Taylor v. Maguire

• Citation: 13 Mo. 517
• Parties: GEORGE TAYLOR v. JOHN MAGUIRE.
• Decision Date: 31 October 1850
• Court: Missouri Supreme Court

13 Mo. 517

GEORGE TAYLOR

v.JOHN MAGUIRE.

Supreme Court of Missouri.

October Term, 1850.

ERROR TO ST. LOUIS COURT OF COMMON PLEAS.

Declaration filed August 12, 1847, summons returnable September term, 1847. The obligation declared on was dated 8th September, 1846. In this contract it was agreed that Maguire should build the hull of a steamboat, certainly described, and finish it ready for the engines by the 1st February, 1847, for which certain payments were to be made, amounting in the whole to $9,000. The boat was not then finished, but was never completed as agreed until the 12th day of April thereafter, the plaintiff being in no fault. At the trial at the Feburary term, 1849, the plaintiff offered evidence to show that by reason of the defendant's said breach of contract, the plaintiff had lost the use of the boat for the space of two months, and that the boat could have been chartered or hired to other persons for the period lost for the sum of more than $5,000. Also that boats of inferior capacity and engaged in the same trade in which the plaintiff designed said boat to be employed, made to their owners a net profit of over $14,000, above all expenses. The defendant objected to all this testimony, and it was excluded, to which the plaintiff excepted. It was also agreed that at September term of Court of Common Pleas, 1847, a suit was brought by defendant against the plaintiff to recover a balance remaining due on the price of said hull. That at the trial thereof, this plaintiff offered to recoup the damages, alleging the same damage by reason of the breach of contract on the part of Maguire, as that on which this suit is founded; and the court refused to allow him to recoup his damages, and so adjudged and decided, as appears by their record of judgment now standing therein. That at the time of trial therein, and of the offer to recoup, the present suit was pending, having been entered at the same term with the other.

That Taylor then claimed and offered to prove that the damages sustained as aforesaid, exceeded by several thousand dollars the amount then claimed by Maguire.

The case was hereupon submitted to the court sitting as a jury, who returned a verdict for the plaintiff for $48.

The plaintiff then moved for a new trial, which motion was overruled. And there is assignment of errors accordingly.

TODD & KRUM, for Defendant. 1st. The record of the suit of Maguire v. Taylor, given in evidence, was a bar to a further prosecution of this suit. 17 Serg. & Rawle, 322, and 11...