Court Opinion

ID: 9559955
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 17:39:17.632988+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:11:55.090913
License: Public Domain

*493Duckworth, Chief Justice,
dissenting. The decisive question is whether the terms of the bond limit its protection to the obligee therein, or whether it protects materialmen. The answer is to be found in the language employed by the parties to the bond in stating its obligation. To regard the decisions in American Surety Co. v. Small Quarries Co., 157 Ga. 33, and American Surety Co. v. County of Bibb, 162 Ga. 388, where the plain obligation of the bond was to protect the obligee against claims for material, etc., as controlling here, where the obligation is not as there, to protect the obligee against claims, but is to pay all such claims, is to disregard the decisive question. In Union Indemnity Co. v. Riley, 169 Ga. 229, this court clearly marked the distinction in the two obligations. In headnote 2 it was held that the portion of the obligation expressed in the bond as follows, "and shall pay all persons who have contracts directly with the principal for labor or materials,” inured to the benefit of the persons named and gave them a benefit in the bond, for which suit on the bond by the promisee for their use might be maintained. There is simply no conceivable difference in substance in the obligation there to pay a designated class for materials, and in the obligation here to pay for materials. Obviously the materials could be paid for only by paying those furnishing them. The Riley case is concurred in by all the Justices and is controlling here. Neither American Surety Co. v. Small Quarries Co., supra, nor American Surety Co. v. County of Bibb, supra, is concurred in by all the Justices, and hence, if applicable, would not be binding. Here we have the parties plainly expressing their agreement which obligates the obligor to pay for materials, and the suit is to recover for a breach of this solemn obligation. Here, as in all cases, the safest, the fairest, and the most just course for the court is to accept the plain facts and render judgment accordingly. It is never good grounds for complaint that one is required to fulfill legal obligations wtiich he has for a consideration deliberately assumed. I am authorized to say that Mr. Justice Head and Mr. Justice Hawkins concur in this dissent.