Enforcement of Contracts by Injunctions

• Author: Jeffrey Berryman
• Profession: Professor of Law. Faculty of Law University of Windsor
• Pages: 285-292

CHAPTER

15

ENFORCEMENT

OF

CONTRACTS

BY

INJUNCTIONS

A

INTRODUCTION

We

have already

seen

how

injunctions

can be

used

to

enforce contrac-

tual

terms; both

in the

preceding chapter,

and in

discussion

of

interloc-

utory injunctions

in

chapter two.

In

this chapter

we

focus

on the use of

injunctions

to

enforce

negative stipulations contained within contracts

outside

the

area

of

employment law.

A

contract

is

normally considered

to be an

expression

of

positive

conduct

obligating

the

parties

to

perform

the

specific

promises under-

taken.

One

express promise could

be the

promise

not to

undertake

a

particular

activity

— an

agreement

not to

open

up in

competition with

the

promisee,

for

example. However,

an

express

promise

can

also infer

a

promise

to

undertake

a

particular task

to the

exclusion

of all

other

tasks, (such

as

purchasing exclusively

from

the

other contracting

party).

In

both situations, courts have shown

a

willingness

to

grant

injunctive

relief.

From early

on

courts have accepted that

it was

easier

to

restrain them

from

doing something than

to

order

a

person

to

carry

out a

particular act,

and

thus injunctions were routinely granted. How-

ever,

courts would

not

allow injunctions

to

become

a

roundabout

way

to

effect

specific

performance.

Courts today

are

still

mindful

of

this

restriction,

but are

more

willing

to

grant

an

injunction, preferring

to

focus

on the

substance

of the

dispute

and on

whether awarding

an

injunction

will really violate some other discretionary concern.

285