Court Opinion

ID: 9827515
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-01 17:37:00.340483+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:42:32.578965
License: Public Domain

On Rehearing.
If a contract be unenforceable, as against a plea that it violates the statute of frauds and can neither be specifically enforced, nor enforced by an award of damages, as appellee seems to concede, it is difficult for us to see how the values of the property could be the measure of damages to be awarded in an action to recover the value of the services. Suppose the reasonable value of the services was one amount, and the value of the property was a different amount, how could effect be given to the value of the property without thereby giving some effect to the unenforceable contract? If in an action to recover damages for breach of the contract the measure of damages is the value of the property recoverable if the contract be not rendered unenforceable by the defendant setting up the statute of frauds, then it seems to us the value of the property as the measure of damages results from the contract. If the contract be unenforceable and the plaintiff must rely on his right to recover the value of his services and the reasonable value of the services be different from the value of the property, as it well may be, it seems to us the value of the property cannot be held, as a matter of law, to be the reasonable value of the services, except by giving some effect to the unenforceable contract. The authorities relied on, if sound, seem to be restricted in application to contracts to devise specific property which is different from the agreement in this case, and would not, we think, be controlling for that reason.