Smith, J. Denson

English

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Louisiana Law ReviewVolume 20 | Number 2The Work of the Louisiana Supreme Court for the1958-1959 TermFebruary 1960Civil Code and Related Subjects: ConventionalObligationsJ. Denson SmithThis Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Law Reviews and Journals at LSU Law Digital Commons. It has been accepted forinclusion in Louisiana Law Review by an authorized editor of LSU Law Digital Commons. For more information, please contact kreed25@lsu.edu.Repository CitationJ. Denson Smith, Civil Code and Related Subjects: Conventional Obligations, 20 La. L. Rev. (1960)Available at: https://digitalcommons.law.lsu.edu/lalrev/vol20/iss2/6LOUISIANA LAW REVIEWproperty could only be administered and sold to pay communitydebts, the presumption which attaches after this 67-year period(term between the succession sale and the present attack) isthat community debts existed.During the past term, the court also decided the followingcases dealing with successions, donations, and community prop-erty. They are McGregor v. McGregor,81 which has been omittedbecause the decision turned solely on questions of fact, andJones v. Jones,3 2 which has been omitted because it involved noquestion of substantial import."CONVENTIONAL OBLIGATIONSJ. Denson Smith*It has been said that, since man lives by his labors, when aperson renders beneficial services to another it is not to be pre-sumed they are rendered gratuitously. Consequently when aperson having the opportunity to reject the services of anotherreceives the benefit of them knowing or having reason to knowthat they are not being rendered gratuitously, he thereby con-sents to pay their reasonable value. These principles were in-volved in Bender v. International Paint Co.' where a realtor wasclaiming a commission by way of quantum meruit for bringinga lessor and lessee together. Both parties were made defendants.The court found against the realtor on the facts, since it ap-peared that neither party had reason to believe that the paymentof a commission was his responsibility. A generous reading ofplaintiff's case might have indicated that his claim, based on theallegation that he was the procuring cause of the lease, was ac-tually planted on the theory that he was entitled to recover inquasi contract to prevent the unjust enrichment of the defend-ants. It is not clear that this possibility was considered by thecourt. If so, it may have been believed that there was no show-ing of enrichment or no showing that whatever enrichment mayhave occurred was unjust. The fact that plaintiff was claiming31. 236 La. 184, 107 So.2d 437 (1958).32. 236 La. 52, 106 So.2d 713 (1958).33. This case may be used as an aid for the analysis of complicated accountingprocedures.*Professor of Law, Louisiana State University.1. 237 La. 569, 111 So.2d 775 (1959).[Vol. XX1960] CIVIL CODE AND RELATED SUBJECTS 225the reasonable value of his services suggests that he was pro-ceeding on the theory that he had a contractual rather than aquasi contractual right to be reimbursed for benefits received,although this is by no means conclusive. The parties werebrought together by the efforts of the realtor to the benefit ofboth, yet neither had to pay. However, the courts might be trou-bled with fewer cases involving such claims if realtors dependedless on the theory that whenever they are a procuring causethey are entitled to compensation and more on securing an ex-press obligation to pay in return for the services to be renderedby them.In Garcia v. Dulcich2 the court found it unnecessary to de-termine whether the plaintiff's action in having a house and lotfor which he paid in full transferred to the defendant and him-self jointly, in return for living with the defendant and receivinghis board, lodging, laundry, and care constituted a donation oran onerous contract since in either event the benefit granted tothe defendant was subject to annulment. From the standpointof the cause or motive of the plaintiff the transaction mighthave been basically either a donation or a bargaining transac-tion, depending on whether the transferor was moved by a spiritof liberality or a desire to assure himself that his needs wouldbe taken care of for the rest of his life by buying such assurance.However, the Code presumably renders it unnecessary to under-take to identify the true cause in such cases, since it providesthat the rules relating to donations will not apply unless thevalue of the thing given exceeds by one-half the value of thecharges imposed.3 This would mean that an evaluation of theobligation of care and support would have to be made in orderto apply Article 1526, to which end mortality tables could beused to get at the probable number of years over which the ob-ligation would have to be performed. The court took the viewthat no such finding was necessary because there was either afailure to fulfill the conditions of an onerous donation or a fail-ure to perform the obligations of a synallagmatic contract. Itis interesting to notice that a previous similar case treated sucha transfer as an innominate contract translative of property.The suggestion was that the transfer was made by way of bar-gain and not of gift.42. 237 La. 359, 111 So.2d 309 (1959).3. LA. CivrL CODE art. 1526 (1870).4. Thielman v. Gahlman, 119 La. 350, 44 So. 123 (1907).LOUISIANA LAW REVIEWIn Orr v. Walker the court correctly held that a contractmay be avoided because of fraud practiced by the other partyalthough no pecuniary loss is involved. Article 1847 of the CivilCode, relied upon as authority, is clear to the point.In Loew's, Inc. v. Don George, Inc.,6 the court concluded thata demand for triple damages under the state and federal anti-trust laws was not contractual or quasi-contractual in naturebUt sounded in tort and was subject to a prescription period ofone year.PARTICULAR CONTRACTSJ. Denson Smith*SALESThe degree of care required in the formulation of legislationis amatter of common knowledge. Even greater care is requiredto translate accurately legislative provisions from their originallanguage into another. That the person or persons who trans-lated the Louisiana Civil Code from French into English werewanting in this respect is also a matter of common knowledge.Some expressions of the court in Zemurray v. Boe1 seem ques-tionable, perhaps for this reason. Creole, a land developer, paid$500 for a two-year option to purchase certain acreage from theplaintiff. The exercise of the option was subjected to the condi-tion that on or before a stated date Creole pay or buy a note ofa third party held by the plaintiff. This Creole failed to do,hence the present suit to cancel the option notwithstanding thatthe note was paid in full prior to the expiration of the optionperiod. After a painstaking review of the complicated evidence,the majority of the court found no basis for holding the plaintiffestopped to claim that the option had terminated for failure, ofthe condition. A dissent took the contrary view. Although theultimate disposition of the case turned on the matter of estoppel,in rejecting a contention that the option was not forfeited sinceCreole had not been put in default, a prerequisite to an action inresolution, the majority opinion took the position that the pur-chase or payment of the mentioned note within the stated period5. 236 La. 740, 109 So.2d 77 (1959).6. 237 La. 132, 110 So.2d 553 (1959).*Professor of Law, Louisiana State University.-1. 2.35 La. 623, 105 So.2d 243 (1958).[Vol..XX

Civil Code and Related Subjects: Conventional Obligations

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Civil Code and Related Subjects: Conventional Obligations

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