Wagner v. Engel-Millar Co.
| Decision Date | 10 January 1911 |
| Citation | 144 Wis. 486,129 N.W. 392 |
| Parties | WAGNER v. ENGEL-MILLAR CO. |
| Court | Wisconsin Supreme Court |
OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE
Appeal from Circuit Court, Milwaukee County; O. T. Williams, Judge.
Action by E. W. Wagner against the Engel-Millar Company. Judgment for defendant. Plaintiff appeals. Reversed and remanded, with directions.
This is an action to recover $618.75, alleged to have been expended by the plaintiff in the purchase of corn on the Board of Trade in Chicago at the request of the defendant. The defense was, in substance, that the transaction in question was a gambling transaction, and not an actual purchase of corn.
The jury returned the following special verdict:
“(1) Did both parties to this transaction, plaintiff and defendant, intend when entering into it that it should be settled by the payment of difference in the price of corn according to the rise and fall of the market? Answer: No.
(2) If you answer the foregoing question ‘No,’ then answer this question; otherwise, you need not answer this question: Did the plaintiff intend when entering into this transaction with the defendant to make a delivery of corn under the contract? Answer: Yes.”
Upon motion the trial court changed the answer to the first question from “No” to “Yes,” struck out the answer to the second question, and rendered judgment for the defendant, from which the plaintiff appeals.Burke, Alexander & Burke, for appellant.
Ernest A. Kehr, for respondent.
WINSLOW, C. J. (after stating the facts as above).
The plaintiff was a grain broker on the Chicago Board of Trade; the defendant a domestic business corporation located at Milwaukee. October 18, 1907, the defendant corporation telegraphed to the plaintiff an order to buy 10,000 bushels of May corn at 61 1/8 cents, and on October 21st following an order to buy another 10,000 bushels of May corn at 61 1/2 cents. Both orders were immediately executed on the Chicago Board of Trade; that is, one of Mr. Wagner's employés went into the grain pit and found a seller, and “contracted for the purchase” of 10,000 bushels of corn for delivery in the following May under the rules of the Board of Trade; the trades being noted on cards which each broker carried for the purpose. October 29th following the defendant telegraphed the plaintiff to sell the corn previously purchased, and the plaintiff sold 20,000 bushels of May corn on the Board of Trade in the same manner at 58 1/4 cents per bushel, entailing a loss of $637.50, for which loss (less a credit of $18.75) this action is brought.
Both Mr. Wagner and his manager testified that, while the purchases were margin transactions, there was an actual intent to deliver the corn purchased in each case; that deliveries were expected to be made by warehousereceipts representing corn actually stored in elevators;...
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Bank of Ettrick v. Emberson
...116, 40 Am. Rep. 154;Corbett v. Underwood, 83 Ill. 324, 25 Am. Rep. 392;Union Nat. Bank v. Carr (C. C.) 15 Fed. 438;Wagner v. Engel-Millar Co., 144 Wis. 486, 129 N. W. 392. The principal contentions of defendant's counsel relate to the purchase and sale by which a loss of $765.97 was incurr......
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Becher-Barret-Lockerby Co., a Corp. v. Sjothun
... ... 660, 83 A.L.R. 512; ... Fraser v. Farmers Co-op. Co. (Minn.) 209 N.W. 33; ... Sunderland v. Hibbard, 97 Neb. 21, 149 N.W. 57; ... Wagner v. Engel-Millar Co. 144 Wis. 486, 129 N.W ... 392; Rogers v. Marriott, 59 Neb. 759, 82 N.W. 21 ... Burke, ... Ch. J. Burr, ... ...
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Kassuba Comm'n Co. v. Blodgett
...money in so doing can recover it or that he cannot. Our answer is that he cannot. There was no such record in Wagner v. Engel-Millar Co., 144 Wis. 486, 129 N. W. 392. If the appellant has suffered injustice, it has itself to blame for limiting us to the above ...
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Kassuba Comm'n Co. v. Blodgett
...no recovery. Where the only question in the case is with reference to the validity of the principal contract, as in Wagner v. Engel-Millar Co., 144 Wis. 486, 129 N. W. 392, the legal inquiry should be directed to the validity of that contract. The language used in the case last mentioned is......