The case of Mr. Kass is an example of a court proceeding where the judges had to consider several facts in reliance on the principles of the law. Mr. Kass quit his job with Bechtel Power and moved from Michigan to New Jersey since he was to be employed by Brown Boveri Corporation. Mr. Brown Boveri and Mr. Kass had entered into an agreement that saw Mr. Kass employed in managerial control and automation. The new job was in the form of a contract to run for two years.
Mr. Kass’s employment with Brown Boveri ended when Mr. Kass wrote a resignation letter due to a violation of the contract they had agreed on at first. Kass had found out that another managerial staff in brow Boveri’s organization had an executive role in a project that conflicted with the agreement in his contract with Boveri. Then, a gentleman’s agreement prevented Mr. Kass from exercising executive power over the other managerial staff, Bruce Reinman, or the project he was in charge of. After six months, Brown Boveri tried to demote Mr. Kass to a sales engineer position which was a lesser position, leading to Mr. Kass’ resignation.
These facts are similar to those in the case of Wharton v. Christie (1891) since, in both cases, Kass and Christie’s submitted their resignation letters after their employers had wrongly discharged them. Both employers had violated the agreement they had with their employees during the time of employment. Thus, these two cases took place in similar circumstances and involved identical areas of law but occurred in different periods.
This decision suggests that judges decide cases based on the facts and basic law principles. Under the legal realist approach, judges decide cases based on their interpretation of the law and the facts. In this regard, in Mr. Kass’s case, the judges used legal precedents considering specific facts and the time perspective of the precedent and Mr. Kass’s point. Thus, this case demonstrates that judges make decisions based primarily on the law but may depart from the precedents if it is necessary to comply with the principles of justice.
Work Cited
Frank, Jerome. “Realism and the Law”. American University. Web.