Wetmore v. Pattison

• Citation: 45 Mich. 439,8 N.W. 67
• Court: Supreme Court of Michigan
• Decision Date: 28 January 1881
• Parties: WETMORE and others v. PATTISON.

8 N.W. 67

45 Mich. 439

WETMORE and others v. PATTISON.

Supreme Court of Michigan

January 28, 1881

The damages for breach of contract are those which it is reasonable to suppose were in contemplation of the parties at the time of entering into it, and do not include damages that result from failure of one of the parties to comply with a contract subsequently entered into, performance of which is prevented by the breach complained of. Certain contract for logs, stumpage, and towage construed.

Error to Marquette.

F.O Clark, for plaintiffs in error.

E.J. Mapes, for defendant in error.

GRAVES J.

On the seventeenth of May, 1878, the parties entered into a written contract by which Pattison for certain considerations therein stated agreed to furnish certain saw-logs to the plaintiffs. He furnished a part of the number but failed to supply the whole. It was part of the agreement of the plaintiffs that Pattison should not pay over 50 cents a thousand for towing nor more than one dollar per thousand feet stumpage on any land owned by Lac la Belle Company, or the Marquette Lumber Company or William L. Wetmore and Bay Furnace Company.

The plaintiffs brought this action to recover damages of Pattison for his failure to fulfil the contract, and he claimed as matter of defence that it was the intent of their stipulation in the contract that he should be allowed to get the logs on the lands mentioned at one dollar per thousand for the stumpage and should not be compelled to pay more than 50 cents per thousand for their towage, and that the plaintiffs failed to secure to him the right to get the logs on said lands and the owners forbade and expelled him. For this he claimed damage by way of recoupment and under the charge of the court the jury found in his favor to the amount of five dollars. Several days subsequent to the contract between the plaintiffs and defendant the former made an agreement with a car company at Michigan City to furnish them with the lumber expected to be sawed out of these logs. As a consequence of defendant's failure to perform the plaintiffs were unable to keep their agreement with the car company and they insist that their loss thus occasioned was a proper measure of damages.

This is not a correct view. The logs were not contracted for on the strength of the lumber agreement. The latter had no existence when the former was entered into. The plaintiffs after having made their...