Nye v. Western Union Telegraph Co.
| Decision Date | 09 November 1900 |
| Citation | 104 F. 628 |
| Parties | NYE v. WESTERN UNION TEL. CO. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — District of Minnesota |
Fred. H. Boardman and M. H. Boutelle, for plaintiff.
C. M Ferguson, for defendant.
The petition of the defendant for an order setting aside the verdict and judgment in this action and granting a new trial was duly brought on for hearing on August 31, 1900, in the March, 1900, term of this court, and both parties appeared by their respective counsel. The action is to recover damages alleged to have been sustained by the plaintiff by the publication incident to the transmission over defendant's telegraph from New York to Minneapolis on the night of July 27, 1899, of two telegrams, below quoted, and the delivery of each to the person to whom it was addressed on the following morning, at Minneapolis, by defendant's messengers.
The first count in the complaint is based on the following telegram to M. H. Boutelle, an attorney at law of Minneapolis, having some business association with the plaintiff, who is also a practicing attorney of the same place:
W. H. Vanderburgh.'
The second count is based upon the following other telegram so delivered to the plaintiff:
W. H. Vanderburgh.'
The complaint sufficiently alleged the meaning and purpose of the telegrams to be to charge the plaintiff with having been bribed to sell his vote and political influence for a money consideration in the year 1896, and as being corrupt and dishonest. Upon the trial it was admitted that the defendant's servants in New York who received and transmitted these telegrams knew nothing of the plaintiff, nor of any facts or circumstances connected with the subject-matter of the telegrams; and it appeared that the telegrams were presented for transmission at different times the same evening, and at different stations of the defendant in the city of New York, by William H. Vanderburgh, and were transmitted in the customary manner.
On the trial the jury were instructed that there was nothing upon the face of the Boutelle telegram to advise the servants of defendant who received and transmitted it that it was defamatory, as the statement that Nye was bought off by Pillsbury in 1896 might well be understood to refer to a purchase of some claim or interest of Nye respecting property or property rights, and that plaintiff could not recover upon said first count. But the court refused to charge the jury, as requested by defendant:
'That there is not sufficient evidence in this case to establish a cause of action against the defendant with respect to the telegram addressed to the plaintiff, set forth in the complaint as the second cause of action, and with respect to such cause of action your verdict must be for the defendant.'
The defendant duly excepted to this refusal to charge, and also to that portion of the charge which in effect left the jury to determine whether, upon the face of the message, it appeared that its only purpose was to defame and slander the plaintiff, so that the receiving clerk, if a person of ordinary intelligence, would so understand it, in which case, only the defendant would be liable in damages for its publication to its own employes who might read it in the transmission, but that if the terms of the dispatch were such that the receiving clerk might properly regard it as an answer to an inquiry by plaintiff, or as a communication for any purpose other than defamation, the defendant would not be responsible. The jury returned a verdict for the plaintiff on this cause of action for the sum of...
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O'brien v. Western Union Telegraph Co.
...in which the sender in fact was privileged, as often he may be. It must be broader than that, and the cases so hold. Nye v. Western Union Telegraph Co., C.C., 104 F. 628; Western Union Telegraph Co. v. Brown, 8 Cir., 294 F. 167; Klein v. Western Union Telegraph Co., 1939, 257 App.Div. 336, ......
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Lesesne v. Willingham
...for aught that appeared on its face, might be privileged, were in fact sent with a defamatory or mischievous intent. Nye v. Western Union Tel. Co., C.C., 104 F. 628; Western Union Telegraph Co. v. Cashman, 5 Cir., 149 F. 367, 9 L.R.A.,N.S., 140, 9 Ann.Cas. In Peterson v. Telegraph Co., 65 M......
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...defamatory matter may outweigh the harm to the reputation of others. See O'Brien v. Western Union, 1 Cir., 113 F.2d 539; Nye v. Western Union, C.C.Minn., 104 F. 628; Western Union v. Brown, 8 Cir., 294 F. 167, 168; Von Meysenbug v. Western Union D.C.S.D.Fla., 54 F.Supp. 100; Klein v. Wester......