Ayres v. Thomas

Brokerage—Earning of Commissions — Completion of Transaction— Procuring Cause.—In order to entitle a broker to commissions, the transaction must be completed, or he must have completed his part in the transaction, and the failure of the negotiation must be due to the interference of the principal, or to outside causes; and where a contract or sale is effected, the broker must be the efficient agent or procuring cause of the contract or of the sale.

Id.—Solicitor’s Commission—Improper Instructions—Services Tending to Obtain Orders—Introduction of Customers.—In an action upon an agreement providing that the plaintiff should solicit orders for the output of defendant’s business as a foundryman, and should receive, a commission on all orders secured, an instruction to the effect that if, at the request of the defendant, the plaintiff performed any services which tended to obtain work done by the defendant for third parties, or if he introduced to defendant or to his manager or superintendent parties who subsequently ordered work, he would be entitled to his commissions, is erroneous as being too broad; and the error is not cured or qualified by joining disjunctively with such instruction the proposition that if the plaintiff, by means of his solicitations, brought the attention of any parties to the defendant or his manager or superintendent, and by reason thereof work was afterward ordered by such third parties, plaintiff would be entitled to his commission.

Id.—Instruction as to Procuring Cause—Objectionable Clause—Intervention of Other Influence.—An instruction requested by the defendant that “ to entitle a solicitor to a commission on work or orders claimed to have been obtained by him, it must appear that he was the moving or procuring cause of consummation of the transaction; it is not enough that the plaintiff has something to do with the transac,tion, unless it appear that that something was the procuring or moving cause of the consummation of the transaction, and that that something would and did procure such consummation, without the intervention or aid of any other.essential matter, thing, or influence,” is correct, with the exception of the last clause, consisting of the words, “without the intervention or aid of any other essential matter, thing, or influence,” which clause renders the instruction objectionable.