Page:The Green Bag (1889–1914), Volume 12.pdf/562

 The Law of the Land. tions and may be said to have comparative and superlative points of view. That is, to say of a man that he is a thief is more of a slander at one time than another. To so speak of an honest man means more loss, damage and disgrace, than of a dishonest one. Again, he who gives utterance to such a slander may be a disreputable sort of a char acter or it may come from the most exem plary citizen of the community, and the latter will be so to speak more slanderous than the former, because the tort of the tongue of the man of good repute must necessarily be more damaging than that out of the mouth of the man of no account. Words falsely spoken of a person which impute that the party is afflicted with some contagious disease, when if the charge is true it would exclude the party from society, are slanderous in themselves, and proof of the words is the proof of the damages which the jury is to estimate. Human society draws peculiar distinctions. It tolerates moral leprosy, but let it be said of any one that he or she is a physical leper, the doom of such a one is sealed, doors are shut in their face. They are shunned. There is no place for them except Molokai. So where one is so falsely slandered, the words are actionable in themselves. Defamatory words falsely spoken of a person, which impute to the party unfitness to perform the duties of an office or employ ment of profit or the want of integrity in the discharge of the duties of such an office or employment. To say of a magistrate that his decisions are not honest, that he is a blackleg who, without regard to law or jus tice, pulls the legs of those who come before him, must necessarily injure an officer and hence the proof of the words is proof of the damage. Defamatory words falsely spoken of a party which prejudice such party in his or her profession or trade are slanders per se. Your butcher may have sold you a great many pounds of bone which lie more heav

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ily on your conscience than his, but it will be no justification for you to give vent to your feelings by saying that he keeps false weights and that he keeps false books, and that he makes more money in that way than by the meat that actually goes over his counter. Such words will do him injury in the utterance of the same and hence are slanderous, and no proof of damage is required by the law. Should you attempt to prove the truth of what you said, you will fail, for the butcher will prove beyond the shadow of a doubt that all his legitimate profits are in the bones. There are slanders where the words falsely spoken of a person, though not generally actionable in themselves, become so in par ticular localities by common consent and are deemed so exceptionably disgraceful and damaging that courts will take judicial notice of their injurious nature. To be falsely called a witch in ye olden days in Salem would be a slander per se. In these modern days many of us laugh at such things, but there are communities standing just beyond the trend that hint of such things, and to be called a witch in such a community might be so exceptionably dis graceful and damaging that a court would take notice of the same. Many of those who deal in slanders are cowards and think to escape the conse quences of their speech by couching it in terms containing no positive affirmation. They argue that when they say I think or I believe that it does not necessarily mean that the party spoken of did the act thought of or believed about. Courts, however, can not be hoodwinked with any such special reasoning. They have declared that a slan der, clothed in an expression of opinion or belief, might destroy the fairest reputation with impunity and that the law will not countenance such an artifice. So it may be said that he who steals my pocketbook steals trash, yet if I say of him that I had reason to believe he stole it, or I am persuaded in