When Do Minor Liable for Contracts?

1.0 INTRODUCTION
All people do not have the same legal capacity to make contract. In some case the legal capacity of the person has no relation to the individual’s actual ability. A person who is 17 years old for example, may have just as much to make a contract as an older person. Nevertheless a17 years old are ordinarily under a legal incapacity. In other cases such as those involving insane persons, the legal incapacity is based upon the inability to understand the consequences of the particular transaction. Person whose legal capacity is or may be restricted include minors, insane persons, convicts and aliens.
The law governing minor’s contracts shows how the law must compromise between two principles. The first and more important is that, the minor must be protected against his own experience. The second is that in pursuing this object the law should not cause unnecessary hardship to those who deal with minors, the compromise between these principles results in certain contracts with minors being valid (contracts for necessaries and contract for service).
2.0 MEANING OF KEY WORDS
2.1Necessaries
According to Avtar Singh he defined necessaries as those things without which an individual cannot reasonably exist.
2.2 Minor
A minor or infant is one who has not attained the age which law deems necessary to give him his full maturity of mind and below which he requires a special protection from the state.
At common law any person male or female under 21 years old is a minor though it has been reduced to 18 years in most states and countries like Tanzania and 19 in few. Some state and countries provide for the termination of minority upon marriage.
2.3 Contract
According to sect.2 (1) paragraph (h) of the Law of Contract Act defines the contract as an agreement which is enforceable by law.
2.4 Contract for necessaries
Refers to contract made by a minor to those things without which he cannot reasonably exist.

3.0What are necessaries?
Necessaries are items that fulfill basic needs, such as food, clothing, shelter, and medical services at a level of value required to maintain the minor’s standard of living or financial and social status.
Originally necessaries were limited to those things absolutely necessary for the sustenance and shelter of the minor and would extend only to the most simple food, clothing and lodging. In the course of time, necessaries extend generally to things relating to the health, education and comfort of the minor. Thus, rental of a house by a married minor is a necessary. Property other than mentioned above acquired by a minor is not generally regarded as a necessary, this rule is obviously sound in the case of jewelry and property used for pleasure.
The rule has been relaxed to hold that, whether an item is a necessary in a particular case depends on the financial and social status or state on life of the minor hence the rule does not treat all minors equally.
2.1 A minor may be liable to a contract for necessaries when
A minor who enters into a contract for necessaries may disaffirm the contract but remains liable for the reasonable value of the goods. Generally, then, for a contract to qualify as a contract for necessaries:
1) The item contracted for must be necessary to the minor’s subsistence,
2) The value of the necessary item must be up to a level required to maintain the minor’s standard of living or financial and social status, and
3) The minor must not be under the care of a parent or guardian who is required to supply this item. Unless these three criteria are met, the minor can disaffirm the contract without being liable for the reasonable value of the goods used.
According to the common law, a child will not be exempt from his or her obligations as set out in a contract if the contract is for the necessaries of life.
Illustration.
Bobby Rogers is a minor, married, quit school and looked for work. He agreed with the Gastonia personnel Corporation any employment through it he would pay a stated commission. Rogers obtained work through the agency but refused to pay the agreed commission of $295, for which he denied liability on the ground of minority.
Decision
Rogers must pay the reasonable value of the agency, should be deemed a “necessary” on the theory that they enable a minor “to earn the money required to pay necessities of the life for himself and those who legally dependent upon him”
Therefore, any minor will be held liable in a contract for necessaries when he enters the contract in the course of earning the money required to pay for necessities of the life for himself and those who legally dependent upon him.

3.0 Conclusion
It is not true then that minor cannot enter into any contract but rather the law of contract is trying to prevent others from taking advantage of the minor’s incapacity, so there comes the guidelines through contract for necessaries to allow minors to acquire there necessaries to sustain their life when seems no one will do that for them.