Court Opinion

ID: 9450710
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 16:55:46.09465+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:32:25.615307
License: Public Domain

KILEY, Circuit Judge
(dissenting).
I respectfully dissent.
The district court found that the contract between the parties was breached by defendant’s delivery at Mobile of the contaminated meal, but decided that plaintiff could not prove the breach proximately caused plaintiff any damage. In my view the court erred in precluding plaintiff from a trial.
Plaintiff’s answers to interrogatories, and the certificate of inspection, showing contamination in the meal, were considered by the district court in support of plaintiff’s claim that it was damaged by defendant at Mobile. These, in my opinion, were sufficient to present an issue of the proximate cause and extent of the damage. What occurred in Naples, Italy is not involved in the question.
The district court misconceived the elements involved in the question whether there was a genuine issue of material fact under F.R.Civ.P. 56, when it regarded as material the question whether the Italian Government would have accepted as fit for human consumption cornmeal already condemned under the United States food and drug laws because of the presence of rodent excreta. Whether or not the Italian Government would accept the meal, the United States could not reasonably offer as a gift to the people of any country food which our law condemns as unfit for human consumption. Defendant knew from the contract that the meal was intended for human consumption and for “domestic or export shipment,” and it breached its contract by delivering meal which failed to meet the contract specifications and which was unsuitable for its intended purpose. By the terms of the contract defendant agreed that it
“shall be liable for loss, damage, destruction, or deterioration from any cause whatever of commodity received from Agency [Commodity Credit Corporation] until serviced commodity has been delivered to Agency in accordance with provisions of the Contract.”
Under these circumstances the United States could not be required, as an element of its case, to prove that the Italian Government would have refused to accept the meal because of the presence of rodent excreta. That is immaterial.
But even if the question whether the meal would have been regarded as fit for human consumption under Italian law was material, the district court improperly placed a burden of going forward on plaintiff. In its complaint plaintiff alleged that the meal delivered by defendant was, without qualification, unfit for human consumption, and the appended inspection certificate showed its failure to meet American food and drug law *408standards. In support of its motion for summary judgment defendant showed only that the meal was adjudged unfit for human consumption in Italy because of mold fungus and that there is no causal connection between rodent excreta and mold fungus. Defendant’s affidavit was not sufficient to show that the meal was fit for its intended purpose of human consumption, in spite of the rodent excreta, in Italy. Thus a genuine issue of material fact remained and plaintiff had no burden of going forward with affidavits or other evidence.1 If defendant wished to show that the Italian Government would have accepted the meal for human consumption, contaminated as it was by rodent excreta, and that the United States would not thereby be prejudiced, the burden was upon it, as movant, to present evidence to that effect. United States v. Ball, 326 F.2d 898 (4th Cir. 1964). Only in that event could the plaintiff have been required to make a showing to the contrary sufficient to raise a genuine issue of material fact to avoid summary judgment against it.
In addition, in the absence of any evidence on the point it was as reasonable to assume that Italian law also would condemn this meal because of the rodent excreta as it was to assume the contrary. The entire shipment was rejected because of the mold fungus. Presumably, then, there was no reason for the Italian inspectors to go further and reject half of it because that half also contained rodent excreta. On motion for summary judgment, where “the inferences to be drawn from the underlying facts contained in * * * [affidavits, exhibits, etc.] must be viewed in the light most favorable to the party opposing the motion,” United States v. Diebold, Inc., 369 U.S. 654, 655, 82 S.Ct. 993, 994, 8 L.Ed.2d 176 (1962), it was improper for the district court, on the basis of speculation that Italian law might be different from the United States law, to place on plaintiff, the opposing party, the burden of showing the contrary.
I agree with plaintiff that it was damaged in Mobile by delivery of the contaminated cornmeal “to the extent of the difference between unadulterated cornmeal and the cornmeal unadulterated by rodent excreta.” This is unaffected by the shipowner’s breach of its contract and the further damage to the contaminated meal from mold fungus. Had defendant performed its obligations the shipowner’s liability would have been the difference in value between unadulterated meal and meal contaminated by mold fungus.
The majority decision leaves defendant with the price plaintiff paid it for processing uncontaminated meal, plaintiff with the greatly diminished if not destroyed liability of the shipowner for its breach, and settles the loss on plaintiff, the only innocent person involved.
In my opinion there was a genuine issue of material fact made or offered by the answers to interrogatories, the inspection certificate, and the admitted contract price paid for processing uncontaminated corn into meal. Plaintiff was damaged at Mobile and should not be precluded from trial upon the facts against defendant, who caused the damage, because a third party caused further damage or because the damage might be slight. See Corbin on Contracts § 1001 (1964 ed.) Defendant could show at a trial whatever was relevant in mitigation.

. As the Notes of the Advisory Committee on the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure point out, in regard to the amendment to subsection (e) of Rule 56, effective July 1, 1963, “where the evidentiary matter in support of the motion does not establish the absence of a genuine issue, summary judgment must be denied even if no opposing evidentiary matter is presented.” 28 U.S.C.A. (Supp.1964) pp. 71-72.