Opinion ID: 1854562
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Both defendants assert error by the trial court in finding there was a breach of express warranty.

Text: For convenience we shall first consider the position taken by Speed Queen on this issue. By way of exclusion where is no evidence disclosing any express warranty was ever advanced, made or given to plaintiffs by defendant manufacturer. In fact the only possible basis upon which any claim to the contrary could stand is that Holiday acted as agent for Speed Queen. Plaintiffs' pleading alleges, in part, Holiday acted as agent jobber and broker for Speed Queen. This blanket conclusion is admitted by Holiday's answer. However that alone is not binding on defendant Speed Queen which denied any such relationship. Agency is a fiduciary relation which results from the manifestation of consent by one person, the principal, that another, the agent, shall act on the former's behalf and subject to his control, and consent by the other so to act. Reed v. Bunger, 255 Iowa 322, 328, 122 N.W.2d 290, 294. An agent may testify as to his authority. Johnson v. Aeroil Products Co., Inc., 255 Iowa 931, 936, 124 N.W.2d 425. But his extra judicial statements to a third person are not admissible, over objection, to prove a principal and agent relationship between himself and another. Robinson v. Home Fire & Marine Ins. Co., 244 Iowa 1084, 1089, 59 N.W.2d 776; Schroeder v. Cedar Rapids Lodge, 242 Iowa 1297, 1301, 49 N.W.2d 880; Friedman v. Forest City, 239 Iowa 112, 126, 30 N.W.2d 752; McDonald v. Dodge, 231 Iowa 325, 327-328, 1 N.W.2d 280; and 3 C.J.S. Agency § 322c, page 276. Incidentally, Restatement, Second, Agency, section 14J. provides: One who receives goods from another for resale to a third person is not thereby the other's agent in the transaction: whether he is an agent for this purpose or is himself a buyer depends upon whether the parties agree that his duty is to act primarily for the benefit of the one delivering the goods to him or is to act primarily for his own benefit. Plaintiffs having made the affirmative assertion of an agency relationship between these two defendants, had the burden of proving it by a preponderance of the evidence. Rule 344(f) (5) (6), R.C.P.; Reed v. Bunger, supra, loc. cit., 255 Iowa 329, 122 N.W.2d 290; and McDonald v. Dodge, supra, loc. cit., 231 Iowa 328, 1 N.W.2d 280. This they failed to do. We have no alternative but to conclude the trial court erred in finding defendant Speed Queen ever made or gave any express warranty upon which plaintiffs may rely.