Court Opinion

ID: 9827443
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-01 17:33:19.384133+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:42:31.426597
License: Public Domain

On Motion for Rehearing.
If this case is stripped of the facts bearing upon fraud, mistake, overreaching, or whether there was only an agreement to give only one day’s work, to which appellee is already entitled under a contract of employment, and the like — all of which were jury questions under the evidence, and not for the trial court or this court — the question becomes simple.
[12-15] In the first place, a written contract imports a consideration. Our statute provides:
“Every contract in writing hereafter made, shall be held to import a consideration in the same manner and as fully as sealed instruments have heretofore done.” Article 7093, R. C. S.; Warren v. Gentry, 21 Tex. Civ. App. 151. 50 S. W. 1025; Railway Co. v. Shirley, 62 Tex. Civ. App. 158, 130 S. W. 687; Harris v. Cato, 26 Tex. 338.
Where the writing does not show upon its face a want of consideration, it is admissible in evidence, without proof aliunde of a consideration. The duty, therefore, was on ap-pellee, who asserted it was without consideration to prove that assertion. This was a jury question upon the facts proven, and not for the trial judge or this court. In the Quebe Case, 98 Tex. 6, 81 S. W. 20, 66 L. R. A. 734, 4 Ann. Cas. 545, the court passed, on a contract of which this is a literal copy, with the exception of the parties, injury named, date, and the like. The appellant railway had evidently used the contract in that case to model the one here set up. The Supreme Court, in speaking of that contract, said:
“The consideration was a valuable and legal one, though small. Considering the fact that the matter settled was regarded by both parties as involving no large amount, it cannot be said that the smallness of the consideration, by itself, furnishes ground for disregarding the release.”
It would be absurd to say the Supreme Court held in that case the contract was void because on its face it showed no consideration, and that it was rendered valid by proving $1 paid, and one day’s work. The contract was definite as to its terms, and evidences .mutuality. It was not indefinite or unilateral as is the contract in the Smith Case, 98 Tex. 47, 81 S. W. 22, 66 L. R. A. 741, 107 Am. -St. Rep. 607, 4 Ann. Cas. 644, so much relied upon by appellee. In that case the following is the provision of the company’s promise:
“Now, therefore, in consideration of re-employment by said company for such time only as may be satisfactory to said company.”
This contract was clearly indefinite as to time and was unilateral. There was no promise on the part of the company to employ for any time. Employment rested alone upon the will or wish of the company; hence there was no contract binding upon either party, no meeting of minds; and such is the nature of the contract in the case of Railway Company v. Winton, 7 Tex. Civ. App. 57, 26 S. W. 770. In the Smith Case the time of employment was so indefinite by the terms of the contract that employment thereafter would not relate back to the original promise and thereby make a valid contract. The time of employment is required to be sufii-*533ciently definite in title contract to enable the court to ascertain it. In other words, the consideration is to be tested by the agreement and not what was done under it. In the contract in question the amount paid and the time of employment promised was definite by the agreement, and hence the court could not, as a matter of law, exclude the contract from the jury.
[16-18] It is contended by appellee that he was never paid the dollar. The terms of the contract are:
“For and in consideration of an order on the treasurer of said company, for the sum oi one dollar, the receipt whereof is hereby acknowledged.”
Did appellee get the order “on the treasurer ” ? He does not testify whether he did or not in his evidence. If he got the order the company did not breach its contract; if he did not, whose fault was it that he did not? The evidence does not show that the company failed or refused to give the order, or that its treasurer refused to pay it. A party cannot base an action for breach of contract on his own fault or neglect. It is insisted that after executing the contract appellee did not work for appellant, as found by us in the original opinion. He testified:
That on the 4th day of October, 1914, about 11:30 in the morning, Sunday, he received the injury. From that time until Thursday thereafter lie did not work. “On Thursday I went back to work. The same character of work that I was doing when I left. I think the last day I worked was on the 13th of October.”
The contract offered in evidence is dated October 9, 1914, and appellee testified the release was signed by him on that day. After the injury on the 4th he testifies he went back to work on the 8th. He got an order on that day from his foreman, directed to the company’s doctor, and went to see the doctor the next morning. After going to see the doctor, and after he returned, he was required to sign the paper. The doctor, on that visit, found nothing in his eye. Appel-lee then says after he went back to work his eye continued to trouble him, and later he went to Topeka. Broadus, a witness, testified after the time of the alleged injury:
“The plaintiff came back in two or three days and worked two or three days before he went to the ‘hospital’ ”
—which is shown to be in Topeka. This testimony clearly raises the issue that he worked at least one day after he signed the release. It was certainly an issue for the jury to determine, and not for the court. In our judgment, on the question of admitting the contract in evidence, it makes no difference whether appellant proved he worked or was given the order. That matter was for the appellee in any event. We do not understand the mere fact that appellee did not work or receive his dollar would defeat the contract. He has a valid promise therefor. He, having accepted the terms of the contract, by executing the release did what he was obligated to do, leaving an outstanding liability only on the side of the railway company. Heisch v. Adams, 81 Tex. 94, 16 S. W. 790; Rose v. Railway Co., 31 Tex. 60.
If the railway company refused to pay or furnish the work promised, a different question may be presented. There is nothing in this record to show refusal on its part.
The appellee cites Freeman v. Morrow, 156 S. W. 284, as holding contrary to the Supreme Court on this contract. That case was tried before the court without a jury, who filed his findings of fact. The question was one of fact, whether there was a consideration for the release. The trial court found there was none. The question was not whether the agreement to employ for one day at the usual rate of pay was a valuable consideration, but appellant was already legally bound to employ for that same day. The trial court found there was a contract between the employs and the company in writing for a definite time, which had not expired when the release was given, and would not expire until after the one day mentioned in the release. The trial court, whose province it was in that case to pass on the facts, so found; the appellate court held, under such circumstances, there was no consideration for the release. It is useless to repeat the facts were for the jury and not for the trial court, or this court. When the release was offered in evidence, it should have been admitted to be considered by the jury with the other facts as to whether there was a consideration therefor. The' trial court or this court have not the power to determine the facts in this case. It was for the jury.
Motion overruled.