Johns v. Patterson

• Decision Date: 21 April 1919
• Docket Number: (No. 188.)
• Citation: 211 S.W. 387
• Parties: JOHNS v. PATTERSON.
• Court: Arkansas Supreme Court

211 S.W. 387

JOHNS v. PATTERSON.

(No. 188.)

Supreme Court of Arkansas.

April 21, 1919.

Appeal from Circuit Court, Mississippi County; R. H. Dudley, Judge.

Action by H. C. Patterson against F. Johns. Judgment for plaintiff, and defendant appeals. Reversed and remanded.

H. C. Patterson brought an action against F. Johns to recover damages for enticing and inducing Nathaniel Meyers to leave his employment.

According to the testimony of H. C. Patterson himself, he made a contract with Nathaniel Meyers to work a crop for him on the shares during the year 1918. Meyers worked with him until some time in May. He then left Patterson's farm and went to work for the defendant, Johns. At the time Meyers left Patterson, he owed the latter $51. Patterson went to see Johns about his employment of Meyers, and Johns refused to either turn him off or to pay his account to Patterson. Meyers was not dissatisfied, and had no row with Patterson at the time he left him. Patterson tried to get Meyers to come back and work his crop, but the latter refused to do it.

The defendant, Johns, was a witness for himself, and testified that Meyers had already left Patterson's place when he hired him; that he did nothing to prevent Meyers from going back to Patterson; that Patterson came to see Meyers about going back to his place, and that he told him that he would not work for him at all, and that there was no use to talk to him any further about it; that he employed Meyers by the day and paid him every night; and that he kept Meyers employed for several months after he had left Patterson.

The case was tried before a jury, which returned a verdict for the plaintiff in the sum of $51, and from the judgment rendered the defendant has appealed.

J. T. Coston, of Osceola, for appellant.

W. J. Driver, of Osceola, for appellee.

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

The statute under which this action was brought reads as follows:

"If any person shall interfere with, entice away, knowingly employ, or induce a laborer or renter who has contracted with another person for a specified time to leave his employer or the leased premises, before the expiration of his contract without the consent of the employer or landlord, he shall, upon conviction before any justice of the peace or circuit court, be fined not less than twenty-five nor more than one hundred dollars, and in addition shall be liable to such employer or landlord for all advances made by him to said renter or laborer by virtue of his contract, whether verbal or written, with said renter or laborer, and for all damages which he may have sustained by reason thereof." Acts of 1905, p. 726.

It is earnestly insisted that this statute is unconstitutional because it conflicts with the Peonage Act of Congress, which reads as follows:

"The holding of any person to service or labor under the system known as peonage is abolished and forever prohibited in the territory of New Mexico, or in any other territory or state of the United States; and all acts, laws, resolutions, orders, regulations, or usages of the territory of New Mexico, or of any other territory or state, which have heretofore established, maintained, or enforced, or by virtue of which any attempt shall hereafter be made to establish, maintain, or enforce, directly or indirectly, the voluntary or involuntary service or labor of any persons as peons, in liquidation of any debt or obligation, or otherwise, are declared null and void." Act March 2, 1867, c. 187, 14 Stat. 546 (U. S. Comp. St. § 3944).

We do not think that the contention of counsel for the defendant is well taken. A comparison of the two statutes will show that they have wholly different objects in view. Congress undertook to prevent, directly or indirectly, the voluntary or involuntary service or labor of any persons as peons, in the liquidation of any debt or any obligation. In other words, the gist of the offense denounced by the act of Congress is the holding of persons in unwilling servitude in payment of a debt. United States v. Reynolds, 235 U. S. 133, 35 Sup. Ct. 86, 59 L. Ed. 162.

On the other hand the state statute was enacted for the purpose of providing a penal and civil liability against third persons who with knowledge of an existing contract of employment induce the laborer to quit to the injury of the employer. This rule is recognized by Blackstone in the following language:

"The retaining another person's servant during the time he has agreed to serve his present master; this, as it is an ungentlemanlike, so it is also an illegal, act. For every master has by his contract purchased for a valuable consideration the services of his domestics for a limited time. The inveigling or hiring his servant, which induces a breach of this contract, is therefore an injury to the master; and for that injury the law has given him a remedy by a special action on the case;...