What is Felthouse v Bindley '1862' case about?

Answer 1

It is a major common law case that basically says that you can't presume someone has accepted your offer because they haven't made a reply or are silent.

The case: John Felthouse offered to sell his horse to his uncle Paul Felthouse for 30guineas. His uncle made a counter-offer saying "I will buy your horse for £30:15s; If I hear no more about him, I consider the horse mine at £30 and 15s."

However by the time Paul replied to his nephew, the nephew had already given the horse to an auctioneer to sell. So when John found out that his uncle now wanted it, he went back to the auctioneer to say "don't sell my horse, I want it back to sell to my uncle". But unfortunately it was to late; the horse had been sold to Mr Bindley.

So the uncle then took Bindley to court for conversion (having property which doesn't belong to you, kindof). The uncle claimed that he owned the horse as he thought the horse was his because his nephew John didn't say otherwise, so demanded that Bindley give it to him.

Judgement: The judge rules that the horse did not belong to Paul Felthouse as his nephew had not accepted his new offer of £30. He stated "silence cannot amount to acceptance".

Therefore because John had agreed to sell his horse in an auction, regardless whether he would later regret the agreement, Bindley had rightly bought the horse from John and did not need to give it back.