" which should be received "from any revivals of" the play" 'Alias Jimmy Valentine' including productions in New York City, 'on the road,' or 'in stock.' " Plaintiff's share was to be mailed direct to him under division orders from wherever the play was being produced, accompanied by box office statements. It was stipulated that "all contracts . . . or other arrangements . . . affecting the title to the dramatic rights ( exclusive of motion picture rights) . . . …

Go to article

Contracts - Illegality - Effect Of Partial Illegality Dec 1934

Contracts - Illegality - Effect Of Partial Illegality

Michigan Law Review

It has long been accepted that the illegality of part of a contract does not necessarily make the entire contract unenforceable. However, it is difficult to predict in a given case whether or not the court will hold that recovery may be had upon the lawful part of the contract. It is often said that such recovery will be allowed when the illegal portion of the contract can be clearly separated from the lawful part, but .even when stated in such broad terms - so broad in fact that it is of little help in solving the problem - the …

Go to article

The Vendee's Lien- On Land And Chattels Nov 1934

The Vendee's Lien- On Land And Chattels

Michigan Law Review

The vendee's lien is now firmly established as an equitable device to insure full restitution to the purchaser of land on his rescission for the vendor's fraud or default. It first appeared in a dictum in an early English case where it was suggested as a possible analogy to the implied vendor's lien for the purchase money. But it was 1855 before the question was presented squarely to an English court of record, and 1860 when the House of Lords definitely approved it. Long before this, however, courts of equity in the United States had begun to μse this device …

Go to article

Contracts --Anticipatory Breach- Denial Of Liability As A Repudiation Nov 1934

Contracts --Anticipatory Breach- Denial Of Liability As A Repudiation

Michigan Law Review

A life insurance policy provided that the insured was to be paid a certain sum per month in case of permanent disability. A dispute arose between the company and the insured as to the proper construction of the contract. The company expressed willingness to perform the contract as it construed it, but this was a refusal to pay the monthly disability income. The insured brought an action to recover total damages for anticipatory breach, of the contract to pay the permanent disability benefits. Held, that the insurer had not made such an unequivocal refusal to perform the contract as …

Go to article

Limitation Of Actions-Husband And Wife-Suspension Of The Statute Of Limitations During Coverture Nov 1934

Limitation Of Actions-Husband And Wife-Suspension Of The Statute Of Limitations During Coverture

Michigan Law Review

Plaintiff sued in equity to recover for services rendered to her deceased husband for a period of six years prior to her marriage to him. Defendant, the executor of decedent, contended that she could not recover the portion of her claim which represented wages earned more than six years before a claim w.as filed with the estate. Held, the statute of limitations does not run on the claim of one spouse. against the other during the continuance of the marital state, irrespective of whether the claim arose before or during coverture. Therefore, plaintiff could now recover for the six …

Go to article

The Varying Meaning And Legal Effect Of The Word "Void", Abraham J. Levin Jun 1934

The Varying Meaning And Legal Effect Of The Word "Void", Abraham J. Levin

Michigan Law Review

To interpret properly what has been said or written necessitates our going beyond the dictionary into the sphere of action and reality. In its narrowest sense the, meaning of a word is the single effect which is given to it in the specific case. Insofar as nature repeats itself are we able to build up concepts and symbols which function in substantially the same way in different cases. But the mind must always be ready to discard an accepted definition of a word symbol for the particular legal effect which the circumstances demand. The same word or symbol with the …

Go to article

Constitutional Law-Validity Of Statute Exempting Insurance Benefits From Process For Debts Jun 1934

Constitutional Law-Validity Of Statute Exempting Insurance Benefits From Process For Debts

Michigan Law Review

C, a judgment creditor of W, instituted garnishment proceedings to recover the amount of the judgment out of moneys owed by the X insurance company to W as beneficiary of H's life insurance. Subsequently the Arkansas legislature passed a statute exempting all moneys paid or payable to any resident of the State as the insured or beneficiary designated under any life, sickness, or accident insurance policy, from liability or seizure under judicial process, and provided that such benefits should not be subjected to the payment of any debt. Held, by a unanimous decision of the United …

Go to article

Wills-Contract Not To Contest Jun 1934

Wills-Contract Not To Contest

Michigan Law Review

A testatrix left the bulk of her estate to the plaintiff whom she named as her executor. Defendant, dissatisfied with his bequest, threatened to contest the will. Thereupon, the parties entered into a contract whereby the plaintiff agreed to give the defendant a piece of land and a sum of money in addition to his legacy in consideration of defendant's promise not to contest the will. Shortly thereafter defendant joined relatives of the decedent in opposing probate. In an action in equity to specifically enforce the agreement, held, that the contract was valid and that the defendant be permanently …

Go to article

Contracts - Fraud -Tests Of Materiality In Deceit And On Rescission For Fraud May 1934

Contracts - Fraud -Tests Of Materiality In Deceit And On Rescission For Fraud

Michigan Law Review

Current decisions abundantly show the usefulness and efficiency of remedies based on rescission in contracts induced by fraud, as compared with damage remedies. Modern improvements in the rescission remedies go far to explain their popularity. On the other hand, the tests for "materiality" of misrepresentations that are unavoidably connected with the action of deceit have restricted its utility. Both the advantages of rescission and the disadvantages of damage remedies appear most clearly in a period of rapidly fluctuating and uncertain values. These considerations seem to justify a comparative study of the tests of "materiality" evolved by recent decisions in actions …

Go to article

Contracts - Fraud - Effect Of Provision In Contract That Representations Of Seller's Agent Are Not Binding May 1934

Contracts - Fraud - Effect Of Provision In Contract That Representations Of Seller's Agent Are Not Binding

Michigan Law Review

Plaintiff sued on promissory notes given it by defendant in part payment of the purchase price for a dumptor. Defendant counterclaimed on the ground that he was induced to buy the dumptor because of fraudulent misrepresentations made by the plaintiff's agent. The contract contained the stipulation that "no representations made by an agent not included herein shall be binding," and therefore the plaintiff contended that the jury could not consider any of the false statements made by its agent. Held, said statement is ineffectual to preclude the defendant from asserting fraud. National Equipment Corp. v. Volden, (Minn. 1934) …

Go to article

Contracts - Consideration - Agreement To Reduce Rent Reserved In Lease May 1934

Contracts - Consideration - Agreement To Reduce Rent Reserved In Lease

Michigan Law Review

Plaintiff sued defendants, who were trustees of a business trust, to enforce personal liability upon them for accrued rent due under a lease. When the lessee company, which was losing money because of the depression, threatened to vacate the premises, the plaintiff acquiesced in the lessee's demand that the rent be reduced for the balance of the term. Plaintiff sought to recover the amount due under the lease, claiming that the agreement for reduction was without consideration and therefore a nullity. Held, that in view of plaintiff's knowledge of the lessee's financial condition, the latter's agreeing to remain in …

Go to article

Insurance - Conditions Precedent To Existence Of Contract Apr 1934

Insurance - Conditions Precedent To Existence Of Contract

Michigan Law Review

The application for a non-medical-examination insurance policy, and the policy itself, contained the provision that the policy should not take effect if the insured should die before the date thereof or if, on such date, the insured should not be in sound health. At the time of delivery of the policy the insured was actually suffering from high blood pressure or heart disease, although this condition was unknown to him. A statute provided that the statements made in the application as to the physical condition of the insured should be valid and binding upon the insurance company "unless wilfully false …

Go to article

Contracts - Offer And Acceptance -Termination Of Offer By Subsequent Higher Bid Of Another Mar 1934

Contracts - Offer And Acceptance -Termination Of Offer By Subsequent Higher Bid Of Another

Michigan Law Review

The receiver of an insolvent bank received from one Lorensen bids of $4,500 for the building and $500 for the fixtures of the bank, the bid for the fixtures being conditioned on acceptance of the bid for the building. He received a subsequent bid of $4,600 for the building alone, no mention being made of the fixtures. Lorensen's bid for the fixtures was made on separate paper and was considered as distinct from his bid for the building. The receiver called on Lorensen, notified him of the higher bid {indicating that it had been received without qualification) and tried to …

Go to article

Divorce - Alimony - Modification Of Decree - Impairment Of Obligation Of Contracts Mar 1934

Divorce - Alimony - Modification Of Decree - Impairment Of Obligation Of Contracts

Michigan Law Review

A decree of divorce, following the terms of a prior agreement between the parties, ordered the defendant husband to assign to the plaintiff an insurance policy and pay her $105 per month as long as she remained unmarried. Later, the court upon the defendant's petition reduced the monthly allowance to $90, finding that the defendant's earnings had been diminished and that his remarriage had precipitated new family obligations and debts. Upon appeal of both parties, held, that the court had the power to modify the decree to conform to the changed conditions of the parties, and this modification did …

Go to article

Sales - Section 14, Uniform Conditional Sales Act - Removal To Other State Without Refiling Mar 1934

Sales - Section 14, Uniform Conditional Sales Act - Removal To Other State Without Refiling

Michigan Law Review

The plaintiff, vendor in a conditional sale contract, received notice of the removal of the goods by the vendee to another State, but failed to refile the contract in the other State as required by its statute. A creditor of the vendee attached the goods without notice of the conditional sale contract, but was given actual notice of it by the plaintiff during the prescribed filing period. In this action, the plaintiff sought to recover the goods from the attaching creditor. Held, the conditional sale contract was void as to the creditor in the absence of a refiling, notwithstanding …

Go to article

The Equitable Lien As A Remedy For Breach Of Contract Mar 1934

The Equitable Lien As A Remedy For Breach Of Contract

Michigan Law Review

Modern decisions have developed the equitable lien as an important procedural device alongside the equitable remedies of constructive trust and subrogation, with both of which it is intimately connected. The equitable lien or charge, enforceable by foreclosure and sale, is in many situations the most convenient and flexible device for enforcing equitable obligations. A sphere of activity in which it has already proved useful, and in which its usefulness may increase, is in the field of breach of contract. The equitable lien here provides an intermediate ground between affirmative specific performance and complete rescission.

Go to article

First Prev Next Last