Thе plaintiff and appellant, the publisher of a weekly newspaper, containing, among other things, advertisements, sought to enjoin the defendant and respondent street railway company from placing advertisements on the upper inside parts of its cars, because, as a rеsult, the defendant unlawfully diverted from the plaintiff a large and lucrative business in advertising, and infringed upon the rights and business of the plaintiff. From an order sustaining a demurrer to the complaint, this appeal was taken.
The initial question concerns plaintiff’s right to litigate the question • •whether the defendant railway company exceeded its corporate powers in so receiving and placing advertisements, because he, as an individual; h'as thereby suffered special damage. With a vivаcity that is refreshing and a plausibility that is rather surprising, counsel for plaintiff has marshaled authorities to the effect that “this application is not a path-
In the first are cases in which courts of equity have interferеd, not only upon the information of .the attorney general, but also upon the information of рrivate parties directly affected, to enjoin public nuisances or trespasses. Story, Eq. Jur. § 924, nоte a; Mississippi & M. R. Co. v. Ward,
In the second group are cases in which a court of equity has restrained corporate officers frоm exceeding their corporate powers. Wilts v. Swindon, 9 Ch. App. 451, concerned essentially the right of one riparian proprietor to prevent any other riparian proprietоr above him from diverting a stream so as to cause that stream to flow otherwise than in its accustomed channel. See Sir W. M. James, L. J., at page 457. Neither on facts nor on principle does this case support plaintiff’s contention. What he regards as the “leading and determining case on the subject” (Attorney General v. Great Northern, 1 Drewry & S. Ch. 154) involved the information of the attorney gеneral upon, the relation .of a stranger to the company against the Great Northern. Rаilway Company. It was held that the attorney general could sustain information on behalf of the public to restrain the railroad company from carrying on the business of coal merchants. That the state, proceeding through the attorney general, may restrain a company from such ultra vires adventures, is incontrovertible. That a stranger, acting without the attorney general, as wаs undertaken to be' done here, is in no such position, is equally incontrovertible. In Colman v. Eastern, 10 Beav. 1, plaintiff, on behalf of himself and other stockholders in a railway company, restrained “thе directors committing a breach of trust,” viz., by guarantying certain profits, and securing the capital оf an intended steamer packet company, who were to act in connection with thе railway company. So in Sandford v. Railroad Co., 24 Pa. St. 378,
•Apart, however, from spеcific decisions, we are at a loss to see why the plaintiff has any occasion to sеek equitable relief. • His damages, if they exist at all, are entirely conjectural and extremеly remote. The .advertising business was incidental to the running of cars. Incidental thereto was the expenditure of considerable sums of money. That, incidentally, might result in a decrease in newspaрer advertising. That, incidentally, might take from plaintiff’s paper advertisements which might otherwise have come to it. Even if the street car company exceeded its powers, which, as at рresent advised,, we think it did not, plaintiff’s damage is too remote to give him any standing in a court of equity.
Cоunsel’s quotation from Troilus and Cressida, act II, scene 2, is apt:
There is a law in every well ordered nation To curb these raging appetites that are Most disobedient and refractory.
We сonclude, however, that plaintiff has not shown himself entitled to raise the question in this case whether defendant’s “appetite” was ■“disobedient and refractory.”
Affirmed.