Court Opinion

ID: 9578940
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 21:49:47.971248+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:33:39.604587
License: Public Domain

Beasley, Judge,
dissenting.
The verdict and the conforming judgment should be affirmed. The charges to the jury on certain principles of contract law, if it was error to give them, were harmless. The award of attorney fees under OCGA § 13-6-11, which included the expense of defending against the counterclaim, was justified in the circumstances.
As correctly concluded in Division 1, the ambiguity in the contract required determination of facts found by the jury based on evidence presented to it. The trial court had come to this same conclusion in ruling on plaintiff’s motion for partial summary judgment. In an order setting out the undisputed facts and the law applicable thereto which, although OCGA §§ 9-11-56 (c); OCGA § 9-11-52 (a) do not require it, is enlightening as an explanation to the parties and helpful to the appellate court, the judge extracted the issue clearly and articulated the legal principles for the construction of contracts. The judge carefully detailed the respective roles assigned to court and jury for the resolution of contract disputes. Relying in part on Travelers Ins. Co. v. Blakey, 255 Ga. 699, 700 (342 SE2d 308) (1986), which is quoted by the majority, and applying the rules of construction in OCGA § 13-2-2, the court concluded that there was still ambiguity, so that the fact of the intention of the parties was up to a jury to find.
In this context, the parties went to trial, each side being of the opinion that the contract was unambiguous in its favor. Although defendant had made no motion for summary judgment, he contended throughout the trial that the contract clearly and unambiguously supported his position. That was also the basis for his motion for directed verdict and for judgment n.o.v., the denials of which he enumerates as error for the very same reason.
*190Defendant/appellant insisted on two interrogatories to the jury, over plaintiff’s objection: “Do you find that under the original contract the parties’ intent was for [plaintiff] to work until the project was completed[?],” which the jury answered “No”; “Do you find that the promise to pay [plaintiff] the additional $12.00 an hour was supported by legal consideration as that term was defined to you[?],” which the jury answered “Yes.”
Thus the appellant is mistaken when he states, as the caption in that portion of his brief setting out the argument addressing the three enumerations dealing with jury instructions: “The trial court was required to determine as a matter of law whether the contract was ambiguous and committed error by submitting the issue of whether an ambiguity existed to the jury.” The court had undertaken and fulfilled its duty to ascertain whether the contract was unambiguous as a matter of law and, after concluding it was still ambiguous after applying the rules of construction, it submitted the contract to the jury to resolve the remaining ambiguity by a finding of fact as to the intention of the parties. This was in conformity with the sense of the ruling, cited by the majority, in Bennett v. Dove, 93 Ga. App. 57 (3) (90 SE2d 601) (1955): “ ‘The construction of contracts is a prerogative of the courts which is delegated to the jury only when there are ambiguous expressions in the contract and resort must be had to aliunde testimony in order to clarify the meaning of the language used, as it was understood by the parties, and thus make plain their real intention.’ Ludden & Bates Southern Music House v. Dairy & Farm Supply Co., 17 Ga. App. 581 (87 S.E. 823).”
The. court’s statement to the jury of the law governing the ascertaining of the intention of the parties when there is a dispute between them on this matter was not error. It is not error to charge correct legal principles applicable to a case. Davidson v. Consolidated Quarries Corp., 99 Ga. App. 359, 373 (7) (108 SE2d 495) (1959); see also Griffith v. Newman, 217 Ga. 533, 540 (4) (123 SE2d 723) (1962). That is particularly true when the now-targeted instructions are considered as part of the whole charge, which must be done. Shirley v. State, 245 Ga. 616, 619 (3) (266 SE2d 218) (1980). The instructions were not inappropriate, taking into account the defendant’s efforts to persuade the jury that the contract was unambiguous in his favor.
None of the cases cited by the majority holds that it is error, much less reversible error, to instruct the jury on the principles now challenged. By way of the interrogatories which directed the jurors’ attention to finding the contracting parties’ intent, by the plethora of testimony and evidence outside of the written contract, and by the court’s charge in its entirety, it is manifest that the jury was not misled as to its proper function in deciding the case and reaching a verdict. The jury’s answers to the interrogatories also bear this out. It *191did not find that it was the parties’ intent by the contract that the contractor be found to work until the project was completed. The jury found that there was new consideration for the promise to pay an additional hourly wage if the contractor completed the project, implying of necessity that they took into consideration all of the evidence and found that it had not been the intention of the parties originally to bind the contractor to finish the job.
Decided March 13, 1990
Rehearing denied March 28, 1990
Adams, Gardner, Ellis & Inglesby, George L. Lewis, for appellant.
Oliver, Maner & Gray, Wendy W. Williamson, for appellee.
While instructing the jury on what constitutes a contract and how to ascertain the meaning of its terms, the court merely apprised the jury that, in effect, it could not construe the contract as a matter of law by looking at the four corners of the contract and applying the legal rules of construction, as there was ambiguity and it remained despite the completion of this process. The jury took it from there. This was in compliance with the three-step process of contract construction reiterated in Travelers Ins. Co. v. Blakey, supra at 700. There was no error, as there was in Travelers, where the trial court did not apply the rules of construction after first finding an ambiguity and, concluding that it still remained, only then submitting the ambiguity to the jury.
Further, appellant fails to relate each enumeration to a corresponding section of the argument in the brief. He fails also to show where each of plaintiff’s requested charges and defendant’s related objection and the corresponding giving of the charge appear in the record. Rule 15 (c) (3). See Law v. Smith, 226 Ga. 298 (174 SE2d 893) (1970); Benefield v. Benefield, 224 Ga. 208, 209 (5) (160 SE2d 895) (1968); Hicks v. Maple Valley Corp., 223 Ga. 577, 578 (156 SE2d 904) (1967); Chapman v. Gray, 8 Ga. 337, 339 (1850).
I am authorized to state that Presiding Judge Banke joins in this dissent.