Moyer v. Moyer

• Decision Date: 01 January 1864
• Citation: 49 Pa. 210
• Parties: Moyer versus Moyer.
• Court: Pennsylvania Supreme Court

49 Pa. 210

Moyer versus Moyer.

Supreme Court of Pennsylvania.

ERROR to the Common Pleas of Elk county.

Henry Souther and R. Brown, for plaintiff in error.

Chapin & Wilbur, for defendant.

The opinion of the court was delivered by READ, J.

Mr. Pitt Taylor, in the 4th edition of his Treatise on the Law of Evidence, in speaking of evidence in mitigation of damages in slander and libel, says: "Whether, in an action for defamation, evidence, impeaching the plaintiff's previous general character, and showing that at the time of the publication he laboured under a general suspicion of having been guilty of the charge imputed to him by the defendant, is admissible as affecting the question of damages, is a point which has been much controverted;" and, after stating the arguments on both sides, he says: "Such being the arguments on either side of this vexed question, it remains only to observe that the weight of authority inclines slightly in favour of the admissibility of the evidence, even though the defendant has pleaded truth as a justification, and has failed in establishing his plea." "It seems, however, that here, as in other cases where witnesses to character are admitted, evidence must be confined to the particular trait which is attacked in the alleged libel, and as to this, it can only furnish proof of general reputation, and must by no means condescend to particular acts of bad conduct:" vol. 1, pages 354, 355, 356.

In Teese v. Huntingdon, 23 How. 2, it was clearly established, as the general rule in the United States, that in impeaching a witness the inquiry should be as to his reputation for truth and veracity. In Chess v. Chess, 1 Penn. Rep. 32, this is undoubtedly the rule; and in Gilchrist v. McKee, 4 Watts 380, where it was held that the character of a female witness for veracity could not be impeached by evidence of her general character for chastity, Chief Justice Gibson said, "But if an inquiry into reputation for a particular vice be inadmissible, it is not easy to comprehend how an inquiry into reputation for a variety of vices may be less so. Granting that universal immorality includes want of veracity, yet a man may be generally vicious without being universally so. He may be intemperate, incontinent, profane, and addicted to many other vices that ruin the reputation, and yet retain a scrupulous regard for truth. Countless instances of such partial exemption from depravity are in the knowledge of every one. It is, after all,...