Cabal refuses to install when the "License" field is incorrect, without a clear message

[HJvT]

I tried to install a package with

  license-file: ""

in the .cabal file and got the messages:

> cabal install
[...]
setup-Simple-Cabal-1.22.5.0-x86_64-windows-ghc-7.10.3.exe: : does not exist
[...]
cabal: Error: some packages failed to install:
Macbeth-lib-0.0.9 failed during the final install step. The exception was:
ExitFailure 1

Giving the command:

cabal -j1 install

leads to the message:

Warning: The 'license-file' field refers to the file '' which does not exist.

which is much clearer, but the package is still not being installed.
After adding the proper file name for the license file to the .cabal file, the package was installed.