Reid v. Terwilliger

• Decision Date: 26 November 1889
• Citation: 22 N.E. 1091,116 N.Y. 530
• Parties: REID v. TERWILLIGER et al.
• Court: New York Court of Appeals Court of Appeals

116 N.Y. 530

22 N.E. 1091

REID

v.TERWILLIGER et al.¹

Court of Appeals of New York,

Second Division.

Nov. 26, 1889.

This is an appeal from a judgment of the general term, third department, affirming the judgment at the circuit in Ulster county in favor of the plaintiff, and an order denying a motion upon the minutes for a new trial. The action was brought by the plaintiff to recover damages, under the act (chapter 646, Laws 1873,) known as the ‘Civil Damage Law,’ to her means of support, occasioned by the death of her husband in consequence of intoxication produced by drinking intoxicating liquors sold to the deceased by the defendant McLaughlin in a hotel stand owned and leased by the defendant Terwilliger. The defendant Terwilliger alone appealed from the judgment. The facts appeared upon the trial that the hotel at which the liquors were sold and drank was in Wallkill, Ulster county; that the defendant Terwilliger lived some 12 miles from the hotel; that he leased the hotel stand to the defendant McLaughlin in 1884, and had so leased it for the three years preceding; the rent was payable quarterly, and the defendant Terwilliger used to come to the hotel to collect the rent. Evidence was introduced by plaintiff showing these facts, and that the plaintiff was dependent upon the deceased for her support; that she had given the defendant McLaughlin notice and requested him not to sell or give her husband liquors, and defendant McLaughlin had promised compliance with her request; that on or about the 8th day of November, 1884, the deceased drank at this hotel, and became very much intoxicated, and that in consequence thereof he fell from a wagon, receiving injuries thereby, which caused his death in a day or two thereafter. I am satisfied the case was sufficiently proved against the defendant McLaughlin to sustain a verdict including exemplary damages, and that there was competent evidence sufficient to warrant the finding by the jury that the defendant knew the premises were used and were to be used for the purpose of selling intoxicating liquors. There was no evidence showing, or tending to show, that Terwilliger knew of McLaughlin's selling intoxicating liquors to the deceased at any time, or that he had been forbidden by the plaintiff to sell to the deceased. The jury rendered a verdict against both defendants under a charge that the jury might award exemplary damages against both defendants. The defendant Terwilliger duly excepted to that part of the charge.

Scott & Hirschberg, for appellant.

Gideon Hill, for respondent.

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

The question upon this appeal is whether the plaintiff in this case, as presented by the evidence, is entitled to recover exemplary damages against the defendant Terwilliger. The statute under which the question in this appeal arises is chapter 646, Laws 1873, and is as follows: ‘Section 1. Every husband, wife, child, parent, guardian, employer, or other person who shall be injured in person or property, or means of support, by any intoxicated person, or in consequence of the intoxication, habitual or otherwise, of any person, shall have a right of action, in his or her name, against any person or persons who shall, by selling or giving away intoxicating liquors, cause the intoxication, in whole or in part, of such person or persons; and any person or persons owning or renting or permitting the occupation of any building or premises, and having knowledge that intoxicating liquors are to be sold therein, shall be liable, severally or jointly, with the person or persons selling or giving intoxicating liquors aforesaid, for all damages sustained, and for exemplary damages; and all damages recovered by a minor under this act shall be paid either to such minor, or to his or her parent, guardian, or next friend, as the court shall direct; and the unlawful sale or giving away of intoxicating liquors shall work a forfeiture of all rights of the lessee or tenant under any lease or contract of rent upon the premises.’ A critical examination of the language of this statute will suggest, to a mind familiar with legal principles, that the legislature has and intended to create a cause of action or a right to recover damages for an injury where one did not exist before, and to apply to such new cause of action an existing remedy. Volans v. Owen, 74 N. Y. 526;Mead v. Stratton, 87 N. Y. 493. The substance of the statute is that whenever the person, property, or means of support of certain classes of persons shall be injured by any intoxicated person, or in consequence of the intoxication of any person, they shall have a right of action, and the person who shall have sold or given the liquors causing the intoxication in any degree, and any person owning, renting, or permitting the occupancy of the premises having knowledge that liquors were to be sold therein, shall be liable, severally and jointly, for the injury, for all damages sustained, and for exemplary damages. The legislature has in this statute defined the elements of a new cause of action, and who may be liable for it. The legislature, however, made no change in the rules of ascertaining and determining the damages, or the limits of liability in the newly-created causes of action, but left them subject to the existing rules of damages, and to the facts established upon the trial.

The damages recoverable in actions for torts or wrongs have long since been classified into ‘compensatory’ and ‘punitive’ or ‘exemplary.’ Compensatory damages were not...