Steinman v. McWilliams
| Decision Date | 13 July 1847 |
| Citation | 6 Pa. 170 |
| Parties | STEINMAN <I>v.</I> McWILLIAMS. |
| Court | Pennsylvania Supreme Court |
Bancroft and Ellis, for plaintiff in error.
Comly and Montgomery, contrà.
July 13. COULTER, J.
The paper book is not remarkable for its lucid order. Nor is the testimony set out, if it were so given, with the exactitude and precision necessary to indicate with desirable certainty, the materiality of evidence sworn to by the plaintiff, and its alleged variance from the truth; and which was charged by the defendant to have been wilfully corrupt and false. But this defect is compensated by the controlling character of some of the points of law arising in the cause, which will be considered, and which relieve this court from any minute attention to the confused mass of testimony — such as it is — contained on the record. The two first errors assigned are of no moment; there is nothing in them which requires further notice. The third is, that the court erred in permitting the defendant to give evidence, in mitigation of damages, of the general character of the plaintiff for truth and veracity. This assignment will cover also the refusal of the court to permit the plaintiff to give evidence of his general character to protect and shield himself, and confining him to evidence of his general character for truth and veracity; to which the plaintiff excepted. The grievance set forth in the plaintiff's declaration is, that the defendant charged him with having committed perjury. The defendant withdrew his first plea of not guilty, and relied solely on the plea of justification, on which issue he went to trial. And the competency of evidence as to the plaintiff's general character for truth and veracity under that issue, is the question to be first resolved. The vibrating decisions of the English courts, seem at last to have settled on the position, that the defendant in actions of slander may give the general character of the plaintiff in evidence, in mitigation of damages, on the plea of not guilty, or when the plea is double, not guilty, and the plea of justification superadded. The New York courts, after a contest among the eminent judges who shed such brilliance on her judicial character, finally adopted the same conclusion: and such is the rule in our own courts. But I know of no decision, nor was any such cited in the argument, which adopts the rule in cases where the sole issue was justification. The defendant there seems to throw himself altogether upon the maintenance of the charge made by him, and to reject all aid from other sources. He admits that he made the charge; that he made it because it was true; and in short admits every thing that it was necessary the plaintiff should prove on the general issue, and puts him on his defence as to the particular charge. It is an issue not dependent upon character, except as to the commission of the offence imputed. If the defendant succeeds in establishing the plaintiff's guilt, he maintains his issue, and destroys his adversary; and no animal but the ass kicks the dead lion. Why, then, in such cases, give evidence of general character? And if the defendant fail in maintaining the truth of the charge, which he has deliberately and advisedly put on the record to cover the plaintiff with disgrace — after having fallen short in his attempt thus to reach the heart of his adversary — ought he to be permitted to stab him in the leg or arm, and to throw himself back on the plea of not guilty, and resort to the plaintiff's general character to lessen the effects of his malice? Under such circumstances, the plea of justification is always considered a high aggravation. This plea would seem to throw the plaintiff off his guard in relation to evidence of general character, and attract his attention solely to a defence of the particular accusation. But whether evidence of general character may be given in such cases to mitigate the damages, is not the question here, and is therefore not decided. But can evidence of particular and separate departments of character be lawfully allowed? Evidence of this kind, when admitted, goes upon the ground, that the jury cannot rightly estimate the damages done to the character, unless they have some idea of its value. But how is character estimated? Certainly by its general import. It will not do to take up the decalogue and inquire whether a man is generally reputed as addicted to fornication, or adultery, to profane swearing, to Sabbath breaking. Nor would it be allowable to ask whether a man was generally reputed as a covetous person, who loved his neighbour's goods or his wife; and by the same rule, it is not competent to inquire, whether a man is generally reputed as a liar. If this mode of destroying character was allowed in our courts, the standing of all men would be in peril. We have but few Catos amongst us; and if we had more, such individuals would hardly seek redress in our courts. But the law is not made for the protection of such men; but for the protection of that middle class all the world over, who have a sense of truth, honour and virtue, and who are yet not above the infirmities of life; whose sensibility as to the value of character, and whose liability to err, make them more susceptible of wounds from the shaft of slander. The thousand wagging tongues of this world — sometimes in sport and sometimes in malice — make free with some department or quality of character of good men in the main. And if malice were allowed to seize hold of these reports, and embody them in a court of justice, to destroy character, few men would be safe. The truth is, that it is only in general character that a man finds his true level in society; and that alone ought to mark his value. It is a man's character in gross, and all taken together, his faults and his virtues — if he have any, and few but who have some — that forms his individuality as to character; and which ought to determine for how much it is worth. Even a man's relatives have some interest in his character; his wife, and his children are entitled to...
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...Pa. 493 (1880); Barr v. Moore, 87 Pa. 385 (1878); Burford v. Wible, 32 Pa. 95 (1858); Chapman v. Calder, 14 Pa. 365 (1850); Steinman v. McWilliams, 6 Pa. 170 (1847). In 1953, this common law principle was codified in the Act of August 21, 1953, P.L. 1291, No. 363, § 1(2)(a), 12 P.S. § 1584 ......
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...United States, 2 Cir., 1927, 16 F.2d 951, at page 954; United States v. Slutzky, 3 Cir., 1935, 79 F.2d 504, at page 506; Steinman v. McWilliams, 6 Pa. 170 at page 177. The test is whether the testimony has a natural effect or tendency to influence, impede, or dissuade the grand jury from pu......
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U.S. v. Gaudin
...or else there could be no directed verdicts for civil plaintiffs. The other early case relied upon by the Government, Steinman v. McWilliams, 6 Pa. 170, 177-178 (1847), another slander case, is inapt for the same reason. The earliest American case involving the point that we have been able ......
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