Willetts v. Earl

• Decision Date: 19 February 1891
• Parties: WILLETTS et al. v. EARL.
• Court: New Jersey Supreme Court

21 A. 327

53 N.J.L. 270

WILLETTS et al.

v. EARL.

Supreme Court of New Jersey.

Feb. 19, 1891.

(Syllabus by the Court.)

Case certified to circuit court, Camden county, for advisory opinion.

The questions of law arising in the foregoing cause, and reserved for review, are the following, viz.: "First. At the trial of this cause before the circuit court the plaintiff proved his bill of particulars, and rested. The defendant then offered in proof the contracts under which the erection of the buildings had been undertaken by the contractor. These contracts were executed, not by Mrs. Earl, as owner, but by Harry Earl, her husband, in his own name. It appeared that these contracts had been duly filed before the buildings had been begun. Objection was made by the plaintiff, that contracts made with a contractor by a person other than the owner were not such contracts as, under the mechanic's lien law, would protect the property from liens; which question is hereby certified to the supreme court for its advisory opinion. Second. There was evidence in the case tending to show that, before the buildings were completed, the contractor and builder mutually abandoned the building contracts. It also appeared that all of the plaintiff's bill of particulars had been furnished prior to such abandonment. Plaintiff contended that, upon such abandonment being shown, the power of the contracts, though filed, to protect the buildings, was gone. This question is also certified to the supreme court for its advisory opinion. Third. It appeared that, during the erection of the buildings begun under the contracts filed, modifications and extensions were agreed to between the builder and contractor, and embodied in written contracts between them, which were not filed in the clerk's office. The court held that the failure to file these contracts, in the condition of the testimony, would not destroy the efficiency of the contracts which were filed to protect the buildings from materials subsequently used under such supplemental contracts; which question is also certified to the supreme court for its advisory opinion."

Argued November term, 1890, before Beasley, C. J., and Magie and Dixon, JJ.

J. W. Westcott, for plaintiffs.

A. Stephany, for defendant.

DIXON, J. The first question, read in the light of the accompanying case, is whether, when a person makes a written contract for the erection of a building, in the name of an agent, the contract not disclosing the name of the principal, the filing of such a contract will, under our mechanic's lien law, prevent a lien in favor of any person save the other party to that contract. The first section of the law gives a lien against every building to every person furnishing labor or materials for its construction. The second section enacts "that when any building shall be erected, in whole or in part, by contract in writing, such building, and the land whereon it stands, shall be liable to the contractor alone, for work done or materials furnished in pursuance of such contract: provided, such contract, or a duplicate thereof, be filed in the office of the clerk of the county in which such building is situate, before such work done or materials furnished." The manifest object of the proviso just recited is to notify all persons, other than the original contractor, who may be about to furnish...