133 N.Y.S. 852 | N.Y. App. Div. | 1912
Lead Opinion
The provoking article published by Collier's did not, as is said, make a general charge of fraudulent and deceptive advertising against the defendant. The charge was that the defendant by its methods of advertising was to its own injury causing its food products to be classed in the public mind with fraudulent and failing patent medicines. The specific charge was as follows:
“One widely circulated paragraph labors to produce the impression that ‘ Grape-Nuts ’ will obviate the necessity of an operation in appendicitis. This is lying, and, potentially, deadly lying. Similarly, ‘ Postum ’ continually makes reference to the endorsements of ‘ a distinguished physician ’or ‘a prominent health official,’ persons as mythical, doubtless, as they are mysterious.”
In the retort, which is the basis of this suit for libel, the defendant quoted these specific statements, characterized them as “mendacious falsehoods,” and in substance charged that they were published to force the defendant to advertise in Collier's on its own terms. To meet the defendant’s plea of privilege the plaintiff assumed the burden of proving the falsity of the alleged libelous article and actual malice in its publication. That involved proof of the truth of the said specific statements, which naturally would consist of evidence of advertisements calculated or tending to create the impression that Grape-Nuts would obviate the necessity of an operation in appendicitis, of the falsity of such a claim, if made, and of the publication of fictitious indorsements purporting to have been made by physicians and health officials. I am unable to find in the voluminous record before us any evidence whatever of the publication
The judgment and order appealed from 'should, therefore,
Ingraham, P. J., and Scott, J., concurred; Laughlin and Dowling, JJ., dissented.
Dissenting Opinion
The action is for libel. At the time of the publication of the alleged libel and for years prior thereto .the plaintiff and his father, Peter F. Collier, since deceased., owned and published a weekly periodical known as Collier’s Weekly, of which plaintiff was the managing editor. The plaintiff determined the policy of Collier’s and had and exercised general supervision over it, but the editorials published therein were written by others, and Norman Hapgood, who was the chief editorial writer, ■ was known as “Editor” by those connected with the paper, and on one occasion when a picture of the staff was published in Collier’s the word “Editor” was printed under Hapgood’s name. In the complaint it' is charged that the libel was of and concerning the plaintiff as one of the owners and one of the editors of Collier’s Weekly, and was composed and published “ with the intent to injure this plaintiff and the newspaper ‘ Collier’s Weekly,’ of which the plaintiff is one of the owners and editors, in his and its good name and reputation. ” The , alleged libel was published on the 4th day of September, 1907, in answer in part, at least, to an editorial published in Collier’s Weekly on the 27th day of July, 1907, which it is claimed made both the occasion and the article privileged. It is alleged in the complaint and admitted by the answer that the defendant
“ Collier’s will accept no advertisements of beer, whisky, or alcoholic liquors; no advertisements of patent medicines; no medical advertisements or advertisements making claims to medicinal effect; no investment advertising promising extraordinary returns, such as stocks in mining, oil, and rubber companies. The editor reserves the right to exclude any advertisement which he considers extravagant in claim or offensive to good taste. ”
The lower right-hand corner of the page on which this announcement was made contained an advertisement of Postum headed in large heavy type “Funny!” with a hand pointing to that word, and with the further heading on the line below 1 ‘ People Will Drink Coffee When It ‘ Does Such Things, ’ ” and the body of the advertisement was as follows :
“‘I began to use Postum because the old kind of coffee has so poisoned my whole system that I was on the point of breaking down, and the doctor warned me that I must quit it.
“ ‘ My chief ailment was nervousness and heart trouble.
“ c Any unexpected noise would cause me the most painful palpitation, make me faint and weak.
‘“I had heard of Postum and began to drink it when I left off the old coffee. It began to help me just as soon as the old effects of the other kind of coffee passed away. It did not stimulate me for a while, and then leave me weak and nervous as coffee used to do. Instead of that it built up my strength and supplied a constant vigor to my system which I can always rely on. It enables me to do the biggest kind of a day’s work without getting tired. All the heart trouble, etc., has passed away.
“ ‘ I give it freely to all my children, from the youngest to the oldest, and it keeps them all healthy and hearty.’
“Mame given by Postum Co., Battle Creek, Mich.
“ There’s a reason.
“Eead the little book, 1 The Eoad to Wellville.’ in pkgs.”
“I have your letter of November 29, and agree with you that Postum and Grape-Nuts should never, for one moment, be classed as patent medicines, nor have I done so.
“During our present campaign against patent medicines, however, it is not possible for us to publish, in any advertisement, symptoms of heart trouble, stomach troubles, and nervous diseases, which are clearly subject for the family physician’s attention.
“We have no doubt whatever that Postum and Grape-Nuts are doing a great deal of good; but in view of our present campaign against patent medicines, it is impossible for us to allow then* promotion through our columns in the style of copy we have been inserting.”
Post replied on December eleventh, stating that it might be correct if it had been stated that defendant made claims that Grape-Nuts and Postum produced “physical and mental effects; ” but that it was not correct to charge that it claimed “medicinal effects,” and gave his reasons for claiming that these products produced beneficial mental and physical effects, and objected to having the work he was doing in introducing these natural foods to the public classed with the work which Collier’s was making a crusade against. Nast again replied on December eighteenth, reiterating his position and pointing out that Postum and Grape-Nuts could be advertised “without giving a list of symptoms which may be obviated by the use of the two foods;” and that the symptoms incorporated in defendant’s advertising “come in the field of the physician’s work, and should not, therefore, appear in type in conjunction with a food, any more than with a patent medicine,” and stating that Collier’s could not during its campaign against patent medicines insert the style of copy which defendant had been furnishing, and closed with the following:
“I dislike very much to lose the Postum and Grape-Nuts advertising; and hope you may be able to see my difficulty and submit copy written on general publicity lines, which would overcome it, and, at the same time, prove a valuable investment for you.”
On the twenty-sixth of December Collier’s returned advertising copy received from the advertising agency on December twentieth, and from that time, without further negotiations, both parties apparently acquiesced in the abandonment of the advertising contract. The editorial published in Collier’s
“Deception There Is, in advertising, as in all dealings between the imperfect human animal and his equally imperfect fellow. It is lessening with the spread of intelligence. Some, that is still conspicuous in print, is unnecessary, and hence incredibly stupid. For example, take certain recent exploitations of ‘ Grape-Nuts’ and its fellow article ‘ Postum,’ put out by the same concern. One widely circulated paragraph labors to produce the impression that £ Grape-Nuts ’ will obviate the necessity of an operation in appendicitis. This is lying, and, potentially, deadly lying. Similarly, ‘Postum’ continually makes reference to the endorsements of ‘ a distinguished physician’ or ‘a prominent health official,’ persons as mythical, doubtless, as they are mysterious. Here are two articles of food which unless there is some secret Futility reason against it should sell on their merits. Yet their manufacturer persists in insulting the intelligence and alienating the support of people who might otherwise purchase them. ‘I’ve stopped taking Grape-Nuts since it became a patent medicine,’ said an acquaintance of ours recently. The editor of a prominent religious journal writing of the cancellation of certain patent-medicine contracts, says: ‘I have sometimes the same feeling toward the Postum advertisements, and those of Grape-Nuts. * * "x" The manner in which they are pushed and the phraseology used to commend them, constantly cause me annoyance.’ If these breakfast foods desire to be classed in the public mind with the fraudulent and failing patent medicines, they are taking the proper steps to that end. But isn’t it worth their while to stop and consider whether, in the long run, it will pay to identify themselves with a class of merchandise which has no other selling power, save only that which it derives, at an enormous outlay and an increasing risk, from mendacious claims ? ”
At that time Mr. Post was in Paris. He received a copy about the middle of August, and according to his testimony, after reading the editorial, he immediately wrote and mailed to the defendant for publication the alleged libelous article as follows:
“To call a man a liar seems rude, so we will let the reader select his own term.
“Some time ago the manager of ‘Collier’s Weekly’ got very cross with us because we would not continue to advertise in his paper.
“We have occasionally been attacked by editors who have tried to force us to advertise in their papers at their own prices, and on their own conditions, failing in which we were to be attacked through their editorial columns. The reader can fit a name to that tribe.
“We had understood that the editor of Collier’s was a wildcat of the Sinclair ‘ jungle-bungle ’ type, a person with curdled gray matter, but it seems strange that the owners would descend to using their editorial columns, yellow as they are, for such rank out-and-out falsehoods as appear in their issue of July 27, where the editor goes out of his way to attack us, and the reason will appear tolerably clear to any reader who understands the venom behind it.
“We quote in part as follows: ‘ One widely circulated paragraph labors to induce the impression that Grape-Nuts will „ obviate the necessity of an operation in appendicitis. This is lying, and potentially, deadly lying. Similarly, Postum continually makes reference to the indorsements of ‘a distinguished physician ’ or ‘ a prominent health official,’ persons as mythical, doubtless, as they are mysterious.’
“We do not hesitate to reproduce these mendacious falsehoods in order that it may be made clear to the public what the facts are, and to nail the liar up so that people may have a look at him. If this poor clown knew what produced appendicitis, he might have some knowledge of why the use of Grape-Nuts would prevent it. Let it be understood that appendicitis results from long continued 'disturbance in the intestines, caused primarily by undigested food and chiefly by undigested starchy food, such as white bread, potatoes, rice, partly cooked cereals and such. These lie in the warmth and moisture of the bowels in an undigested state, and decay, generating gases and irritating the mucous surfaces until under such condi
“Now then, Grape-Nuts food was made by Mr. C. W. Post, after he had an attack of appendicitis, and required some food in which the starch was predigested. No such food existed; from his knowledge of diatetics he perfected the food; made it primarily for his own use, and afterward introduced it to the public. In this food the starch is transformed by moisture and long-time cooking into a form of sugar, which is easily digested and does not decay in the intestines. It is a practical certainty that when a man has approaching symptoms of appendicitis the attack can be avoided by discontinuing all food except Grape-Nuts and by properly washing out the intestines. Most physicians are now acquainted with the fact and will verify the statement.
“ Of course this is all news, and should be an education to the person who writes the editorials for ‘Collier’s ’ and who should take at least some training before he undertakes to write for the public.
“Now as to the references to ‘ a distinguished physician ’ or ‘ a prominent health official ’ being mythical persons. We are here to wagerc Collier’s Weekly,’or any other sceptic or liar any amount of money they care to name, and which they will cover, that we will produce proof to any board of investigators that we have never yet published an advertisement announcing the opinion of a prominent physician or health official on Postum or Grape-Nuts when we did not have the actual letter in our possession. It can be easily understood that many prominent physicians dislike to have their names made public in reference to any article whatsoever; they have their own reasons, and we respect those reasons, but we never make mention of indorsements unless we have the actual indorsement, and that statement we will back with any amount of money called for.
“When a journal wilfully prostitutes its columns, to try and harm a reputable manufacturer in an effort to force him to advertise, it is time the public knew the facts. The owner or editor of Collier’s Weekly cannot force money from us by such methods.
“POSTUM CEREAL CO., LTD.”
The history of the case down to the publication of the alleged libel presents other facts which have received due consideration. Those deemed most material and controlling have been set forth, and the substance of the others has been sufficiently stated for the purposes of deciding the questions presented on the appeal.
It is contended by the learned counsel for the appellant that the motion to dismiss the complaint should have been granted, and that, if there was a question for the jury the verdict is against the weight of the evidence. It is claimed that it was not shown that the plaintiff was the editor of Collier’s to whom the alleged libelous article referred; that both the occasion and the article published by appellant were privileged, and that, therefore, it was incumbent on plaintiff to show both the falsity of the article and actual malice; and that he failed to give evidence of actual malice sufficient to take the case to the jury. It is not now contended, although the claim was made on the trial, that respondent failed to present evidence for the consideration of the jury on the question of falsity. Certain exceptions to the charge may be appropriately considered in this connection. Counsel for appellant requested the court to charge that plaintiff had failed to show that he was the editor referred to in the article, and that he was not entitled to recover any damage for injury to Collier’s Weekly and excepted to the refusal to charge as requested. It is to be borne in mind that the alleged libel published by the defendant does not specify any particular editor. It cannot be held as matter of law, I think, that it refers only to the .editor who wrote the article which it is claimed provoked the reply. The plaintiff was the managing editor and as such was responsible for all editorials published in Collier’s and would be liable personally and to criminal prosecution for a libel published therein. (Penal Code, § 246; Penal Law, § 1344.) It was for the jury to determine whether readers of average intelligence would understand that the
The appellant predicates error on the reception of evidence which the respondent was permitted to introduce, over objection and exception duly taken that it was immaterial, tending to show that appellant was guilty of deceptive advertising. This evidence related to advertisements published in the press and periodicals within a comparatively short period prior to the editorial published in Collier’s, to the printed matter on the wrappers in which appellant’s products were put on the market for sale, to chemical analysis of defendant’s products and the opinions of medical experts, some of whom were connected with the health departments of other States and who had in the performance of their official duties investigated appellant’s products, as to whether appellant’s products were calculated to produce the effects which appellant by its advertisements represented. The appellant’s principal objection to this evidence is made upon the theory that it only characterized the two specific charges in the editorial published in Collier’s, which were quoted in the libel, as mendacious falsehoods, and that the evidence should have been confined to those. It is not seriously contended by the learned counsel for the appellant, and it could not successfully be contended, that with the burden of proof resting on the respondent of showing
Ordinarily the jury in a libel case may either find for the
Appellant also asks a reversal on jurisdictional grounds. It claims that it has been brought into court as a copartnership and not as a corporation, and that unless it was an unincorporated association having more than seven members no judgment could be rendered against it, and that even on that theory the action should have been brought against its president or treasurer under section 1919 of the Code of Civil Procedure. It was shown that appellant consisted of only four members. This evidence apparently came out incidentally, for there was no issue with respect to it on the preliminary examination of Mr. Post, who testified that he was chairman, and his brother vice chairman and secretary of 'defendant, and who the treasurer was, and that all the members “of this partnership association are officers, except my daughter,” and that there were four members in 1907. It was alleged in the complaint that the defendant is “a partnership association, duly organized and existing under and by virtue of the laws of the State of Michigan,” and this allegation was admitted by the answer. The question was first raised by a motion to dismiss the complaint on this ground made at the close of the plaintiff’s case. The learned counsel for the appellant contends that the allegation was not sufficient to show that the defendant was a corporation, and he relies on the case of Chapman v. Barney (129 U. S. 677), wherein it was held that the allegation that the defendant company was organized under and by virtue of the laws of the State of New York was not an allegation that it was a corporation. When this question was raised, counsel for the respondent did not ask leave to amend the complaint, but over objection and exception was allowed to introduce certain sections from the Constitution of the State of Michigan and certain statutes of that State and decisions construing them, which show that such a copartnership association has many of the attributes of a corporation and for the purpose of suing and being sued is regarded as a corporation. (Const. Mich.
Error is predicated on the instructions to the jury contained in the plaintiff’s request No. 11, which is as follows: “If the jury should find that the charges contained in the Adams editorial were true that the defendant’s advertisement in regard to Grape-Nuts and Postum were deceptive, they must find that the defendant’s libel was not a privileged communication.”
If the jury found that the charges contained in the editorial were true, it necessarily follows that the defendant’s publication, in which it was charged that the editorial was false and
Oomplaint is also made of the charge in so far as the jury were permitted to consider the publication of the alleged libel in forty-four newspapers in the State of New York, and the further extensive circulation of it, as evidence of malice, giving them the right in their discretion to award punitive damages. Every separate publication of a libel gives rise to a cause of action, and, therefore, each of the forty-four publications in
I have now discussed every point presented by the learned counsel for the appellant, and have shown, I think, that, even on the theory on which the case was tried, no error prejudicial to the rights of the appellant is presented for review by exception, and that plaintiff was entitled to recover as matter of law, and the only question for determination was the amount of the verdict. If, however, errors were committed it does not follow that there should be a reversal. Even on the review of a conviction in a criminal case the Legislature has commanded that “the court must give judgment, without regard to technical errors or defects or to exceptions which do not affect the substantial rights of the parties.” (Code Crim. Proc. § 542.) There is no presumption that an error committed on the trial is sufciently prejudicial to the rights of the appellant to entitle him to a reversal, and he is not entitled to a new trial unless it appears that the error affected the verdict to his prejudice. In Post v. Brooklyn Heights R. R. Co. (195 N. Y. 62), in reviewing an appeal in a civil case the Court of Appeals unanimously held as follows: “There are errors in this record, but we find none calling for reversal, when the circumstances under which the erroneous rulings were made and their probable effect on the result are taken into account. Under our system of appeals every error does not require a new trial, for the vast judicial work of the State could not be done on that basis. Unless the
I, therefore, vote to affirm.
Dowling,. J., concurred.
Judgment and order reversed and new trial ordered, with costs to appellant to abide event.
Concurrence Opinion
The discussion of this case by Mr. Justice Laughlin points out various rulings upon questions of evidence, exceptions taken to the charge as made, and refusals to charge, which I think are erroneous, and an examination of the record discloses that in consequence of the rulings of the learned trial judge both in regard to evidence and passing upon the defendant’s requests to charge, the case was not presented to the jury in such a way as to preserve the rights of the defendant.
I also concur with Mr. Justice Miller and, therefore, vote for a new trial.