O'Donnell v. Daily News Co. of Minneapolis
| Decision Date | 22 November 1912 |
| Citation | 119 Minn. 378,138 N.W. 677 |
| Parties | O'DONNELL v. DAILY NEWS CO. OF MINNEAPOLIS. |
| Court | Minnesota Supreme Court |
OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE
Appeal from District Court, Hennepin County; Andrew Holt, Judge.
Action by Charles A. O'Donnell against the Daily News Company of Minneapolis. From a judgment for defendant, plaintiff appeals. Affirmed.
A telegraphic offer of employment, which is manifestly the result of prior verbal negotiations, and which alone does not purport to contain all the assential terms of a contractual offer, must be considered as though the language thereof had been used at the conclusion of the negotiations, or, conversely, as though express reference to the substance of the negotiations had been incorporated in the telegram; and the terms of the contract created by a telegraphic acceptance of such offer are to be gathered from the telegrams and the negotiations taken together, and not from the telegrams alone.
A contract for services, which by its terms shows that it is not to be performed or is incapable of performance within one year from the making thereof, is within the statute of frauds; but a contract for one year's services, commencing on the date on which the contract is made, is not within the statute.
Defendant's telegraphic offer of employment, and its letter explanatory thereof, and the plaintiff's telegraphic acceptance, held not to be sufficient writings to satisfy the statute of frauds.
Where the date for the commencement of the performance of a contract is shown by the same evidence which establishes the contractual consensus, such date must, for the purpose of determining the applicability of the statute of frauds, be deemed to appear from the terms of the contract.
Contract for one year's employment considered, and held to show by its terms that the commencement of its performance was to begin in the future, thus bringing it within the operation of the statute of frauds.
In determining the applicability of the statute of frauds to a contract of employment, the date of the contract will not be persumed to be the date for the commencement of its performance, where it affirmatively appears from the terms of the contract that a subsequent date therefor is contemplated.
The doctrine of de minimis cannot be invoked to avoid the operation of the statute of frauds upon a contract which by its terms is not to be performed within one year. A. B. Jackson, of Minneapolis, for appellant.
Wilson, Mercer, Swan, Ware & Stinchfield, of Minneapolis, for respondent.
This is an action for damages for breach of an alleged contract for the plaintiff's employment as advertising manager for the defendant, the Minneapolis Daily News. The case was tried to the court without a jury. Findings were filed, it being held that the plaintiff was entitled to recover of the defendant the sum of $65, and judgment was ordered to be entered accordingly. Whereupon the plaintiff made request for substituted or additional findings, which request was denied, and judgment was entered as ordered. This is an appeal by the plaintiff from the judgment so entered.
The facts, as gathered from the undisputed evidence and the findings of the court, are as follows:
On January 27, 1910, the plaintiff came to St. Paul, met the president and general manager of the defendant corporation, and orally proposed to enter the employment of the defendant as its advertising manager at Minneapolis, at a salary of $60 per week, for the first year, and moving expenses from his then home at Germantown, Pa. No direct reply was made by the defendant's representatives to this proposition, but the parties entered into a general conversation with reference to employing the plaintiff as the defendant's advertising manager at Minneapolis. In the course of this conversation the defendant's president objected to the proposition as to the payment of the plaintiff's moving expenses, and suggested that he would prefer to pay the plaintiff a definite sum, $250 or $300, to cover such expenses, to which suggestion the plaintiff assented, as being satisfactory to him. The plaintiff also stated that he wanted a contract for at least a year; but the defendant's representatives said nothing as to the length of time for which the contract was to continue, though they did intimate strongly that they did not wish the plaintiff to use a position with the defendant as a stepping stone to a position with some other newspaper. It was agreed between the parties that, if a contract should be made, the plaintiff could report for work at Minneapolis in about a week from the date of the conversation, or on February 7th, and that such would be agreeable to the defendant. The negotiations then closed, without any contract having been made, but with the understanding that the plaintiff would receive a telegram, upon his return to his home, relative to his application for the position. The plaintiff then, after receiving from the defendant's president a check for $75 to cover the expenses of the trip which he had made to St. Paul in order to have the conference above described, returned to his home in Germantown, where, on January 30, 1910, he received the following telegram from the defendant: In reply to this message, the plaintiff, on January 31, 1910, sent to the defendant the following telegram: ‘All right, will be there next Monday’-which day fell on February 7th. After sending this message, but on the same day, he received a telegram from the defendant as follows: And likewise, on the same day, he received the following letter from the defendant:
Previously to the receipt of the telegram notifying him that he was not wanted for the position in question, the plaintiff had surrendered the lease for his home in Germantown, and had begun to pack and ship his furniture and household effects to Minneapolis; and on February 7, 1910, he reported at the office of the defendant in the said last-mentioned city, ready and willing to commence work, but the defendant refused to allow him to do any work for it, its alleged reasons for such refusal being immaterial in the view which we take of the case. The plaintiff thereafter made diligent effort to find other employment, but failed to get any, except to the extent of earning $500 during the following year.
Aside from the ultimate questions presented to this court for determination, the above statement represents the substance of not only the findings made by the court, but also the substituted or additional findings requested by the plaintiff, and thus we are relieved of the necessity of passing upon the propriety of the court's denial of the plaintiff's request for additional findings, except, of course, in so far as such request may involve the ultimate questions involved. These questions are: (1) Was the contract which was entered into by the parties one for an indefinite period at a fixed salary of $65 per week, or was it a contract for a year's services at such salary? (2) If the contract was for a year's services, what must be deemed to be the date contemplated thereby for the commencement of its performance?-this question being material upon the defense of the statute of frauds.
[1] 1. Upon the first of these questions we must hold, with the plaintiff, that the contract which was closed by the plaintiff's telegram of acceptance of date January 31st was not for an indefinite period, but for the term of one year. It seems clear to us that while the telegrams above quoted, taken alone, did not constitute a contract, yet that the defendant's telegram of January 29th must be considered in connection with and as supplementary to the negotiations which took place on January 27th, and that when so interpreted it must be read as though it had been written out substantially as follows: ‘Referring to our negotiations of January 27th, in the course of which you offered to take the position of advertising manager for the Minneapolis Daily News at a salary of $60 per week for the first year, with an allowance for moving expenses, we have decided to offer you $65 per week, without moving expenses.’ Such an interpretation of the telegram is, furthermore, strongly supported by the defendant's letter of January 31st,...
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