Uberrima Fidei
Uberrimae Fidei– utmost good faith– is a legal concept at the heart of a good deal of contract interpretation. It goes more or less like this: If I ask you to enter into an agreement with me, and I have relevant knowledge that you do not have, but which would affect your decision if you knew it, then I must share that knowledge with you before I let you consummate the deal with me. The doctrine is especially relevant in contracts of insurance and indemnity.
Lord Mansfield introduced the concept into the Common Law in the 1766 case Carter v Boehm, where he wrote, “Good faith forbids either party by concealing what he privately knows, to draw the other into a bargain from his ignorance of that fact, and his believing to the contrary.”
Now, the doctrine has hardly overturned the basic notion of caveat emptor — “buyer beware”, and does not relieve us of due diligence. But it goes a long way toward punishing the commercial equivalent of a sucker punch.
Utmost good faith, though, should not be reserved for arcane argument in the courtroom. Our civil society, our personal relationships, and our democracy cannot long stand if we accept “Gotcha!” as a generally acceptable way of conducting ourselves.
When we all rely on guile, the very foundations of family, friendship, community, and commerce are eroded until ultimately we are all subject to the law of the jungle.
Just sayin’.