Houston v. Pulitzer Pub. Co.

• Decision Date: 28 March 1913
• Citation: 155 S.W. 1068,249 Mo. 332
• Parties: HOUSTON v. PULITZER PUB. CO.
• Court: Missouri Supreme Court

155 S.W. 1068

249 Mo. 332

HOUSTON v. PULITZER PUB. CO.

Supreme Court of Missouri.

March 28, 1913.

Rehearing Denied April 8, 1913.

1. CORPORATIONS (§ 503) — JURISDICTION — LIBEL.

Under Rev. St. 1899, § 997, providing that suits against corporations shall be commenced either in the county where the cause of action accrued or in any county where such corporations shall have an office or agent, a citizen can only bring an action against a newspaper for libel in the county where first published or of the residence of the plaintiff, and the court of any other county has no jurisdiction, at least where there is no waiver as to jurisdiction.

2. CONSTITUTIONAL LAW (§§ 249, 305) — CORPORATIONS (§ 500) — VENUE — LIBEL — EQUAL PROTECTION.

A statute that would allow one to sue a publishing corporation for libel in any county he chose, where publications were circulated, would be unconstitutional as depriving citizens of the equal protection of the law, and as depriving them of property without due process of law.

Woodson and Bond, JJ., dissenting.

In Banc. Appeal from Circuit Court, Macon County; Nat M. Shelton, Judge.

Action by William P. Houston against the Pulitzer Publishing Company. Judgment for plaintiff, and defendant appeals. Reversed.

This cause reached us from Division 2 of this court on the ground of a federal question being involved. It is an action for libel in which the plaintiff recovered below the sum of $30,000; $10,000 actual and $20,000 punitive damages. With the view we have of the constitutional question, we need not go into the merits of the case. At this point suffice it to say that our Brothers in Division 2 were not impressed with the idea of the justness of the verdict because they cut the aggregate sum from $30,000 to $6,000. The details and reasoning upon questions of liability or no liability, libel or no libel, excessive or nonexcessive verdict, must, however, be put aside in the view we take of the law upon the question of the jurisdiction here. To that question only will we address ourselves.

Plaintiff was a citizen and resident of Cass county, Mo. At the time of the alleged libel, he was the representative of his county in the lower branch of the Missouri General Assembly. What was published of and concerning him by defendant was of him in that capacity. Defendant is a Missouri corporation domiciled in the city of St. Louis, Mo. The paper it publishes is circulated throughout the state and in Macon county, in this state. Plaintiff, for reasons thought best by himself, did not see fit to sue defendant in the place of its domicile, nor in the county of his residence, but brought his suit in Macon county, many miles distant from either of the other two. The jurisdiction of the Macon county circuit court was promptly challenged by defendant, and such challenge kept alive from the beginning to the end of the trial, nisi, and upon appeal is urged here. Defendant contends, first, that the statutes of Missouri as to service of process do not give the circuit court of Macon county jurisdiction of this cause; and, secondly, that, if such is the reading of the statute and the construction to be given it, then such statute is violative of certain provisions of the federal Constitution, as well as certain provisions of the state Constitution. The federal question thus lodged carried the case from division to court in banc, but, now that it is here, all questions are open for discussion and review. We decline to discuss the merits of the case, because we are of opinion that the constitutional questions determine the case, and a further discussion of the merits would but muddy the waters of jurisprudence. One determinative point in a case is all that need be discussed. If the trial court was without jurisdiction, as we think it was, then we have the one determinative point, and the discussion of others might only lead to confusion. This sufficiently states the case.

Judson, Green & Henry, of St. Louis, for appellant. John T. Barker, of Jefferson City, Campbell & Ellison, of Kirksville, Silver & Dumm, of Jefferson City, and Sanford B. Ladd, of Kansas City, for respondent.

GRAVES, J. (after stating the facts as above).

1. The case at bar presents for the first time in this court the sole and naked question of our then statute as to service of process and the place of bringing suits (if given the construction contended for by the plaintiff in this case) being violative of the federal Constitution. In this case the question of waiver of jurisdiction is not a factor, because there was no waiver. As said above, the case presents to us for the first time a clear-cut, naked, federal question. It presents the federal question involved in the Julian Case and a school of cases following it, but presents it stripped of all incidents which, under the law and the practice, would preclude a review of the question by the highest tribunal of the land. Personally I had hoped that the Julian Case might be left in a position where the question could be settled by the United States Supreme Court and the differences among our Brothers upon this bench finally set at rest. That hope was blighted by the appearance of a concurring opinion which raised a purely state question. Those of us who fostered the idea that both the state and federal Constitutions were violated by the construction given our statute in the Julian Case have never receded from this federal question in all the cases which followed. We have recognized the majority ruling upon the matter of waiver, but have continuously asserted confidence upon the pure question of jurisdiction under constitutional views.

Our position was clearly stated in Tilles v. Publishing Co., 241 Mo. loc. cit. 629, 145 S. W. loc. cit. 1148 et seq., whereat a majority of this court said: "The first point made in the brief for appellant is the one going to the action of the circuit court in disallowing its plea to the jurisdiction. Several authorities are cited in support of the proposition. The original motion going to the jurisdiction is elaborate and well and carefully worded. Special appearance is preserved in the motion. At all times thereafter the defendant undertook to assert the want of jurisdiction. The question was preserved in the answer after the overruling of the motion. This question, however, has been so recently gone over by this court in the case of Julian v. Kansas City Star, 209 Mo. 35 , that it would be useless to rediscuss the question here. The individual views of the writer and of Lamm, J., are expressed in the dissenting opinion in the Julian Case. Those views, however, are not the views of the court. The principal majority opinion in the Julian Case, as well as the minority opinion, left a fair federal question, which federal question is again urged here. By a separate concurring opinion in the Julian Case, a state question, finally determining the case, was injected. That question was the waiver of jurisdiction over the person by reason of filing an application for change of venue. Upon this particular question, our court stood four to three. It was a state question, and operated to obviate a discussion of the real question discussed in the Julian Case, when such case reached the Supreme Court of the United States. What that court may have thought of the real issue in the Julian Case must, by reason of the injection of this state question in that opinion, remain as a sealed book. 30 Sup. Ct. 406 . A reading of the memoranda opinion by the United States court, supra, shows that a discussion of the real question in the Julian Case and the real question of jurisdiction...