271 F. 464 | 7th Cir. | 1921
This is an action to recover a broker’s commission for the sale of 13,099 acres of Alabama timber land. Plaintiff in error, Patrick Glynn, denied the employment of defendant in error, Alexander J. May, and contended that he was not the procuring cause of the sale. Upon the issues as joined a jury heard the evidence, found a verdict in favor of defendant in error, upon which the trial court entered judgment, to set aside which this writ of error was sued out.
The assignments of error based upon rulings of the court upon the admission and exclusion of testimony cannot be sustained. In the rulings complained of the trial court committed no reversible error.
The fourteenth assignment of error complained of the refusal of the court to give an instruction that—
“If you find that the contract was so terminated by the failure of the plaintiff to procure a purchaser, ready, willing, and able to purchase within a reasonable time, if any new contract or extension of time was given after May 15, 1917, then such extension of time or new contract would be void as being in violation of the Brokerage Contract Law, which requires such contracts to be in writing.”
The Brokerage Law referred to is the Act of May 15, 1917 (Acts 1917, c. 221), being section 2305m of the Revised Statutes of Wisconsin. This statute in effect provides that every contract to pay a commission to a real estate agent or broker or to any person for selling or buying real estate shall be void, unless such contract or some note or memorandum thereof, 'describing the real estate, expressing the price for which the same may be sold or purchased, the commission to be paid, and the period during which the agent or broker shall procure a buyer or seller, be in writing and be subscribed by the person agreeing to pay such commission.
At the conclusion of the instruction of the jury by the court, counsel for the plaintiff in error suggested that the court should instruct the jury that the burden of the proof is on the plaintiff to show that this contract was in existence, and, further, if it existed, that the burden
“You will be well paid if it goes through. Keep after it; you will get a handsome commission if it goes through.”
The verdict of the jury is fully sustained by the law and the evidence, and the judgment entered thereon is accordingly,
Affirmed.