Specific performance: Difference between revisions

{{a|contract|}}[[Specific performance]] one of the great [[Equitable remedy|equitable remedies]] for [[breach of contract]] — designed to wrap an innocent, clean-handed contractual counterparty with the warm blanket of the [[courts of chancery]] when the cold economic rationalism of the common law leaves the moral senses still outraged.  All it really amounts to is a court order directing a contractual counterparty to do what it has promised to do where the court has plausible grounds to think that it might not — most likely where “damages would not be an adequate remedy” — you will hear that phrase checked about a lot — and the innocent party cannot find someone else to perform the contract (and thus have a clear and manifestly adequate measure of loss for a damages claim).

Specific performance is a common remedy in commercial construction contracts, but less so for contracts for personal services where bleeding-heart liberal types — and let’s face it, the whole law of [[equity]] sprung from the brow of bleeding-heart liberal types — would fret that specific performance might restrict an individual’s freedom.