I notice several time’s when a railroad has derailment, or blizzard they reference (Force Majeure). What does this mean.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Force_majeure
In my opinoin it is used a little too much. It seems as though some railroads use it for any service disruption.
I am sure the customers who sign the transport contract have the ability to read the contract or have a lawyer read it ahead of time. Thus, if it is contracted for, I don’t see how RRs could use it too much.
Moreover, courts construe force majuer terms very narrowly. i.e. if it covers tornadoes and floods, and lightning disrupts service, the RR is out of luck. Thus, if it is specifically covered in the contract, the more power to RRs for negotiating for it.
Finally, it is not like the RRs want service disruptions.
Gabe
Wouldn’t most contracts like this be written with some gray area clauses in them: “acts of God”…“force of nature”…“circumstance beyond our control”…etc ? Yes, the customers have lawyers read the contracts, but railroads have lawyers write the contracts as well. I’d be upset, if my lawyer didn’t write in some weasel clauses wiggle room into my contracts.[;)]
And if you believe in a God that causes these "acts’, then, by definition, isn’t everything that happens everywhere an “act of God”?
The legal gobbledegook, from one source:
In the law of contracts, an “act of God” may be interpreted as an implied defense under the rule of impossibility, i.e., the promise is discharged because of unforeseen, naturally occurring events that were unavoidable and which would result in insurmountable delay, expense or other material breach. In other contracts, such as indemnification, an act of God may be no excuse, and in fact may be the central risk assumed by the promisor, e.g., flood insurance or crop insurance; the only variables being the timing and extent of the damage. In many cases, failure by way of ignoring obvious risks due to “natural phenomena” will not be sufficient to excuse performance of the obligation, even if the events are relatively rare, e.g., the year 2000 problem in computers. Under the Uniform Commercial Code, §2-615, failure to deliver goods sold may be excused by an “act of God” if the absence of such act was a “basic assumption” of the contract, but has made the delivery commercially “impracticable”.
You read this stuff all day, and there’s no wonder Gabe spends so much time looking out the window, watching trains. [xx(]
The Lord works in strange ways…LOL! The devil made him do it. [}:)]
The way you say it there, you are absolutely correct…AT THE INDIVIDUAL LEVEL. If one believes in a god almighty as an omnipotent being, then yes the omnipotent is omniresponsible as well.
As it pertains to Insurance companies though, it’s more of a metaphor implying “beyond the control of mortal men”. If it were to be interpreted literally, you could place the Insurance company in an interesting position of needing to prove there is in fact a god, in order for them to disallow an obligation to pay damages.
And if so, anything good OR bad is iin His hands, and thus unavoidable . . . ? Theology can be so slippery!
It was probably such trouble with the term “Act of God” that it got secularized in our age to “force majeure,” a hard-to-translate term with the closest-to-literal meaning “a superior force.” Kind of like the way AA’s don’t have to believe in God but they at least have to profess faith in “A higher power.” My guess is that more common-sense terms than Force Majeure like “through an unfortunate incident” or “by pure chance” leave too much in the open; i.e., such choice of words would work against the plaintiff in things like an injury suit because they strip away any last causality on the part of the plaintiff – so why are they suing? - a. s.
Well your diving into a subject a little too deep for me.[X-)]
Actually, that is exactly my point, courts don’t play that game with force majeure clauses. They construe the clause in favor of the non-drafter and it is somewhere between difficult and impossible to use enforceable “weasel words” in a force majeure clause. That is why most of them read like a laundry list of the apocalypse (given what else has been said in this thread, I am loathe to use a biblical term for fear of people going outside the rails, but I think it is the most accurate term), and try to specifically include every foreseeable calamity under the sun.
Moreover, often times, the real issue with these clauses is who insures the freight while it is in transit. It is really an argument between insurance companies . . . . Calamities happen to all forms of transportation, they are unavoidable. A force majeure clause simply constitutes a form of negotiat
Lawyers make the entire court system into a Farce Majeure, telling your kid to study to be lawyer is like telling your kid to get a job as robber.
The Force Majeure ate my homework.
Dave Nelson