Case Name: WILLIAM W. BALLARD, TALMADGE E. BROWN, AND EDWARD L. MARSH v. THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA
Court: Supreme Court of the District of Columbia
Jurisdiction: District of Columbia
Decision Date: 1881
Citations: 3 MacArth. 49
Docket Number: No. 13,494
Parties: WILLIAM W. BALLARD, TALMADGE E. BROWN, AND EDWARD L. MARSH v. THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA.
Judges: 
Reporter: Reports of cases argued and determined in the Supreme Court of the District of Columbia (District of Columbia - reported by Mackey)
Volume: 10
Pages: 49–51

Head Matter:
WILLIAM W. BALLARD, TALMADGE E. BROWN, AND EDWARD L. MARSH v. THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA.
At Law. —
No. 13,494.
The plaintiff made a proposal to the Board of Public Works to pxxt down certain pavements, the board to designate the streets when the plaintiffs should be ready to commence. The assistant secretary of the. board embodied the proposal in a letter accepting it, signed by his name alone : Held—
I. That this was not a contract executed as prescribed by law, and was not binding on the District in an action to x-ecover damage for a failure of the board to designate sixch sti-eets.
STATEMENT OE THE CASE.
Demurrer to declaration. The alleged contract for a.breach of which this action is brought is contained in an exhibit to the declaration, and is expressed as follows:
Board oe Public Works, District oe Columbia,
Washington, December 10, 1871.
To Ballard Pavement Co.,
Washington, D. C.:
Your proposition of this date, as follows:
“ The Ballard Pavement Company hereby make proposals for the following woi’k, with accompanying conditions. We will put clown preserved wood pavement as follows: The Ballard block, the Perry block, or the wedge-shaped block, such as laid by Filbert & Taylor in this city, as the contractors may elect, either to stand five inches high, for three dollars and fifty cents per square yard, and we hereby ask for seventy-five thousand square yards, contractors to have during the year 1873 within which to complete this work; the board not to stop the work without a gross violation of the contract on the part of the contractors. The streets to be designated by the board at such times as the company shall be ready to commence work. Said work to be paid for as the same progresses.
“ We also hereby apply for a separate and a further contract for so much of the grading, hauling, and filling as is not embraced in the contract for paving and for.setting the curbing on the streets to be paved by us at board prices, subject to the conditions of the paving contract,” is this day accepted.
By order of the board.
Charles S. Johnson,
Assistant Secretary.
After stating the contract, plaintiffs allege in the declaration that they entered upon their part of the contract, provided the material with which to do the said work, and from shortly after the making of the contract, hitherto, they have been prepared and ready to do the said work according to their said contract; that they have repeatedly demanded the said work of the proper authorities representing the District, which authorities have at all times neglected and refused to perform any part thereof, though often requested so to by plaintiffs. Plaintiffs further allege that they have been greatly damaged, to wit, in the sum of one hundred thousand dollars, and they ask judgment for that amount with costs.
The defendant demurred to the declaration as being bad in substance, for-the reason that it does not show that the said contract was made by any person authorized by law to bind said District by the terms of the alleged contract. There was another ground of demurrer, which is not noticed for the reason that it was not passed upon.
John A. Grow, for plaintiff’.
Edwin L. Stanton, for-District of Columbia.

Opinion:
Cartter, Ch. J.,
delivered the opinion of the court, to the effect following:
The letter bearing the signature of Charles S. Johnson, assistant secretary, is not a contract made in pursuance of law. The thirty-seventh section of the act organizing a government for the District of Columbia requires that all contracts made by the Board of Public Works shall be in writing and signed by the parties making the same, and a copy is to be filed in the office of the secretary of the District. As to the construction of a contract we give effect to the intention of the parties, but when the statute has prescribed a certain form, it must be followed. In order to render the contract binding in this particular, the law requires it to be in writing and signed by the parties, and without this formality it is not complete. The act contemplated a written instrument filed away in the archives of the board and authenticated by their signatures. There is no such officer provided for as an assistant secretary. His signature is not binding on the District, and Ms letter is no evidence at all of a contract. Besides, this letter simply accepts a proposition to lay any of three Muds of pavements; thus evidently contemplating a contract afterwards to be prepared in form, fixing the kind of pavement to be used when the agreement should be completed. It is to be remembered that the District is sued because the Board of Public Works did not-designate the streets upon which work was to be performed, and not to recover for the value of work performed by the plaintiff' and accepted by the District; and as the contract by the parties is not executed within the meaning of the statute, we think there is.no cause of action, and the demurrer must be sustained.