delivered the opinion of the court.
Plaintiffs, Thomas E. Joyce, Leo Palewich, Jr. and Everlast Development Corporation, filed a complaint in chancery on March 26, 1962, in which they prayed that an executed settlеment agreement entered into between the parties on June 30, 1961, be declared null and void and that plaintiffs recover substantial damages from all of the defendants. All three defendants filed written motions to dismiss the complaint and the motions to dismiss were sustained and by leave of court the plaintiffs filed an amended complaint. After a hearing the motions to dismiss the amended complaint were sustained and it was dismissed as to the two dеfendants mentioned above and also dismissed as to defendant Year Investments, Inc. with the exception of paragraph fourteen of the complaint and no appeal was taken as to the ruling concerning the latter defendant.
The case grows out of an agreement by Joyce on January 2, 1960, to purchase from Year certain real estate known as Blackberry Heights Subdivision, which then consisted of 54 subdivided lots and adjoining acreage, all located in Kane County, Illinois. Thereafter Joyce and Palewich formed the Everlast Development Corporation for the purpose of developing this subdivision. Some time after the contract was entered into Land Title and Lawyers Title assumed all negotiations for Year and they guaranteed plaintiffs that they owned and controlled the subdivision
The parties entered into a subsequent written settlement agreement of all disputes concerning their contract on June 30, 1961. In this settlement plaintiffs were given certain credits and agreed to pay a specified balance due Tear on the contract which payment was to be paid partly in cash and partly in the conveyance of certain real estate to Year and to deliver a note of one Edward Engel in the amount of $1,010.74 which was guaranteed by Joyce and Palewich. Upon full compliance of the above and other enumerated acts by the plaintiffs Year would assign and quitclaim certain of the lots described in the purchase contract. The plaintiffs released and discharged the defendants in this agreement from “any and all claims and demands which they have or may hereаfter claim to have based on any matter or thing whatsoever. .
The amended complaint, summarized briefly, charges that plaintiffs, after performing work, investing time and money, discovered that defendants only controlled twenty of the fifty-four subdivided lots they had agreed to sell, and controlled none of the adjoining acreage of Blackberry Heights; that as a result of this misrepresentation by defendants they were forced to enter into an agreement with the owners of the thirty-four lots and the adjoining acreage at great additional expense to them; that defendants withheld titles to properties which plaintiffs were entitled to; that defendants mishandled and manipulated lawsuits involving properties in which plaintiffs had an interest without plaintiffs knowledge; that defendants refused to provide title insurance on the subdivision lots in question; that they refused to transfer commitments for mortgage loans on certain lots in breach of their promises; that they gave plaintiffs a letter of direction to a trustee under a land trust directing
Plaintiffs contend that these allegations make out a clear case оf oppressive demands so gross as to have forced them to enter into the settlement agreement while under conditions amounting to economic duress or business coercion.
The question for us is whether the triаl court erred in dismissing the complaint on the ground that the claim of business duress was dissolved by the plaintiffs’ failure to take proper legal action to restrain
The motion to dismiss, of course, admitted the well-pleaded allegations in the amended complaint which we have summarized above. Taking all of the plaintiffs’ allegations as true we nevertheless hold as did the Chancellor that the previously enumerated legation of evils visited upon the plaintiffs, “could have been the subject of an equity suit by the plaintiffs against the defendants, long prior to the date of the settlement agreement of June 30, 1961.”
“[T]he real and ultimate fact to be determined in every case is whether or not the party really had a choice—whether he had his freedom оf exercising his will.” 5 Williston, Contracts (Rev Ed 1937) § 1603. The legal conception of economic or compulsory duress is in forcing a person to act against his own will. It does not exist when the person upon whom it has been so сharged had an option or choice as to whether he will do the thing or perform the act said to have been done under duress. "We think the Chancellor correctly held that the plaintiff had a choice of seeking relief from the courts.
In the case of Illinois Merchants Trust Co. v. Harvey, 335 Ill 284,
In the case at bar as in the Harvey case the plaintiffs choose to enter into an agreement with the defendants in which the defendants’ allegedly arbitrary demands were met; but here the plaintiffs not only entered into the agreement, but accepted the benefits thereof. They argue that the only course open to them was to enter into the settlement agreement and litigate later. "We do not agree. * Nor are we impressed with plaintiffs’ argument that interlocutory relief was not obtainable in the Chancery Courts. We consider rather that the voluntаry acceptance of benefits under the facts in this case is a bar and complete extinction of former claims. The compromise and settlement of disputed claims are encouraged and fаvored by the courts. 11 ILP § 2 Compromise and Settlement. Accordingly where there is no fraud such agreements are upheld as valid contracts for otherwise no one could rely upon any settlement agreement as final. It is worthy of note that plaintiffs do not charge that the defendants did not fully and completely carry out their settlement agreement.
Furthermore the plaintiffs do not claim that the settlement agreement was prоcured by false and fraudulent representations or entered into by them through
For the reasons indicatеd we have reached the conclusion that the order of the Superior Court dismissing the amended complaint is correct and it is therefore affirmed.
Order affirmed.
Notes
We are of the opinion that the allegations of the аmended complaint pertaining to misrepresentation by defendants of the nnmber of lots they controlled, with regard to certain lawsnits, the refusal to issue title insurance, the refusal to direct the execution of mortgages and deeds when the plaintiffs were in serious financial difficulties which threatened their business venture could all have been the subjects of suits timely brought.