Court Opinion

ID: 9688852
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 18:09:11.285267+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:18:42.670960
License: Public Domain

ON REHEARING
COLEMAN, Justice.
On application for rehearing, plaintiff 'argues that defendant executed the labor and materials bond here sued on in performance of defendant’s obligation to do so, which obligation defendant incurred by executing the bid bond.
Plaintiff argues that, by the bid bond, contractor and defendant agreed that, if the contractor’s bid was accepted by the owner, the contractor and defendant would do one of two things, namely: (1) execute and deliver a contract together with a performance bond and a labor and materials bond; or, (2) refuse to execute the contract and pay to the owner five per cent of the amount of the contractor’s bid.
Plaintiff says that defendant chose the first alternative and, in executing the labor and materials bond, was merely carrying out defendant’s own primary obligation incurred by executing the bid bond, so that, the labor and materials bond became the primary obligation of defendant and not a promise to answer for the debt, default, or miscarriage of the contractor. Plaintiff says that, as a result, the labor and materials bond was not a collateral undertaking by defendant, but. became defendant’s original undertaking to pay its own debt or to discharge its own obligation.
No authority is cited in brief filed on rehearing to support plaintiff’s argument nor do we understand that any case cited in briefs previously filed supports the argument. We think that the argument is fallacious in that it fails to state correctly the obligation of defendant under the bid bond.
*642Assuming arguendo that, defendant, by executing the bid bond, obligated itself to execute the labor and materials bond, we are of opinion that the obligation, if any, of defendant remained an obligation to execute merely another promise to answer for the debt, default, or miscarriage of contractor, to wit, the labor and materials bond, which was such a promise and within the statute of frauds, as we undertook to show on original deliverance.
So, if execution of the labor and materials bond should be regarded, arguendo, as performance of defendant’s obligation under the bid bond, the labor and materials bond still remains a promise to answer which must be in writing under the statute of frauds.
Opinion extended.
Application overruled.
LIVINGSTON, C. J., and GOODWYN and HARWOOD, JJ., concur.