Doremus v. Hennessy

• Decision Date: 24 October 1898
• Parties: DOREMUS et al. v. HENNESSY.
• Court: Illinois Supreme Court

176 Ill. 608

52 N.E. 924

DOREMUS et al.

v.HENNESSY.¹

Supreme Court of Illinois.

Oct. 24, 1898.

Appeal from appellate court, First district.

Action on the case by Mary G. Hennessy against Abram F. Doremus and others. From a judgment for plaintiff, and orders overruling motions for a new trial and in arrest of judgment, affirmed in the appellate court, defendants appeal. Affirmed.Howard Henderson and Francis W. Walker, for appellants.

Tuttle & Grier, for appellee.

PHILLIPS, J.

Appellee instituted an action on the case, alleging that in 1890, and several years prior thereto, she was conducting a laundry office in the city of Chicago, where she received clothing from various customers, to be laundered; that she did not own a laundry plant herself, but employed other operating laundries, who, when the work was done, returned the same to her for delivery to her customers; that she had built up a good and profitable business; that appellants conspired to injure her in her good name and credit, and to destroy her business, because she would not increase the price charged by her to customers in accordance with the scale of prices fixed by an organization known as the ‘Chicago Laundrymen's Association,’ and to that end willfully and unlawfully, by intimidation and unlawful inducements, caused parties who were doing her work (five of whom were mentioned in the declaration) to refuse to longer do the same, and by threats, intimidation, false representations, and unlawful inducements caused others who were operating laundries (who were specifically designated in a bill of particulars) to refuse to take or do her work; that this was done for no justifiable purpose, but to cause loss to the plaintiff, and injure and destroy her business; that various persons with whom she had engagements to so do her work, in consequence of the acts of the appellants, broke their contracts with her, and the business she had built up as a laundry agent was destroyed and entirely broken up, and she thereby sustained great loss and damage by reason of appellants so contriving, plotting, and conspiring by the means aforesaid to break up and destroy her said business. Issues were joined, and upon a trial in the circuit court of Cook county the defendants were found guilty, and the plaintiff's damages were assessed by a jury at $6,000. Motions for a new trial and in arrest of judgment were overruled, and judgment was entered on the verdict, to which defendants excepted. On appeal to the appellate court for the First district the judgment was affirmed, and this appeal is prosecuted.

The contention of appellants is that they cannot be held liable for merely inducing others to break their contracts; that the parties who broke their contracts were the only ones liable, they being free agents, and not coerced or influenced by force or fraud; that their acts in inducing parties to break their contracts with appellee were not mere malicious acts, done solely with the intent to injure her, but were in the line of legitimate trade competition, for which they cannot be held liable, nor can they be held liable, they claim, for acts which are charged to have been done in pursuance of a conspiracy, as it is insisted that a conspiracy does not create a liability in a civil action, as the damage illegally done, and not the conspiracy, must be the gist of the action.

The common law seeks to protect every person against the wrongful acts of others, whether committed alone or by combination, and an action may be had for injuries done which cause another loss in the enjoyment of any right or privilege or property. No persons, individually or by combination, have the right to directly or indirectly interfere or disturb another in his lawful business or occupation, or to threaten to do so, for the sake of compelling him to do some act which, in his judgment, his own interest does not require. Losses willfully caused by another, from motives of malice, to one who seeks to exercise and enjoy the fruits and advantages of his own enterprise, industry, skill, and credit, will sustain an action. It is clear that it is unlawful and actionable for one man, from unlawful motives, to interfere with another's trade by fraud or misrepresentation, or by molesting his customers, or those who would be customers, or by preventing others from working for him, or causing them to leave his employ, by fraud or misrepresentation, or physical or moral intimidation or persuasion, with an intent to inflict an injury which causes loss. A conspiracy may create a liability; for, by reason of the fact that one or more conspirators may do an unlawful act which causes damage to another, all those engaged in the conspiracy for the accomplishment of the purpose for which the injury was done, and which was done in pursuance of the conspiracy, would be alike liable, whether actively engaged in causing the loss or not. For acts illegally done in pursuance of such conspiracy, and consequent loss, a liability may exist against all of the conspirators. Appellants, and those persons who refused to do appellee's work, had each a separate and independent right to unite with the organization known as the ‘Chicago Laundrymen's Association,’ but they had no right, separately or in the aggregate,with others, to insist that the appellee should do so, or to insist that appellee should make her scale of prices the same as that fixed by the association, and make her refusal to do this a pretext for destroying and breaking up her business. A combination by them to induce others not to deal with appellee, or enter into contracts with her, or do any further work for her, was an actionable wrong. Every man has a right, under the...