9: Termination and Enforcement of Contracts

Anticipatory breach

A breach that occurs before the date for performance.

Assignment

The transfer of a right by an assignor to an assignee.

Balance of probabilities

Proof that there is a better than 50 percent chance that the circumstances of the contract are as the plaintiff contends.

Condition

An important term that, if breached, gives the innocent party the right to terminate the contract and claim damages.

Damages

Monetary compensation for breach of contract or other actionable wrong.

Duty to mitigate

The obligation to take reasonable steps to minimize the losses resulting from a breach of contract or other wrong.

Expectation damages

Damages that provide the plaintiff with the monetary equivalent of contractual performance.

Force majeure clause

A clause that stipulates what is to happen to the contract in face of an unexpected, extreme, or unusual event outside of the parties' control.

Frustration

Termination of a contract upon the occurrence of an unforeseen catastrophic event that makes contractual performance impossible or prevents the contract from being performed in a manner at all similar to what the parties envisioned when they entered the contract.

Innominate term

A term that cannot easily be classified as either a condition or a warranty.

Interlocutory injunction

An order to refrain from doing something for a limited period of time.

Novation

The substitution of parties in a contract or the replacement of one contract with another.

Punitive damages

An award to the plaintiff to punish the defendant for malicious, oppressive, and high-handed conduct.

Restitutionary quantum meruit

An amount that is reasonable given the benefit the plaintiff has conferred.

Unjust enrichment

Occurs when one party has undeservedly or unjustly secured a benefit at the other party's expense.

Vicarious performance

Performance of contractual obligations through others.

Warranty

A minor term that, if breached, gives the innocent party the right to claim damages only.