Extending the Lessons of Hadley v. Baxendale

I have taught the venerable case of Hadley v. Baxendale more than thirty times to students in Contracts I and an additional thirty or more times to students in a Remedies course. I recently realized that I had underestimated the potential of the case. This Conference, and some conversations with my colleague Bill Whitford led me to realize that Hadley can be used more ambitiously. The trick to doing this is easy.

One has simply to ask students to imagine that the notice of special circumstances had been given, and then ask what the victims of the breach would have needed to prove in order to recover significant damages, and whether Baxendale would have had any remaining credible defenses.