In 1961, Dorothy and John Wilson purchased a painting from Hammer Galleries titled Femme Debout. It cost
Question:
In 1961, Dorothy and John Wilson purchased a painting from Hammer Galleries titled Femme Debout. It cost $11,000 (about $78,000 in 2010 dollars) and came with this promise: “The authenticity of this picture is guaranteed.” In 1984, an expert deemed the painting a fake. The district court held that the Wilsons’ suit for breach of warranty, filed in February 1987—twenty-one years after its purchase—was barred by the UCC’s four-year statute of limitations. The Wilsons argued, however, that the Code’s exception to the four-year rule applied: [1] “A breach of warranty occurs when tender of delivery is made, except where a warranty explicitly extends to future performance and discovery must await the time of such performance the cause of action accrues when the breach is or should have been discovered.” They said the painting “performed” by being an authentic Vuillard—a French artist—and that the warranty of authenticity not only guaranteed the present “being” of the painting but also extended, as required by 2- 725(2), to the future existence as a Vuillard. Therefore, they contended, explicit words warranting future performance would be superfluous: a Saylor URL: http://www.saylor.org/books Saylor.org 490 warranty that promises authenticity “now and at all times in the future” would be redundant.
How should the court rule?
Smith and Roberson Business Law
ISBN: 978-0538473637
15th Edition
Authors: Richard A. Mann, Barry S. Roberts