Court Opinion

ID: 9530044
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 03:56:41.029759+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:27:59.178961
License: Public Domain

TRAYNOR, J.
I concur in the judgment. I do not agree with the premise implicit in the majority opinion that parol evidence as to the meaning of the contract was admissible only because the contract is ambiguous on its face. Words are used in an endless variety of contexts. Their meaning is not subsequently attached to them by the reader but is formulated by the writer and can only be found by interpretation in the light of all the circumstances that reveal the sense in which the writer used the words. The exclusion of parol evidence regarding such circumstances merely because the words do not appear ambiguous to the reader can easily lead to the attribution to a written instrument of a meaning that was never intended. (Cal. Code Civ. Proc. §§ 1856, 1860; see Wigmore on Evidence 3rd ed., §§ 2458-2478; “The Theory of Legal Interpretation,” 12 Harv. L. Rev. 417, by Oliver Wendell Holmes (then Chief Justice of Massachusetts.)
Edmonds, J., concurred.
Appellant’s petition for a rehearing was denied September 24, 1942.