Court Opinion

ID: 9767096
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 05:09:31.444032+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:30:28.545892
License: Public Domain

GREENHILL, Justice
(concurring).
The Court of Civil Appeals denied a recovery of damages here because the contract, it felt, was too indefinite in its provisions under Bryant v. Clark, 163 Tex. 596, 358 S.W.2d 614 (1962). The holding in Bryant v. Clark was that the contract was not sufficiently definite to be specifically enforceable. The contract here in question, viewed in context, is different in some respects from that in the Bryant case; and I would not extend Bryant v. Clark. See the criticism of that case in 5A Corbin, Contracts 283 (1964).
*98But assuming that the contract here, under Bryant v. Clark, is not definite enough to be specifically enforced, it is sufficiently definite to support an action for damages. Restatement, Contracts § 370, comment b.
There are Texas cases in which damages have been denied after a holding that the contract was not specifically enforceable. See, e. g., Wilson v. Fisher, 144 Tex. 53, 188 S.W.2d 150 (1945); Robertson v. Melton, 131 Tex. 325, 115 S.W.2d 624, 118 A.L.R. 1505 (1938); and Alworth v. Ellison, 27 S.W.2d 639 (Tex.Civ.App.1930, writ refused). In each of these cases, however, the contracts were held to be within the Statute of Frauds and not enforceable for that reason in a suit for damages. 1 Willis-ton, Contracts § 16 (Rev.ed. 1936). The contract here in question is not within the Statute of Frauds and will support an action for damages.
While I agree with the judgment entered by the Court, it seems to me that the above is a sounder ground upon which to rest our decision.