Doran v. Eaton

• Decision Date: 14 January 1889
• Citation: 40 Minn. 35,41 N.W. 244
• Parties: DORAN v EATON ET AL.
• Court: Minnesota Supreme Court

40 Minn. 35

41 N.W. 244

DORANvEATON ET AL.

Supreme Court of Minnesota.

Jan. 14, 1889.

(Syllabus by the Court.)

1. On the question of value of personal property, evidence that it has no market value, where it does not appear that such property was ever offered for sale, is immaterial.

2. Opinions or expectations as to the value or prospective value of property, expressed by the seller to the buyer, cannot, ordinarily, be made the basis of an action for false representations.¹

3. Certain verbal inaccuracies in the instructions to the jury held to have been cured by the tenor of the entire instructions.

4. Where, in an action for false representations to induce plaintiff to subscribe for stock, the bill of exceptions shows that there was evidence tending to show that the stock was worth as much as it would have been worth had the representations been true, the question whether the plaintiff sustained any damages is properly left to the jury.

Appeal from district court, Ramsey county; WILKIN, Judge.

Action for false representations by Michael Doran against Samuel S. Eaton and C. W. Mead. Plaintiff appeals from a judgment for defendants.

Henry C. James, for appellant.

W. D. Cornish, for respondents.

GILFILLAN, C. J.

The evidence offered that the stock had no market value, without evidence that it had ever been offered for sale, was of course inadmissible; for while it is true that ordinarily, and as a general rule, market value-that is, the value in the markets where personal property is bought and sold-is the proper measure of actual value, it is idle to inquire what is the market value of any article in places where such articles were never bought and sold, nor offered for sale. Such articles, of course, have no market value, and can have no market value, in such places; and the fact that they have not has no bearing on their actual value, any more than would the fact that they have never been offered for sale. What the defendant Mead said to the witness De Graff, excluded by the court, was not a statement of fact, but rather the expression of an opinion or an expectation as to matters which might effect the value, such as the law, in deference to the universal habit and practice of mankind, permits men to make, in commending property offered for sale, and as to which the buyer (unless there be peculiar relations of trust and confidence between him and the seller) must rely upon his own judgment.

It is unnecessary to consider whether the books of the corporation were admissible, for the bill of exceptions does not show what they contained, and so it is impossible for us to see how their admission could have been of any prejudice to the appellant. We do not review rulings of the trial court unless they may have injuriously affected the rights of the party complaining.

The appellant selects for one assignment of error the statement of the court in its general charge that the rule of damages in actions of this kind is “the difference between the stock as it was, and as it would have been if the facts were as represented.” And for another assignment, an instruction given on defendants' request, that, “if the representations would not have affected the value of the stock, then the plaintiff has not been damaged, and your verdict should be for the...