George Hyman Construction Company v. The United States

How courts have described this case

Verbatim parenthetical descriptions written by other courts when citing this decision. Ranked by citation-network relevance.

• stating that the words of an unambiguous contract should be “given their plain and ordinary meaning”
• acknowledging the task to interpret a contract “so that the words of [the unambiguous contract] provisions are given their plain and ordinary meaning”
• “[E]vidence of trade usage and custom cannot be used to vary or contradict the terms of a contract.”
• “If we accepted [Wagner’s] argument, we would have to rewrite the contract, and insert words the parties never agreed to, which we do not have the authority to do.”
• “It is well established that where, as here, the provisions of a contract are phrased in clear and unambiguous language, ‘the words of those provisions must be given their plain and ordinary meaning by the court in defining the rights and obligations of the parties . . . .’”

Source: CourtListener parenthetical corpus (CC0).