Ironically, i think you told the truth, hidden by a veneer of sarcasm.

Since when do you go to jail for breaching a contract?

Miriam: he didn’t just breach a contract; he entered into a contract without any intention to perform. This is a classic common-law fraud. I am quite sure it’s also a criminal fraud, but I don’t have time to search this stuff now. For common-law fraud, see, e.g., here:

http://books.google.com/books?id=k-AnAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA4684&lpg=PA4684&dq=fraud+not+intended+to+perform+contract&source=web&ots=xVj60i5t3j&sig=Qr4F7QOhTSsnlDqDFQddgUCIJaM&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=1&ct=result

k. If a promise to perform some act in the future is made with the design and intention of the promisor to disregard it, and with no intention to perform it, and is made to deceive and entrap the other party, then such promise, in case the refusal to perform take place, will amount to actual fraud. Anderson v. Red, L.R.A. 1916B, 862, 20 N.M. 202, 148 Pac. 502.

l. the procuring of property upon a promise which the party, at the time, does not intend to perform, is a fraud. Cerny v. Paxton & G. Co. 10 L.R.A (N.S.) 640, 78 Neb. 134, 110 N.W. 882.

And, for our non-lawyer friends, a very simple non-technical summary:

http://onlineessays.com/essays/politics/a-fraud-lawsuit-under-california-law-2.php

False Promise. A claim of fraud may arise if a defendant entered into a contract and made promises that it never intended to perform. The elements of a false promise claim are:

a. The defendant made a promise.

b. The promise was important to the transaction.

c. At the time he or she made the promise, the defendant did not intend to perform it.

d. The defendant intended the victim to rely upon the promise.

e. The victim reasonably relied upon the promise.

f. The defendant did not perform the promise.

g. The victim was harmed as a result of defendant not carrying out his or her promise.

h. The victim’s reliance on the defendant’s promise was a substantial factor in causing the victim’s harm.

> Oh, I understand now: it was environmental activists cooking up clever legal and illegal strategies and tactics as part of their fight on issues dear to them, that helped drive up the price of gas.

Yes, that is exactly what it was, among other factors. If we drilled in ANWR we wouldn’t have had $4 a gallon gas. if we built a new refinery, same outcome. if we retrieve our shale oil, or use coal, etc.

Maybe you think environmentalism is a good thing. Fine. But it is not a costless thing. Again, you are fooling no one.

Oh, I understand now: it was environmental activists cooking up clever legal and illegal strategies and tactics as part of their fight on issues dear to them, that helped drive up the price of gas.

Nate,

I think you’re absolutely on point as regard Thoreau’s conception of civil disobedience. At the now defunct and sorely missed Law and Society blog I critized animal rights activists who likewise have a curious conception of civil disobedience, one that was not too civil nor in the tradition of civil disobedience that runs from Thoreau through Gandhi and King last century, including reliance on legal pleadings and defenses designed to avoid accepting punishment for deliberately breaking the law. Back in the days when we fought against the siting of PG & E’s Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power plant, not a few of my Abalone Alliance comrades planned to trespass and then invoke a “necessity” defense so as to avoid prosecution: they still thought that this was civil disobedience (because nonviolent and owing to the fact that the law enforcement authorities were informed in advance of their plans, etc.; I vigorously argued to the contrary, claiming they/we were not acting in the tradition of a long-standing if not persuasive model of civil disobedience and that therefore their actions would, in the end, both diminish favorable publicity for our cause and confuse the public as to the meaning of civil disobedience, among other things; cf.: http://www.lawsocietyblog.com/archives/288.). I’m hoping to find the time to write a paper on this before the end of this year.

DeChristopher’s juvenile antics merely expose the intellectual (and moral) bankruptcy of much of the enviornmental-leftist agenda on “global warming”.

1. DeChristopher’s strategy should only work once, at least in theory, since the seller should be able to obtain permanent injunction preventing him from participating in the future. The legal remedies are inadwquate, and a clever lawyer should be able to frame an adequate pleading here. If nothing else, it imposed additional cost on DeChristopher.

2. The seller should require all bidder, as a condition for participating in the bidding, to provide a bond to cover a certain percentage of their potential bids. The bond would be returned to them if they are unsuccessful in the bidding or if they pay the contract price. This would provide a gatekeeping function and deterrence to the likes of DeChristorpher.

3. I think one should be a little more creative in thinking about whether there is a contract which DeChristopher has interfered with. The entire bidding process might be viewed as a contract between the seller and those potential bidder who are actually in attendance. Everyone has implicitly agreed to conduct themselves in a certain manner, and DeChristopher has breach that agreement. If one does not think there is c contract or quasi contract here, then that can be address by having the seller have a simply contract that all potential bidders must signed as a condition for bidding, stating that they certify that they will only submit bid which they are in a financial position to honor. DeChristopher would not be able to satisfy that condition.

As I said, my heart may be with DeChristopher…but civil disobedience should not be costless.

Well, they probably won’t but they would have the right to do so, and they should.

Its idiots like this that gave us $4 a gallon gas last summer. But of course we are going to have at least 2 years of democrats making the energy situations worse not better. i hope i am wrong, but i don’t believe i am.