Torts affecting economic rights

(i) Interference with contract: without lawful justification persuading a person to break his contract with another, or acting in such a way as to prevent its performance.

(ii) Intimidation: making a treat intended to cause another to act or refrain from acting in a certain way to that person’s detriment or that of a third party.

(iii) Passing off: representing one’s goods or services to be those of another, causing loss of trade or damage to business reputation. Trading in a name similar to that of another similar business to the confusion of the public.

(iv) Deceit: making a false statement with intent to deceive, intending another to act upon it to his detriment.

(v) Negligent misstatement: breach of duty of care in giving advice to a person to whom one owes a duty of care, causing him damage of a foreseeable kind including purely economic loss.

Torts affecting reputation

(i) Defamation: ‘The publication of a statement which tends to lower a person in the estimation of right thinking members of society generally; or which tends to make them shun or avoid that person’. If the defamation is in permanent form it is a libel which is actionable per se (without proof of damage); if it is in impermanent form, it is a slander which is generally only actionable on proof of loss. Libel includes defamatory statements in writing or via the media, television, film, records, stage and so on, whereas slander is restricted to verbal statements.

Torts affecting rights generally

(i) Public nuisance: behaviour which materially affects the reasonable comfort and convenience of a class of people who come within the sphere or neighbourhood of its operation; for example, carrying on an offensive trade, obstructing the highway.

(ii) Conspiracy: a combination of two or more persons planning together to injure a third by unlawful means.

Questions.

1) How are torts classified?

2) To whom is the duty owed in case of trespass of land?

3) Against whom is the wrong done in case of conversion?

4) What kinds of economic rights can be affected by passing-off?

5) What kind of defamation is actionable without proof of damage?

6) What torts affect rights generally?

Find the following sentences in the text.

1) Лица несут ответственность за конкретные правонарушения, преследуемые в исковом порядке, которые называются «деликт».

2) Этот деликт преследуется как таковой, то есть подвергается исковому преследованию без доказательства нанесения ущерба.

3) Продажа товаров лицом, которое не является их владельцем, составляет присвоение имущества истинного владельца.

4) Обман: ложное заявление с намерением обмануть так, чтобы другое лицо действовало на основании этого к своему ущербу.

5) Заговор: объединение двух или более лиц, намеревающихся нанести вред третьему лицу при помощи противоправных средств.

Recite the main points of the text.

Unit 10. The Law of Contract

Words to be remembered.

tortious and contractual obligations – деликтные и контрактные

обязательства

legally enforceable – имеющий по закону исковую силу

breach of contract – нарушение договора

imply – подразумевать

obligor – лицо, принявшее на себя обязательство

obligee – лицо, по отношению к которому принято обязательство

obligations under trust – обязательства в связи с исполнением

доверительных функций

trustee – лицо, распоряжающееся имуществом на началах

доверительной собственности

quasi-trustee – как бы доверенное лицо

holder – держатель, владелец

owe fiduciary duties – быть обязанным исполнять роль доверенного

лица

entrust – поручать, возлагать

to be liable for – быть ответственным, быть обязанным

misappropriate – незаконно завладеть, присвоить, совершить

растрату

assets – средства, фонды, имущество, активы

constructive – возникающий в силу закона

unwitting – невольный, нечаянный. неумышленный

fraud – обман, мошенничество

negligence – халатность, небрежность

matching – согласованный, оговоренный

by deed – документально (оформленный)

tangible – ощутимый, реальный

incompetent – неправоспособный

compliance – совпадение (здесь)

fitness – соответствие, пригодность

conformity – соответствие

sample – образец (товара)

bulk – товар оптом

Text for reading.

The Law of Contract

Legal obligations arise from many sources of which the two main types are tortious and contractual obligations. Contractual obligations arise where one person makes a legally enforceable promise to another which puts the promisor under an obligation to perform his promise under the sanction of an action against him for breach of contract. A tortious obligation is an obligation not to wrong another by conduct that the law of torts establishes as wrongful. A person breaking such an obligation will face a legal action in respect of the tort.

An obligation implies the existence of an “obligor”, the person who is legally under the obligation, and an “obligee” for whose benefit the obligation exists. The existence of the obligee who can enforce the obligation for his own benefit by a legal action distinguishes the law of obligations from the criminal law.

Obligations can also arise under a trust which can be seen as comparable to contract in the sense that the trustee accepts the obligation to look after someone else’s property, rather than having the obligation imposed on him. Partners, company directors, agents and bank managers can be regarded as being in a quasi-trustee position vis-a-vis the partnership property and their partners’ interests or the company’s property or the interests of the principal or the account holder. In addition employees owe fiduciary duties to their employers.

Trustees and quasi-trustees have an obligation to take care of the property entrusted to them and will be liable for any breach of their fiduciary duties together with any third party who knowingly assists in it. Thus, if a company’s directors misappropriate the property of the company, they will be liable as quasi-trustees to account to the company for the property which they have misappropriated and, if they have been aided by bankers or others who knew or ought to have known that what was being done was a misappropriation of assets, they may be liable to the company as constructive trustees. This obligation not to be the unwitting instrument of another’s fraud is rather similar to tortious liability in negligence.

Essentials of a Contract

There are three essentials to be complied with for an obligation by promise to be enforceable: (i) there must be a matching offer and acceptance; (ii) the promise must be by deed or supported by valuable consideration; and (iii) the parties must have intended to create legal relations.

Contracts for the Sale of Goods

Contracts for the sale of goods are contracts‘whereby the seller transfers or agrees to transfer the property in goods to the buyer for a money consideration, called the price’. The word ‘property’ refers to ownership. The definition takes into account agreements where the ownership in the goods will not transfer immediately but at some later date. This type of contract is ‘an agreement to sell’. The use of the word ‘property’ excludes any type of contract relating to goods where ownership does not pass. Thus it excludes contracts relating to hire of goods or contracts of bailment where possession but not ownership passes.

‘Goods’ includes ‘emblements, industrial growing crops and things attached to or forming part of the land which are agreed to be severed before sale or under the contract of sale’. Thus crops comes within the definition of goods. Other things which are ‘attached to or form part of the land’ are ‘goods’ if they are distinct from the land. ‘Goods’ includes all ‘chattels personal’, that is all tangible moveable things. The goods must be transferred for a ‘money consideration, called the price’. This excludes contracts of barter. However, contracts under which goods are transferred by a combination of money plus other goods are included.

If the main purpose of the contract is not the transfer of property to the buyer, even though there is an element of transfer, such a contract is a contract for labour and materials. In Robinson v. Graves [1935], the Court of Appeal held that a contract by an artist to paint a client’s portrait was not a contract for the sale of goods since the main element in the contract was the skill of the artist. The same applies where a garage fits new parts to a car while carrying out a service or other repair, or a builder supplies bricks under a contract to build a wall or tiles when building a house.

The Form of the Contract

There are no particular formalities for a contract for the sale of goods and ‘a contract of sale may be made in writing (either with or without seal), or by word of mouth, or partly in writing and partly by word of mouth, or may be implied from the conduct of the parties’. In addition, capacity to contract ‘is regulated by the general law concerning capacity to contract and to transfer and acquire property. However, where necessaries are sold and delivered to a minor or to a person who by reason of mental incapacity or drunkenness is incompetent to contract, he must pay a reasonable price for them.