Leeds v. Little
| Decision Date | 29 January 1890 |
| Citation | 42 Minn. 414 |
| Parties | C. S. LEEDS <I>vs.</I> FRANK E. LITTLE, impleaded, etc. |
| Court | Minnesota Supreme Court |
Flannery & Cooke, for appellant.
Hiram C. Truesdale, for respondent.
Defendant Little, being the owner of the land described in the complaint, in August, 1887, entered into a contract with defendant Stalbird for the erection of a dwelling-house on the premises. Stalbird then entered into a contract in writing (Exhibit B) with plaintiffs, by which the latter agreed The plaintiffs, claiming to have performed their contract, and not having received their pay from Stalbird, in September, 1888, filed their affidavit and statement for a lien, to which was annexed a copy of the written contract between them and Stalbird. To an action to enforce this lien Little interposed two defences: First, that plaintiffs had not filed a properly itemized account of the labor and material, as required by Gen. St. 1878, c. 90, § 6; and, second, that they had not fulfilled their contract.
The objection to the statement for a lien is that it does not give the items of the labor and material, or their value, but is a mere statement in gross, the same as in the contract with Stalbird. This point is virtually disposed of by King v. Smith, supra, p. 286. Plaintiffs' contract being for a gross sum for the whole job, no more detailed statement was necessary or practicable. Had the claim for a lien been by a contract, or against the owner, no other form of statement would have been either proper or possible, and yet the requirements of section 7 as to statements for a lien under section 1 are the same as those of section 6 for a lien under section 2, c. 90. This statute, in giving a material-man, laborer, or subcontractor a lien for the value or contract price of his material or labor, proceeds upon the idea that the owner, by making a contract with another for the erection, etc., of a building on his land, in view of the provisions of the existing lien law, makes him his quasi agent, with authority to charge the land for labor or material for all legitimate purposes of its performance; and this authority extends to the prices, as well as the quantity or quality, of the labor or material; and the amount of the claim secured by the lien will be commensurate with the contract price, if one is agreed on, between the contractor and subcontractor, if the contract be an honest and fair one. It is not, of course, conclusive upon the owner, who may show that it is so exorbitant and unreasonable as to indicate fraud, mistake, or the like; but prima facie, at least, it is the measure of the amount of the lien.
2. A careful inspection of the answer satisfies us that the second defence tenders no issue as to the quality of plaintiffs' work, but merely charges a failure on their part to complete the roof within the time agreed, (alleged to have been November 1, 1887,) by reason of which certain damages resulted to defendant. The court finds that no time was agreed on when the work should be completed, in which case, of course, the law implies a reasonable time. The court further finds that the plaintiffs entered upon the performance of their contract October 15, 1887, and prosecuted work thereunder and thereon until June 16, 1888, at which time they had fully completed it. In the absence of the evidence on the question, and of any finding that this was an unreasonable time, we must construe the finding of the court as adverse to the defendant on the issue as to the time of performance.
This would be decisive of the case in favor of the plaintiffs; but if it be assumed that the parties, voluntarily and outside of the pleadings, tried issues as to the quality of the work, the same result is reached. The only provision in the specifications referred to in Exhibit B, as to the manner of laying the tile, is that they shall be "all laid in proper manner." The only objection made to the manner of laying the tile on the roof is that they were not laid in cement. The finding of the court is to the effect that, at the time this contract was made and this work done, cement had never been used in this locality in laying tile, but they had been uniformly laid on felt, without cement, although tile laid in cement make a better roof than when laid without it. While this, like many of the findings, is rather a summary of the evidence than a finding on an issuable fact, yet, as contracts are presumed to be made with reference to the general customs and usages of trade and business, it must be construed as equivalent to a finding that the roof tile was laid in a proper manner. To the suggestion that the specifications provide that the work was to be done to the satisfaction of the architect and the owner, and that the defendant objected to the tile being laid without cement, it is enough to say that, even conceding that this would give the owner the right to exact a method of doing the work different from that...
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