Grossman, contratos incompletos y otra cosa buena de “lo breve, si bueno, dos veces bueno”

En Nada Es Gratis se publica esta entrada sobre Grossman. Escribió mucho sobre contratos incompletos. Y se cuenta esta historieta

There is an infamous story about Grossman remodeling his house. Having worked on incomplete contracts, Grossman was extra careful to write a contract so there was no wiggle room for the contractor to hold him up. Inevitably, they fell into dispute. The judge said that with the contract that is normally signed he would have sided with homeowner in this kind of dispute. But since a non-standard and rather complex contract was written, the contingency under dispute must have been considered and dismissed. Hence, the judge found in favor of the builder. In other words, Grossman’s attempt to write a complete contract backfired and hurt him in the contract dispute.

Si el juez hubiera sido un juez europeo-continental, tal vez la solución hubiese sido distinta. El argumento incluso unius exclusio alterius y el argumento a contrario en la interpretación de normas o cláusulas contractuales es un argumento de escasa potencia argumentativa cuando se tiene conciencia de que los contratos son necesariamente incompletos. Si los jueces, como sucede en los países de common law inducen a las partes a redactar contratos más completos puede que estemos elevando los costes de transacción en forma de más errores.