Security Sales Agency v. A.S. Abell Co.
| Decision Date | 24 June 1913 |
| Citation | 205 F. 941 |
| Parties | SECURITY SALES AGENCY v. A. S. ABELL CO. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Fourth Circuit |
T Rowland Slingluff, of Baltimore, Md., for plaintiff.
Charles McHenry Howard, of Baltimore, Md., for defendant.
The plaintiff is a West Virginia corporation; the defendant, a corporation of Maryland. The Guarantee Trust & Banking Company is a body corporate of Georgia. For brevity it will be called the Trust Company. Defendant publishes the Baltimore Sun. That paper reported that the Trust Company had gone into receivers' hands and that the hopes of many Baltimoreans for large returns from small investments had been shattered. In point of fact no receivers had been appointed for the Trust Company. The last-named corporation was in the business of issuing large amounts of bonds, many if not most, of which it sold upon the installment plan. By contract with it the plaintiff was its exclusive agent for the sale of these bonds. For so doing the plaintiff received $300 a month and a commission on each bond sold and on each installment paid. The contract was valuable to the plaintiff. It had built up a large business in the bonds. It had incurred considerable expense in establishing subagencies in many cities. If all the installments should be paid on the bonds it had already sold, its commissions thereon would amount to not less than $30,000. It alleges that as a result of the publication in question the market for the bonds was largely destroyed and that many persons who had already bought them announced that they would not pay any further installments thereon. The publication, it asserts, was falsely, wrongfully, wantonly, and carelessly made. It says it has been damaged to the amount of $50,000.
Defendant demurs to the declaration. It says that no well-considered case can be found where any party, other than the direct subject of slander or libel, has been allowed to maintain an action for such grievance. Poe on Pleading, Sec. 421; Odgers on Libel (5th Ed.) 23. The latter author suggests that there may be an exception when the plaintiff can satisfy the jury that the defendant desired and intended to injure him, and that the best way of doing so was by publishing a libel on B., and the damage to the plaintiff was the natural and necessary consequence of that libel on B.
No decided case is cited in support of this suggestion. Perhaps none is needed. When A., for the direct purpose of injuring B., makes any statement which he...
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Hughes v. New England Newspaper Pub. Co.
...of respectable people of the community in which they live by the disclosure that they were related to the deceased. Security Sales Agency v. A. S. Abell Co., D.C., 205 F. 941;Turner v. Crime Detective, D.C., 34 F.Supp. 8;Skrocki v. Stahl, 14 Cal.App. 1, 110 P. 957;Saucer v. Giroux, 54 Cal.A......
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Hughes v. New England Newspaper Pub. Co.
... ... personally and as the widow of said John S. Hughes ... insofar" as it stated ... related to the deceased. Security Sales Agency v. A. S. Abell ... Co. 205 F. 941. Turner v ... ...
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Gilbert Shoe Co. v. Rumpf Pub. Co., Civ. A. No. 52-979.
...is not himself libeled cannot recover even though he has been injured by the libel published concerning another. Security Sales Agency v. A. S. Abell Co., D.C., 205 F. 941. In particular, an officer or stockholder of a corporation who is not personally libeled has no right to recover for a ......
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Fowler v. Curtis Pub. Co., Civil Action No. 863-48.
...else is libeled, has no right of recovery. Any detriment that he sustains is damnum absque injuria. Thus, in Security Sales Agency v. A. S. Abell Co., D.C., 205 F. 941, libelous statements were published concerning a trust company, whose bonds were being sold by the plaintiff as an exclusiv......