Court Opinion

ID: 8192707
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2022-09-09 23:15:49.627937+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T16:40:39.660720
License: Public Domain

Winslow, C. J.
The findings of the court to the effect that in October the defendants ordered the plaintiff to stop all shipments of coal until further orders, and that during the first part of November they ordered two cars under the first contract and three cars under the third, which were never delivered, and that no further orders to ship were given before November 20th, when defendants declined to pay and thus (as plaintiff claims) breached the contracts, are sufficiently supported by evidence and cannot be disturbed.
But the defendants claim that, even conceding these findings to be true, there was no default on the first contract because it was a separate and independent contract, that only one carload of coal had been delivered under it, and that on August 31st the defendants’ payments of $400 in September and $500 in October more than paid for all the coal delivered in July and August, and hence that there was *292nothing due on this contract in November and no breach by the failure to pay at that time.
This contention seems now to be made for the first time. We discover no traces of it in the trial record. The great difficulty with it is that it is quite clear that the parties themselves never treated their transactions as separate transactions, but all as one continuing and continuous deal. Both parties kept their books in that way. Their accounts were simply running accounts upon which payments were made from time to time, not to be applied to any particular shipment or contract but upon the account generally. The so-called separate contracts were considered and treated simply as parts of the general deal, as items in one continuing transaction. The correspondence shows that no claim of separate contracts or of rights arising therefrom was made even when the plaintiff was most insistent in his demands for payment of the whole October balance on November 20th. When the letter sent on behalf of the defendants by their banker on November 22d was written there was an excellent opportunity to make this claim with force, but it is clear that there was no such thought. Had they then said to the plaintiff, “You contracted to sell us twelve cars of stove coal, you have sent but one, for which we have paid, we are not in default on this contract, and we demand that you continue to ship coal under it notwithstanding our failure to pay under other contracts,” the proposition might have been difficult for the plaintiff to meet; but it is evident from that letter as well as from other letters in evidence and the accounts kept by the parties that the formal contracts were regarded by both parties as incidents. of one long transaction, rather than as separate transactions by themselves, as orders rather than as independent contracts. We know of no reason why they should not now be treated as the parties chose to treat them, especially when the contention is first made in the court of last resort.
Treating the case on this basis, we have a case of sale of *293goods with delivery as well as payment to be made in in-., stalments, and we squarely meet the question whether defendants’ failure to pay the amount due on November 20th justified the plaintiff in declining to make any further deliveries, or whether the plaintiff was required to go on and fill its contracts notwithstanding defendants’ default.
On this question the authorities are not in entire accord. For a review of the cases see Quarton v. American L. B. Co. 143 Iowa, 517, 121 N. W. 1009, 32 L. R. A. n. s. 1, and note. In this court see Campbell & Cameron Co. v. Weisse, 121 Wis. 491, 99 N. W. 340, also German American Bank v. Webster M. Co. 144 Wis. 314, 128 N. W. 48. In this state the matter is now unquestionably governed by the uniform sales act (sub. 2, sec. 1684t—45, Stats.), which provides in substance that, where there is a contract for the sale of goods to be delivered and paid for in instalments and there is a defective delivery of or failure to- pay for an instalment, the question whether the breach is so material as to justify, the injured party in refusing to' go on with the contract and suing for his entire damages at once depends in each case “on the terms of the contract and the circumstances of the case.”
Applying this rule to the present case, there seems to us to be no doubt that the refusal of the defendants to’ pay the amount due on November 20th was so material as to justify the plaintiff in his refusal to make further deliveries. A mere neglect to pay an instalment for a time might not be sufficient, but here there was more. As we read the letter of November 22d, it was a plain refusal to make any further payments on coal until all the coal contracted for had been delivered — although much of it was not yet due to be delivered. That the plaintiff so understood the letter there can be no doubt. This is clearly shown by his reply of November 22d, in which he says:
“We are this morning in receipt of a letter from the First National Bank of Madison, Wisconsin, advising that you *294have deposited $1,000 with them to be remitted when we ship you five cars of Pocahontas mine-run coal, eleven cars of Franklin county coal, four cars of White Star lump coal.”
Later in the same letter the plaintiff says:
“The money you owe us is long past due, and now you propose, not to give it to us so we can use it in our business, but to deposit it where it is of no use to us, and hold it out on us until possibly April 1st.”
This shows that the plaintiff construed the letter as a refusal to pay any further monthly instalments until all the coal had been delivered under all the orders.
So far as appears from the evidence the defendants never notified the plaintiff that he had construed the letter of November 22d wrongly; apparently they were content to have it so construed. This was practically a repudiation of all provisions of the contracts requiring payments in monthly instalments. It was not mere neglect or refusal to pay one instalment, but a refusal to be bound by one of the material provisions of the contract in the future while insisting on full performance by the plaintiff. Such a breach must be regarded as a material one, which justifies refusal to further perform on the part of the other party. .
There is another well established principle which seems decisive of the case, namely, the principle that, where one party to an executory contract deliberately declares that he will not perform on his part, the other party may at his option treat the contract as terminated. Woodman v. Blue Grass L. Co. 125 Wis. 489, 103 N. W. 236, 104 N. W. 920. That is, in effect, what the defendants did here when they declined to pay anything until all of the coal had been delivered.
By the Court. — Judgment affirmed.