Moch Co. v. Rensselaer Water Co

In Moch Co. v. Rensselaer Water Co., 247 NY 160 [1928] the Court of Appeals rejected an attempt by the plaintiff (whose warehouse suffered extensive fire damage) to sue a waterworks company for failing to provide sufficient water (to douse the fire) on the theory that plaintiff was a third-party beneficiary of the contract between the company and the city. In so holding, the Court held as follows (247 NY 160 at 164-165, 159 NE 896): "In a broad sense it is true that every city contract, not improvident or wasteful, is for the benefit of the public. More than this, however, must be shown to give a right of action to a member of the public not formally a party. The benefit, as it is sometimes said, must be one that is not merely incidental and secondary . . . . It must be primary and immediate in such a sense and to such a degree as to bespeak the assumption of a duty to make reparation directly to the individual members of the public if the benefit is lost. The field of obligation would be expanded beyond reasonable limits if less than this were to be demanded as a condition of liability. . . "Thus, a contract between a city and a water company to furnish water at the city hydrants has in view a benefit to the public that is incidental rather than immediate, an assumption of duty to the city and not to its inhabitants."