Court Opinion

ID: 9752536
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-28 18:13:50.511176+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:27:17.270883
License: Public Domain

MADDEN, Judge
(concurring in the result).
Though I agree that the Government’s demurrer should be sustained, I desire to state my reasons separately. I do not think that a condition which was unknown to the parties at the time of entering into the contract is necessarily outside the scope of article 4 of the contract just because it results from a governmental regulation. The purpose of article 4 is to enable a contractor to base his bid on normal and anticipated conditions of performance, and not to include additional amounts to cover conditions that may arise, but probably will not. Both its text and its purpose indicate *205that if an unanticipated condition of performance arises, an equitable adjustment will be made, if costs of performance are materially increased by the condition. I think that such a changed condition might be caused by a Federal or local traffic regulation.
The plaintiffs’ petition, however, does not, in my opinion, sufficiently allege such a changed condition. In its paragraph 5 it says that prior to submitting their bid, the plaintiffs went to the site and made an examination and found the usual traffic signs posted and only a minor restricted area, and in reliance thereon submitted their bid. Then, the petition says, “After the contract had been entered into the post engineer, by the erection of signs, restricted traffic to an extent that could not have been anticipated, by requiring that all vehicle traffic must come to a complete stop in the vicinity of any troop movement and should not resume movement until troops were off the street.” In spite of the statement that this restriction “could not have been anticipated,” I am unable to see why it could not have been anticipated. This was an Army post area, and it should have been anticipated that no traffic would be permitted which either jeopardized the safety of the troops or interfered with their training. The petition does not say that neither party to the contract anticipated the traffic restrictions. Yet such an allegation would be necessary to state a ground for the invocation of article 4, unless misrepresentation or concealment by the Government of a condition of which it was aware, but of which, as it knew, the plaintiffs were not aware, were alleged, which it is not.