Section 30 Unconscionability
Library | Consumer Law and Practice 2010 |
A court may refuse to enforce a contract (or clause in a contract) if it finds it to be "unconscionable." Johnson v. United Rys. Co. of St. Louis, 219 S.W. 38, 67 (Mo. banc 1920). Comment 1 to § 2-302 of the UCC (Uniform Commercial Code), 1A U.L.A. 5 (2004), states that the basic test of unconscionability "is whether, in the light of the general commercial background and commercial needs of the particular trade or case, the clauses involved are so one-sided as to be unconscionable under the circumstances existing at the time" of contracting. Once the issue of unconscionability is raised by parties or by the court, "the parties shall be afforded a reasonable opportunity to present evidence." Section 400.2-302(2), RSMo 2000.
The leading Missouri case interpreting the meaning of "unconscionability" under the UCC is Funding Systems Leasing Corp. v. King Louie International, Inc., 597 S.W.2d 624, 634-35 (Mo. App. W.D. 1979). Funding Systems adopts Professor Leff's test that there must be both procedural and substantive unconscionability to trigger the UCC but that these two elements are on a sliding scale, i.e., the more procedural unconscionability present, the less substantive unconscionability there must be and vice versa. The court cites Arthur Allen Leff, Unconscionability and the Code - The Emperor's New Clause, 115 U. Pa. L. Rev. 485 (1967), and Industralease Automated & Scientific Equipment Corp. v. R.M.E. Enterprises, Inc., 58 A.D.2d 482 (N.Y. App. Div. 1977).
Two cases have examined unconscionability in the context of form contracts. An exclusion in fine print that purports to bar...
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- Section 1 Introduction
- Section 2 Common-Law Fraud
- Section 3 Statutory Fraud - An Overview of the Missouri Merchandising Practices Act
- Section 4 Actual or Compensatory Damages
- Section 5 Punitive Damages
- Section 6 Attorney Fees
- Section 7 Equitable Relief
- Section 8 Venue
- Section 9 Fraud, Misrepresentation, and Insurance Coverage
- Section 10 Civil Conspiracy to Commit Fraud
- Section 11 Generally
- Section 12 Deceptive or Unfair Practices
- Section 13 Purchase or Lease
- Section 14 Goods or Services
- Section 15 Personal or Household Use
- Section 16 Ascertainable Loss
- Section 17 Plaintiffs
- Section 18 Defendants
- Section 19 Personal Liability of Officers and Agents
- Section 20 Real Estate Brokers
- Section 21 Statutory Exemptions
- Section 22 Missouri Civil Rule 52.08
- Section 23 Missouri Merchandising Practices Act
- Section 24 Procedures
- Section 25 Eisen v. Carlisle & Jacquelin
- Section 26 Statute of Frauds
- Section 27 Statute of Limitations
- Section 28 Minority
- Section 29 Arbitration
- Section 30 Unconscionability
- Section 31 Other Common Law and Statutory Defenses
- Section 32 Threat of Administrative Action
- Section 33 Unauthorized Practice of Law
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