Schneider v. Neubert
| Decision Date | 18 April 1923 |
| Docket Number | No. 15151.,15151. |
| Citation | 139 N.E. 84,308 Ill. 40 |
| Parties | SCHNEIDER v. NEUBERT et al. |
| Court | Illinois Supreme Court |
OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE
Error to Appellate Court, Second District, on Appeal from Circuit Court, Henry County; Emery C. Graves, Judge.
Action by Oscar W. Schneider against Otto Neubert and others. Judgment for plaintiff was affirmed by the Appellate Court, and defendants bring certiorari. Judgments of Appellate Court and of circuit court reversed, and cause remanded to the circuit court.
Thomas J. Welch, of Kewanee, for plaintiffs in error.
Sturtz & Ewan, of Kewanee, for defendant in error.
Plaintiffs in error employed defendant in error to construct a two-story garage in Kewanee in accordance with plans and specifications prepared by an architect; defendant in error agreeing to ‘use his best ability to get all materials and labor at the least possible cost for the construction of said building,’ and plaintiffs in error agreeing to pay ‘for the performance of the contract the total net cost of labor and materials plus ten per cent. commission on same.’ The contract sets out in some detail the obligations of defendant in error under the contract, including the requirement that the ‘contractor shall maintain such insurance as will protect the owners from claims for damages for personal injuries.’ Defendant in error provided such insurance, and October 4, 1921, shortly after the completion of the building, he submitted an itemized statement of his account, and there appeared among the items this one, ‘To liability, $923.22,’ which the parties all understand to be the amount of the premium paid for employer's liability insurance. Plaintiffs in error received the statement and made no objection to their liability for this item for several months. Nearly a year later, plaintiffs in error having refused to pay this and other smaller items, defendant in error brought this action in the circuit court of Henry county and secured a verdict and judgment for $1,089.03. This judgment was affirmed by the Appellate Court, and the cause is here on certiorari.
Plaintiffs in error contend that defendant in error was to ‘bear the expense of’ the liability insurance, and the latter contends that he was to ‘provide for’ such insurance at the expense of plaintiffs in error. For the reason that the word ‘maintain’ has many different meanings, and for the further reason that the association of the clause in dispute with other clauses in the contract renders the true intent of the parties uncertain, the meaning of the word is ambiguous, and the court properly received evidence of extrinsic facts and circumstances for the purpose of clarifying the meaning. Under this state of the record the trial court gave to the jury the following instruction:
‘The court instructs you as a matter of law that while it is true that in a contract where the intention of the parties can be gathered from the writing itself parol evidence will not be received, still where the terms of a written contract are uncertain and ambiguous and the language employed leaves the meaning of the contract in doubt, as in plaintiff's Exhibit I, then oral testimony may be received to explain it, to enable the jury to understand the true meaning of the parties as to such uncertain and ambiguous terms; and in this case, if you believe from a preponderance of the evidence that both the plaintiff and the defendants, by their acts and conduct, during the performance of said contract, construed and treated the same as imposing the legal duty upon the defendants to pay the premium for compensation and liability insurance taken out by the plaintiff for the protection of the defendants against damages for personal injuries to workmen employed in the construction of said building and injuries to the public therefrom, then the jury is bound by the construction put upon the contract by the parties themselves, and the defendants must be held liable to the plaintiff for such premiums in this suit.’
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...event of each possible finding of fact. See Du Hamel v. Board of Education (1955), 7 Ill.App.2d 487, 130 N.E.2d 10; Schneider v. Neubert (1923), 308 Ill. 40, 139 N.E. 84. We conclude, therefore, based upon our review of the pleadings before the court at the time of entry of the judgment tha......
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...remains as to the meaning of the contract, then the question of interpretation must be left to the trier of fact. Schneider v. Neubert, 308 Ill. 40, 43, 139 N.E. 84 (1923); United Farm Bureau Mutual Insurance Co. v. Elder, 89 Ill.App.3d 918, 921, 45 Ill.Dec. 279, 412 N.E.2d 630 (1980). If, ......
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