The Story of Meinhard v. Salmon: Fiduciary Duty's Punctilio
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Description
A pair of young New Yorkers, who shared opera tickets and a drive to improve their position in turn-of-the-century Manhattan, pooled their financial and human capital to take a twenty-year leasehold on an aging hotel with an impressive address. By the time the lease ended, their economic outlook had improved to the point that one had thoroughbred winners in a Triple Crown race and the other would soon die on an around-the-world cruise. In between, their financial success permitted them to pursue protracted litigation over the future development of the site in which one retained former presidential candidate and Supreme Court advocate John W. Davis and the other a former New York governor and Court of Appeals judge. That the ultimate decision in the case was written by Benjamin Cardozo, known for his high moral principles and his ability to turn a phrase, has produced a case that after eight decades still defines our thinking about fiduciary duty, the most important issue in the law of business associations. Meinhard v. Salmon is the 1928 decision of the New York Court of Appeals in which Chief Judge Cardozo declared the duty of fiduciaries to be not the morals of the marketplace but the punctilio of an honor the most sensitive. The chapter first situates the case geographically at the center of modern Manhattan and introduces the key participants who provide its memorable story. Subsequent parts address the law of the case and the frame it continues to provide for modern legal discussion.
Source Publication
Corporate Law Stories
Source Editors/Authors
J. Mark Ramseyer
Publication Date
2009
Recommended Citation
Geoffrey P. Miller,
The Story of Meinhard v. Salmon: Fiduciary Duty's Punctilio,
Corporate Law Stories
(2009).
Available at:
https://gretchen.law.nyu.edu/fac-chapt/2019
