Court Opinion

ID: 9443023
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-03 19:07:53.70785+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:29:20.328231
License: Public Domain

RUSSELL, Circuit Judge
(dissenting).
I find in the allegations of the answer and counterclaim no basis for permitting the substitution of the retrospective “discretion” of the Court and jury for the discretion which the lender is- granted by the terms of the contract as to the time and circumstances of the advancements which it assumed to make. The answer and counterclaim show no breach of any duty assumed 'by the lender. The request for opportunity to amend to present contentions not pressed in the trial Court does not even now clearly inform us of terms contemplated to be alleged, other than that the “financial help given by the Eagle Company was not given in sufficient time [immediately] and that this was a breach of the contract.” The contract will not support this defense and claim and we should not wait until the termination of a long and expensive trial to so declare. I am also of the opinion that the majority incorrectly . interprets the effect of the “save harmless” provision of the contract. The principle ruled in the cases cited is sound law and properly applicable when an indemnitee seeks to transfer his own liability to a third person to the indemnitor, but is not applicable in the determination of liability between the parties arising in the course of such dealings as the contract now under consideration contemplates. The correct principle is that we applied in Phillippine Air Lines v. Texas Engineering & Mfg. Co., 5 Cir., 181 F.2d 923, 925.
I think the trial Court correctly entered judgment on the pleadings, and therefore respectfully dissent from the judgment of reversal.