Case ID: us-ct-cl_28/html/0548-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Mr. . Justice Blatchford", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

JOHN L. SMITHMEYER ET AL. v. THE UNITED STATES.
    (25 C. Cls. R., 481; 147 U. S. R., 342.)
    
      On the claimants’ Appeal.
    
    From October, 1874, to October, 1886, tbe claimants, architects, at the request of committees and commissions of Congress, devote their time to devising and perfecting plans for the National Library. Tn 1886 one of their designs is adopted by Congress, and they are employed to superintend the work atsalaries of $5,000 and$3,000. It appears that about six years were spent in the evolution of and perfecting the plan finally adopted. They sue for the commission to which they would be entitled from an ordinary employer, according to the schedule of the Institute of Architects.
    The court below decides:
    1. There is no intrinsic property in the architect’s designs; but where they are tendered to a party for inspection, then by a usage which can not be questioned it is mutually understood to be a tender of the services which produced the plans and which are embodied in them.
    2. Where an architect places his plans for a public building before Congress, it is á tender of the professional talent, experience, study, and labor which have produced the plans; and the construction of a building according to his design is in law, usage, and good conscience an acceptance of the service.
    3. Where an architect’s plan for a public building has been accepted by Congress, and he then departs from the general rule of architects by accepting a salary for superintending the work, with no reservation as to his compensation for the preceding service of preparing the plan, the court will compute its value according to the same standard, and not according to the schedule of the Institute of Architects.
    The decision of the court below is affirmed on the same . grounds.
   Mr. . Justice Blatchford

delivered the opinion of the Supreme Court January 23, 1893.