Bowie v. Evening News

• Decision Date: 11 June 1925
• Docket Number: No. 59.,59.
• Parties: BOWIE v. EVENING NEWS et al.
• Court: Maryland Court of Appeals

129 A. 797

BOWIE

v. EVENING NEWS et al.

No. 59.

Court of Appeals of Maryland.

June 11, 1925.

Appeal from Superior Court of Baltimore City; Eli Frank, Judge.

"To be officially reported."

Action by John Bowie against the Evening News and others. From an adverse judgment, plaintiff appeals. Reversed and remanded.

Argued before BOND, C. J., and URNER, ADK1 NS, OFFUTT, PARKE, and WALSH, JJ.

L. Wethered Barroll, of Baltimore, and Eugene P. Childs, of Annapolis (John W. Barroll and James J. Lindsay, both of Baltimore, on the brief), for appellant.

L. Vernon Miller and George Weems Williams, both of Baltimore (Marbury, Gosnell & Williams, of Baltimore, on the brief), for appellees.

OFFUTT, J. On October 20, 1924, the following article was published in the several editions of the Baltimore News, a newspaper published in the city of Baltimore:

"(Special Dispatch to the News.) Annapolis, Oct. 20.—Corruption in official circles of Annapolis and Anne Arundel county was strongly hinted at by Judge Robert Moss of the circuit court in his charge to the grand jury this morning. The judge's charge also included a stinging rebuke to Sheriff Bowie of the county. After declaring the increase of bootlegging was a disgrace to the county, Judge Moss said a cleanup of conditions was in order. He referred to Garfield Chase (colored) who was employed as a 'stool pigeon' by the sheriff's office in running down bootlegs, and said repeated attempts to tamper with Chase and make him useless as a state's witness had been made. He blamed Sheriff Bowie for permitting these attempts, and intimated that a member of the city police force was responsible for them. The court insisted that Chase be indicted either for bootlegging or for perjury, and urged the jury to go to the bottom of the plot to save those against whom Chase was to testify."

The text of the article was the same in each of the editions, but the headlines describing it varied; in the "Home Final" edition the headlines were as follows: "Jurist Hints at Scandal in Anne Arundel. Scandal in A. A. County is Scented. Increase of Bootlegging is called Disgrace in Charge to Jury." In the "Financial" edition they were in this form: "County Scandal Hinted. Scandal in A. A. County is Hinted. Increase of Bootlegging is Called Disgrace in Charge to Jury." And in the "Peach" and "Night" editions they were identical, and in this form: "Jurist Rebukes Anne Arundel Sheriff. Sheriff is Rebuked by Judge. Increase of Bootlegging is Called Disgrace in Charge of Jury"—except that in the "Night" edition, the concluding lines read, "Increase of Bootlegging is Called a Disgrace in Charge to Jury," instead of "Increase of Bootlegging is Called Disgrace in Charge of Jury," as they appeared in the "Peach" edition.

Following these publications, the appellant, who is the John Bowie mentioned in the article, brought this action in the superior court of Baltimore city against the appellees, and successively filed therein four complete declarations, referred to as the original and the first, second, and third amended declarations. Demurrers were filed by the defendants and sustained by the court to each of those declarations, and, after the demurrer to the third amended declaration had been sustained, a judgment for the defendant for costs was entered, and from that judgment this appeal was taken.

The principal questions which the appeal presents are, first, whether, assuming, as we must upon the demurrer, that Judge Moss never made the statements imputed to him by the article, and assuming that the statements were, moreover, false and malicious, are they actionable? and, second, if they are, does any one of the four counts of the narr. properly state a cause of action?

The first question is one of substantive law; the second one of pleading.

Before attempting to analyze the alleged libelous publication in connection with the first of these questions, we will refer briefly, to the legal principles applicable to cases of this character, as they have been stated and applied in this court. It may be stated generally that the right of the individual citizen to rest secure in the possession of his good name, fame, and reputation is a valuable privilege, of which no one may deprive him through falsehood and malice without liability to him for the injury. In theory that principle is practically universally recognized, but its application to the facts of particular cases has often been so forced, unnatural, and confused that it has become exceedingly difficult to formulate any general rule for its application which will afford the citizen adequate protection in the enjoyment of a privilege and a right which are concededly his.

Nowhere are the general principles of the law of libel as recognized in this state more clearly or accurately stated than in the case of Negley v. Farrow, 60 Md. 158, 45 Am. Rep. 715, where the question before the court was whether the publication of a charge intimating that a state senator had sold his vote for private gain was libelous per se. In considering that question the court said:

"It can hardly be necessary to say that such charges as these, against the official conduct of the plaintiff, and the imputation of the base and sordid motives by which such conduct was governed, were calculated to injure his reputation and expose him to the contempt of all honorable men. Independent altogether of the innuendoes, the article on its face shows that these charges were made against the plaintiff, and we have no hesitation, therefore, in saying that the publication is in itself libelous. * * * No one denies the right of the defendants to discuss and criticise boldly and fearlessly the official conduct of the plaintiff. It is a right, which, in every free country belongs to the citizen, and the exercise of it, within lawful and proper limits, affords some protection at least against official abuse and corruption. But there is a broad distinction between fair and legitimate discussion in regard to the conduct of a public man, and the imputation of corrupt motives, by which that conduct may be supposed to be governed. And if one goes out of his way to asperse the personal character of a public man, and to ascribe to him base and corrupt motives, he must do so at his peril; and must either prove the truth of what he says, or answer in damages to the party injured."

In Shepherd v. Baer, 96 Md. 152, 53 A. 790, and in Kilgour v. Evening Star, 96 Md. 16, 53 A. 716, these principles were restated and approved. In the case last cited the plaintiff was the state's attorney of Montgomery county, and the publication complained of charged that he had ordered the release of a colored woman who was under arrest on some charge growing out of the death of a negro baby, and that:

"This action of the state's attorney produced mingled feelings of indignation and resentment on the part of white and colored residents; also what Mr. Thompson' had to say about it, to the effect that 'he denounced it as an outrage on Kilgour's part'; had it been a white man who was charged, etc., he would in all probability have been strung up to one of the trees, etc., and that he intended 'to leave no stone unturned to sift the whole affair'; and, further, that the justice of the peace expressed 'similar views,' etc. * * * In the opening sentences of the publication, it is stated that many prominent citizens were greatly agitated, 'on account of the alleged stifling by the state's attorney of an investigation of the mysterious death,'" etc.

To quote from the opinion there was nothing in that charge which "imputes corrupt motives to the appellant, or that he prevented any inquiry into the death of the child, or that he did anything 'by malfeasance in the discharge of his official duties.'"

In Weeks v. News Publishing Co., 117 Md. 130, 83 A. 162, in connection with an elaborate review of the authorities, that principle was again approved and restated, as it was also in Goldsborough v. Orem, 103 Md. 681, 64 A. 36, and Stannard v. Gibbs, 118 Md. 151, 84 A. 335, 42 L. E. A. (N. S.) 515, Ann. Cas. 1914 B, 709. While these cases all recognize the principle that no one may by falsely and maliciously defaming him, deprive another of his good name without liability, it is nevertheless often difficult to determine just what amounts to actionable defamation. It has been said that there is no definition of the term "libel" sufficiently comprehensive to include all cases, and a very great number of instances in which attempts have been made to define it, collected in note 44a, 36 C. J. 1143, illustrate the force of that comment. There is, however, a distinction between oral and written or printed defamation, and "the presumption that words are defamatory arises much more readily in cases of libel than in cases of slander." Id. 1152, and the courts seem to be in general accord at least upon this, that any unprivileged, false, and malicious publication, which by printing, writing, signs or pictures tends to expose a person to public scorn, hatred, contempt, or ridicule, constitutes an actionable libel. 36 C. J. 1145, etc.

And in determining whether an alleged defamatory statement is to be given that effect the whole publication is to be considered, and it is not necessary that the supposed defamatory charge be made directly; it is sufficient if it may naturally be implied and...