Opinion of the Court, per EARL, J. 569, 602), COLTMAN, J., said: "The duty of not slandering your neighbor on insufficient grounds is so clear that a violation of that duty ought not to be sanctioned in the case of voluntary communications except under circumstances of great urgency and gravity. It may be said that it is very hard on a defendant to be subject to heavy damages when he has acted honestly and when nothing more can be imputed to him than an error in judgment. It may be hard, but it is very hard on the other hand to be falsely accused. It is to be borne in mind that people are but too apt rashly to think ill of others; the propensity to tale bearing and slander is so strong amongst mankind, and when suspicions are aroused, men are so apt to entertain them without due examination, in cases where their interests are concerned, that it is necessary to hold the rule strictly as to any officious intermeddling by which the character of others is affected;" and in the same case CRESSWELL, J., said: "If the property of the ship-owner on the one hand was at stake, the character of the captain was at stake on the other; and I cannot but think that the moral duty not to publish of the latter defamatory matter which he did not know to be true, was quite as strong as the duty to communicate to the ship-owner that which he believed to be true." One may not go about in the community and, acting upon mere rumors, proclaim to everybody the supposed frailties or bad character of his neighbor, however firmly he may believe such rumors, and be convinced that he owes a social duty to give them currency that the victim of them may be avoided; and, ordinarily, one cannot with safety, however free he may be from actual malice, as a volunteer, pour the poison of such rumors into the ears of one who might be affected if the rumors were true. I cite a few cases by way of illustration. In Godson v. Home (1 B. & B. 7), one Noah solicited the plaintiff to be his attorney in an action. The defendant, apparently a total stranger, wrote to Noah to deprecate his so employing the plaintiff, and this was held to be clearly not a confidential or privileged communication. In Storey v. Opinion of the Court, per EARL, J. Challands (8 C. & P. 234), one Hersford was about to deal with the plaintiff when he met the defendant who said at once, without his opinion being asked at all, "if you have anything to do with Storey you will live to repent it, he is a most unprincipled man," etc., and Lord DENMAN directed a verdict for the plaintiff because the defendant began by making the statement without waiting to be asked. In York v. Johnson (116 Mass. 482), the defendant, a member of a church, was appointed with the plaintiff and other members of the church on a committee to prepare a Christmas festival for the Sunday school. He declined to serve, and being asked his reason by Mrs. Newton, a member of the committee, said that a third member of the committee, a married man, had the venereal disease, and being asked where he got it said he did not know, but that "he had been with the plaintiff," who was a woman, and it was held that this was not a privileged communication. There was no question of the defendant's good faith and reasonable grounds of belief in making the communication, and yet DEVENS, J., in the opinion said: "The ruling requested by the defendant that the communication made by him to Mrs. Newton was a privileged one and not actionable except with proof of express malice, was properly refused. There was no duty which he owed to Mrs. Newton that authorized him to inform her of the defamatory charges against the plaintiff, and no interest of his own which required protection justified it. He had declined to serve upon the same committee with Mrs. York; but he was under no obligation to give any reason therefor, however persistently called upon to do so; and even if Mrs. Newton had an interest in knowing the character of Mrs. York, as a member of the same church, it was an interest of the same description which every member of the community has in knowing the character of other members of the same community with whom they are necessarily brought in contact, and would not shield a person who uttered words otherwise slanderous." Having thus stated the general principles of law applicable SICKELS-VOL. LXVI. 20 Opinion of the Court, per EARL, J. to a case like this, I will now bring to mind the facts of this case so far as they pertain to the defamatory letter. The plaintiff was a lawyer and had been engaged in the practice of his profession at Caledonia for several months and resided there at the date of the letter. Miss Dora McNaughton and the defendant also resided there. The plaintiff was on terms of social intimacy with Dora and was paying her attention with a view to matrimony, and some time subsequently married her. Mrs. Collins was about twenty-five years old, two years and a half younger than Dora, and was married November 2, 1875; and prior to that she had always resided within a mile and a half from the residence of Dora and they had been very intimate friends. Dora had a father and no brother, and Mrs. Collins had a brother. During the time of this intimacy and at some time before the marriage of Mrs. Collins, Dora repeatedly requested of her that if she "knew anything about any young man she went with, or in fact any young man in the place, to tell her because her father did not go out a great deal and had no means of knowing, and people would not be apt to tell him," that she, Mrs. Collins, had a brother and would be more apt to hear what was said about young men, and Dora wished her to tell what she knew. Their intimacy continued after the marriage of Mrs. Collinsuntil January before the letter was written, when a coldnesssprang up between them. They became somewhat estranged and their intimacy ceased. Mrs. Collins testified that when she wrote the letter she thought just as much of Dora as if she had belonged to her family; that she had heard the defamatory rumors and believed them, and, therefore, did not wish her to marry the plaintiff. It must be observed that the request of Dora to Mrs. Collins for information about young men was not made when she was contemplating marriage to any young man, and that the request was not for information about any particular young man or about any young man in whom she had any interest; but it was for information about the young men generally with whom she sociated. Nor literally construing the language, did Dora wish for informa Opinion of the Court, per EARL, J. What tion as to the gossip and rumors afloat about young men. she asked for was such facts as Mrs. Collins knew and not for her opinion about young men or her estimation of them. But if we assume that the request was for information as to all the rumors about young men which came to the knowledge of Mrs. Collins, the case of the defendant is not improved. At that time the plaintiff was not within Dora's contemplation, as she did not know him until long after. The request was not for information as to any young man who might pay her attention with a view to matrimony; it was for information about all the young men in her circle. Mrs. Collins was not related to her and was under no duty to give the information, and Dora had no sufficient interest to receive the information. Mrs. Collins was under no greater duty to give the information to Dora than to any of the other young ladies of her acquaintance in the same circle. She could properly tell what she knew about young men, but could not defame them, even upon request, by telling what she did not know, what nobody knew, but what she believed upon mere rumors and hearsay to be true. The mere fact that she was requested or even urged to give the information, did not make the defamatory communication privileged. (York v. Johnson, supra.) But there is no proof that this letter was written to Dora in pursuance of any request made by her four years before its date, and there was no evidence which authorized the jury to find so if they did so find. On the contrary, it is. clear that Dora would not, at the time, have gone to Mrs. Collins for any information as to the plaintiff if she had desired any, and that she did not wish for the information from her; and that this was known to Mrs. Collins the language of the letter clearly shows. In the defendant's answer it is alleged that Mrs. Collin's letter was prompted by her friendship for Dora and by the solicitation of "mutual friends to interfere in the matter and break off the relations which seemed to exist between the plaintiff and Dora," and there is no averment that it was written in pursuance of any request coming from Dora. The letter itself as well as the evidence of Mrs. Collins Opinion of the Court, per EARL, J. shows unmistakably that it was thus prompted. Mrs. Collins did not testify that she wrote the letter in pursuance of any request of Dora, and the action was not tried upon that theory, and no question as to the request was submitted to the jury. The trial judge charged the jury broadly that if the relations of Dora and Mrs. Collins were of such an intimate character as to warrant the latter in warning the former "against a person whom she had reason to believe was not a fit person, and if Mrs. Collins acted fairly, in good faith, conscientiously, although mistakenly, there can be no recovery against her," upon the count in the complaint for libel; and then the court said: "Did Mrs. Collins in writing that letter act fairly, act judiciously, not in the matter of good taste, but did she with the facts which had been brought to her mind act in a conscientious and proper manner? If she did, if she acted as an ordinarily prudent person would act under the same circumstances, if she had probable ground for her belief, she was justified in writing the letter." Mrs. Collins then appears as a mere volunteer, writing the letter to break up relations which she feared might lead to the marriage of the plaintiff to Dora. If she had not been the mother of Dora, or other near relative, or if she had been asked by Dora for information as to the plaintiff's character and standing, she could with propriety have given any information she possessed affecting his character, provided she acted in good faith and without malice. But a mere volunteer having no duty to perform, no interest to subserve, interferes with the relations between two such people at her peril. The rules of law should not be so administered as to encourage such intermeddling, which may not only blast reputation but possibly wreck lives. In such a case the duty not to defame is more pressing than the duty to communicate mere defamatory rumors not known to be true. Some loose expressions may doubtless be found in text, books and judicial opinions supporting the contention of the defendant that this letter was, in some sense, a privileged communication. But, after a very careful research, I believe there |