B. F. Goodrich Rubber Co. v. Holland

• Decision Date: 19 January 1931
• Docket Number: 29065
• Citation: 159 Miss. 346,131 So. 882
• Court: Mississippi Supreme Court
• Parties: B. F. GOODRICH RUBBER CO. v. HOLLAND

131 So. 882

159 Miss. 346

B. F. GOODRICH RUBBER CO. v. HOLLAND

No. 29065

Supreme Court of Mississippi

January 19, 1931

Division A

1. ATTORNEY AND CLIENT.

Authority of attorney employed to prosecute or defend litigation embraces all matters of procedure, and right to act relative thereto is absolute.

2. ATTORNEY AND CLIENT.

Acts of attorney outside due and orderly prosecution or defense of litigation, for which he was employed, to bind principal must be shown to be within scope of authority.

3. ATTORNEY AND CLIENT. Attorney's procuring joinder of another creditor in proposed bankruptcy proceeding which attorney was authorized to institute held beyond scope of authority, and therefore client was not liable for attorney's alleged libelous statements to such creditor.

Attorney was authorized to institute bankruptcy proceedings. To obtain other claims against same debtor, necessary for support of petition in bankruptcy, attorney, without knowledge or consent of his employer, wrote letter to another creditor asking it to join in bankruptcy petition, in which attorney made alleged libelous statements.

HON. J L. WILLIAMS, Chancellor.

APPEAL from chancery court of Sunflower county, HON. J. L. WILLIAMS Chancellor.

Suit by R. E. Holland against the B. F. Goodrich Rubber Company. Decree for complainant, and defendant appeals. Reversed, and bill dismissed.

Reversed and bill dismissed.

Percy Bell, of Greenville, and Willis Bacon, of Akron, Ohio, for appellant.

Code 1906, section 10, by which certain words are made actionable has no application in a suit to hold a principal liable for words spoken by an agent unless possibly such words are spoken at the command of the principal.

Dixie Fire Ins. Co. v. Betty, 101 Miss. 880, 56 So. 705.

In application of the general rules governing the liability of a principal or master for torts committed by his agent or servant, it is generally held that a principal, master, or employer may be held liable in damages for the publication of a defamation by his agent or servant, where the latter in publishing the defamatory matter was carrying out express orders, or acting in pursuance of express authority or where the libelous publication has been ratified and adopted by the principal or master. But otherwise there is no liability on the part of the principal or master.

37 C. J., page 13.

A client is not responsible for any illegal action taken or directed by his attorney which the client did not advise, consent to, or participate in, and which was not justified by any authority that he had given.

6 C. J., page 671.

Frank E. Everett, of Indianola, for appellee.

A corporation is liable for slander uttered by its agent acting within the scope of his employment and in the performance of his duties touching the matter in question.

Rivers v. Y. & M. V. R. Co., 90 Miss. 196; 17 R. C. L. 382; Railroad Company v. Brooks, 69 Miss. 168; Richberg v. Express Co., 73 Miss. 161; Walters v. Stonewall Cotton Mills, 101 So. 495.

Argued orally by Percy Bell, for appellant, and by J. M. Forman, for appellee.

OPINION

Smith, C. J.

This is an attachment in chancery under the statute now appearing as section 173 of the Code of 1930. The cause of action sued on is an alleged libel alleged to have been published of and concerning the appellee by an attorney at law residing in Akron, Ohio, the domicile of the appellant. It appears from the pleadings and the evidence that the Holland Motor Company in which the appellee was interested was indebted to the appellant. It was advised by an attorney at law, with whom it had placed its claim against the appellee for collection that a proceeding in bankruptcy would lie therefor, to which the appellant agreed and authorized the attorney to institute such a proceeding. In order to obtain the two other claims against the ...