Amos Wade, Plaintiff v. Jacob Leroy and Henry Pierrepoint

• Decision Date: 01 December 1857
• Citation: 61 U.S. 34,15 L.Ed. 813,20 How. 34
• Parties: AMOS WADE, PLAINTIFF, v. JACOB R. LEROY AND HENRY E. PIERREPOINT
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

61 U.S. 34

20 How. 34

15 L.Ed. 813

AMOS WADE, PLAINTIFF, v. JACOB R. LEROY AND HENRY E. PIERREPOINT.

December Term, 1857

THIS case came up from the Circuit Court of the United States for the southern district of New York, on a certificate of division in opinion between the judges thereof.

The case is stated in the opinion of the court.

It was argued by Mr. Gillet for the plaintiff, on which side there was also filed a brief of Mr. Reed, and by Mr. O'Connor for the defendants, on which side there was also a brief of Mr. Silliman.

The following notice of the points made by the counsel for the plaintiff is taken from the brief of Mr. Gillet:

POINTS.

FIRST.—Under the averments in the declaration, the plaintiff had a lawful right to prove that he was engaged in business, its character and extent.

The amount of damages sustained by the plaintiff essentially depended upon questions, whether the plaintiff was engaged in business, its peculiar character, and the extent of it.

The plaintiff would suffer more damage if deprived of a good business, than if he had none to lose.

Its character might be such that he could not attend to it at all, or only partially so, after his injury.

If his business was large, so as to require health, strength, and talents, he would lose more than if it were small, and easily attended to. He could hire a substitute to attend to the latter for a less sum than he could to transact the former.

The evidence offered was clearly admissible for these purposes, and went to show the damage actually sustained. If the plaintiff's business had been that of a day laborer, who could only earn a dollar per day, his actual loss would be far less than if he had been earning ten. If he had been employed on wages, the injury could have been ascertained by proving the compensation he received.

When engaged in his own business, the extent of his loss could only be ascertained by proving the nature and extent of his business, so as to show how much his services were actually worth to himself. If his business were small, and easily managed, the damage would be less than if it were large, and managed with difficulty. The manager of a large plantation would sustain more damage by loss of his time than the manager of a smill patch of land. A lawyer earning ten thousand dollars per annum would sustain a greater loss in being rendered unfit for business, than would a pettifogger who could only earn a hundred or two.

SECOND.—Future as well as present losses may be considered in estimating damages.

When a party loses a leg or arm, in estimating his real loss, we look to his probable future under the state of his injury, to form an opinion of the demages he has sustained. If the injury is temporary, the damages will be far less than if lasting and permanent. A flesh wound will soon heal, but a lost limb cannot be restored; both should, however, be considered in estimating the damages sustained—the loss of a limb will be continually felt as long as the party losing shall live, and hence a young person will sustain a greater injury than one whose life is nearly ended. If the mind is destroyed, the loss to a young man, who is supposed to have more years before him than an old one, is much greater than with one whose years are drawing to a close. It follows, that the probable future of the injured party is a proper subject of consideration.

THIRD.—The damage alleged in the declaration was special, as distinguished from particular damage.

Particular damage is where the particular instance of damage is avowed; special damage is where the loss follows from a specific statement of a fact, which generally or naturally results from the statement, as a cause competent to entail such a consequence.

The declaration avers that the injury affected the plaintiff's brain, and affected his memory and understanding, which were impaired thereby; and that he lost his sense of hearing and that he would hereafter suffer much mental and bodily pain and anguish, as well as personal mortification. The damages so specified were special, but not particular—the averment is, that they resulted from the injury. If the injury complained of affected and injured his brain, and impaired his understanding, and he lost his sense of hearing, a necessary and natural consequence was, that he was incompetent to attend to any business, and especially such as that in which he was engaged.

A man who could not hear, and whose brain was injured and affected, and his memory and understanding injured and impaired, was not competent to pursue the business in which the plaintiff was engaged, even though he might have been able to attend to some kinds of business, like tending a porter's lodge, where very little memory or understanding is required. If the plaintiff were not permitted to prove these consequences, necessarily resulting from facts specifically avowed, then he would be debarred presenting a very essential part of his case, and would be prevented from recovering the whole amount of damages actually sustained. This would occasion gross injustice. When a person is made deaf, his memory and understanding injured and impaired, it is hardly possible that any pecuniary damage can make him good: he cannot be fit for business; he can do nothing and earn nothing in his business, if it should require the exercise of hearing, or memory, or understanding. Aside from the pecuniary consequences resulting from such an injury, his life must be one both monotonous and irksome, and almost wholly destitute of those pleasures and that happiness which those in full health, bodily and mentally, must ever enjoy.

FOURTH.—When the action can be maintained without specifying any particular damage, it is not necessary to aver any particular instance of damage.

When the law implies damage, there can be no reason for stating it with particularity. If a person loses an eye, an ear, a limb, or his general health, the law implies damage, the same as if deprived of his property or any other legal right. Words actionable in themselves imply damage, and none need be proved; but if actionable only by reason of some consequence which might or might not follow, then the particular damage must be averred and proved. The loss of hearing, of memory, and understanding, imply injury, and necessarily and naturally result therefrom, and no particular damage need be averred or proved. This change in the condition of a person cannot be made without producing injury to him in his pecuniary circumstances and in his enjoyments. Such an injury would lessen, if not destroy, his ability to maintain and support his family by his own exertions.

It required no averment in the declaration to apprise the defendant that such consequences must result from the injuries specified. They are so necessary and natural that no one could mistake them. Every common understanding must arrive at the same conclusion.

FIFTH.—The evidence offered tended to prove necessary and natural injurious consequences arising from the injury to the plaintiff, within the settled rules of law.

The courts have furnished precedents that clearly sustain the offer of the plaintiff below, and so do the elementary writers. Mayne on Damages, the latest and best English writer, says:

'Special damage must always be expressly averred and proved, when it is so much the gist of the action, that without it no suit could be maintained.'—P. 314.

'It is not, however, necessary to state or establish particular instances of damage.'—P. 315.

'In all other cases, whether the action be on contract, or in tort, if the facts involve a legal injury, no actual damage need be stated.'—P. 15.

'In contracts, too, there are certain damages which the law will presume; as, for instance, in an action for not delivering goods; that the plaintiff had to buy others at a loss. * * * The extent of the loss must be proved; but no notice need be given of the species of loss which will be set up. But it is different where the injury complained of is merely secondary and consequential damage.'—P. 316.

'In an action for slandering a man in his trade, when the declaration alleges that he thereby lost his trade, he may show a general damage to his trade, though he cannot give evidence of particular instances.'—P. 317.

'So if one, not a carpenter, sell timber which the purchaser uses to prop up his building, and, by reason of the timber being defective, the building fall and be destroyed, if the seller acted in good faith, and was ignorant of the defect, he will only be liable for the difference in price between good timber and that sold. If, however, the seller was a carpenter, who sold the timber for the express purpose of propping up the house, then he shall be liable for all the damage done to the building.'—Sedgwick on Damages, 65.

He quotes from Chitty, at p. 575, where the rule is laid down as in the decisions I have copied.

These views are sustained by various decisions.—Dewint v. Wiltse, 9 Wen., 325.

Defendant hired plaintiff's ferry, and covenanted to maintain and keep the same in good order; but, instead of doing so, he diverted travellers from the usual landing to another landing, owned by himself, by means of which a tavern stand, belonging to the plaintiff, situated at his landing, was so reduced in business as to become tenantless. It was held that the plaintiff could recover. The court determined that the damages proved were a legitimate claim, and the legal and natural consequence of the breach of the covenant.

Dickinson v. Boyle, 17 Pick., 78, 79:

'Where the act complained of is admitted to have been done with force, and to constitute a proper ground for an action of trespass vi et armis, all the damage to the plaintiff, of which such injurious act was the efficient cause, and for which the plaintiff is entitled to recover in any form, may be recovered in such action, although in point of time such damage did not occur until...