No agreement is ever 100% clear to both parties.
The job of the court, if the matter comes before it, is to determine:
1. Was there enough evidence to establish the existence of a contract, and
2. If yes, what were the terms of the contract?
There is a whole body of law on what reasonable terms the Court should read into a contract are if they aren't specifically defined in the contract. But I have never seen a contract that covered every single contingency. It would take 1,000 pages to try, and even then there would be some contingency that hadn't been anticipated (for just one example, what happens if a meteor strikes the earth and produces so-and-so result that would make the contract more difficult, but not impossible, to comply with. Should it still be enforced? Modified? Rescinded?)
But that doesn't mean there wasn't a contract.
Again, go sit in a small claims court for a day. Or, actually, listen to Judge Wapner -- he is usually right on the law. I had a very bright friend who clamed he got his A in contracts not by listening to the prof but by watching Judge Wapner. In the course of a term every contract issue you could imagine came before him, my friend claimed. |
