Court Opinion

ID: 9586821
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 23:15:33.46766+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:32:53.187333
License: Public Domain

GOLDEN, Justice,
specially concurring, in which CARDINE, Chief Justice, joins.
I concur in the result in this case, but would have used a more straightforward analysis to hold in favor of International Fabricators, Inc. I prefer that the majority opinion be written so that members of the Wyoming Bar will have no difficulty determining how it fits into our established rules of construction for contract terms.
I would have analyzed this case using the following standards of appellate review. As a matter of law, this court determines whether a written contract term is ambiguous by independently reviewing the disputed term in light of the actual language of the entire contract. State Farm Fire and Casualty Company v. Paulson, 756 P.2d 764, 766 (Wyo.1988); and Bethurem v. Hammett, 736 P.2d 1128, 1136 (Wyo.1987). A term is ambiguous if, considered in light of the plain language of the entire contract, it is susceptible to more than one reasonable meaning. State Farm, 756 P.2d at 766; and Farr v. Link, 746 P.2d 431, 433 (Wyo.1987). When an ambiguity is found, its presence justifies examining extrinsic evidence to determine the reasonable intention of the parties. State v. Pennzoil Company, 752 P.2d 975, 978-79 (Wyo.1988). When extrinsic evidence is considered in this context, the interpretation of the ambiguous term becomes a mixed question of fact and law, which is best answered by the trial court in most circumstances. Kilbourne-Park Corporation v. Buckingham, 404 P.2d 244, 246 (Wyo.1965). Further, ambiguous contract terms are generally construed against the party who drafted the written agreement. Pennzoil, 752 P.2d at 979-80.
Applying these fundamental standards here, we could easily have adopted the trial court’s finding that the phrase “turn key” was ambiguous as a matter of law, thereby *1020requiring consideration of extrinsic evidence. We then could have reiterated the extrinsic evidence as considered by the trial court that Smithco’s employee authored the October 19, 1984 letter containing the disputed terms and deferred to the trial court’s interpretation of the mixed question of fact and law before it. I would have reached the majority’s result by affirming what appears to be the trial court’s use of this fundamental analysis.