DISCHARGE OF CONTRACTS

It is probably just as important for the engineer to understand how a

contract may be discharged as it is for him to know how to enter into a
valid, binding and legal contract. The ways in which a contract may be
discharge are many, and especially in engineering work is it important to
have an understanding of some of these ways of discharging a contract.

1. The Discharge by Performance

The most common method of the discharge of a contract is by
performance of the contract in accordance with it terms. If the contract is
fully performed by all parties, all rights and all obligations under the
contract cease to exist for the parties.

2. Impossibility of Performance
Perhaps no method of discharging the contract is of more interest to
the engineer than this one. The engineering contractor is continually
running into conditions of soil, stream flow, climate, and other condition
which could not have been and were not foreseen prior to the undertaken
of the work; and it is important that he understand the effect of this
unforeseen conditions on the contract before entering into such a contract.

3. Substantial Performance
Another vital of interest to the engineer and the engineering
contractor is the subject of substantial performance, for in most cases of
engineering contracts there is not an exact performance of the contract but
a substantial performance.

It is not necessary here to discuss the technical meaning of

substantial performance. it is simply necessary to state that by substantial
performance, in a general way, is meant the practical completion of the
work so that no material parts thereof remain to be done or so that have
been no material alterations from the original contract.
4. DISCHARGE BY AGREEMENT
A contract may also be discharge by agreement between the parties
thereto. If the contract has not been performed by either party, it may be
discharge by the mutual agreement on the parties, the consideration for
the discharge being the mutual release of each party by the other
Contracts may also be discharged by the agreement between the
parties to the old contract by the making of new contract, the terms of
which are inconsistent with the terms of the old contract or the terms of
which provide that it shall be substituted to the old one.
A contract may also be discharge by the release under seal which is
imports a consideration or a release founded upon a sufficient
consideration and signed by the parties to the contract or by changing the
parties to the contract whereby a new party was substituted for the
previous on by agreement of all three parties to the substitution while the
terms of the contract may remain the same.

5. DISCHARGED BY OPERATION OF LAW

Contracts may be discharged by operation of the law either by the
merger on one contract into another, alteration of the contract by one party
thereto without the consent of the other party, or by bankruptcy, either
voluntary or involuntary, of one of the parties to the contract

6. DISCHARGE BY BREACH OF CONTRACT

If either party to a contract either announces his intentions not to
fulfill the terms of the contract or wholly or partly fails to perform some
of the conditions of the contract.
There is a breach of the contract which gives rise to rights on the
part of the injured party either to give him a right of action against the
other party or in some cases he may apply to a court of equity for specific
performance of the contract.
In the case were a person contracts for the conveyance of the land
upon the payment of the certain money, if the person agreeing to pay the
money is ready and willing and tenders the money, and the party who
agreed to convey the land refuses to convey it, the injured party may the
go into the court of equity, and the court will enter a decree compelling
the conveyance of the land to the party to whom the lands was agreed to
be conveyed

7. DISCHARGE BY STATUTE OF LIMITATIONS

The law of several states of the United States also provide that
certain contracts must be sued upon within the given time after the right
of action arising under the contract has accrued or else all liability
thereunder ceases.