A party may apply for a dedimus and cause testimony to be taken, if the dedimus so states, orally; full notice being given to the opposite party, or his attorney, to appear and cross-examine, or to take the testimony by interrogatories and cross-interrogatories, filed and settled by the court.
The motion to suppress is overruled.
Brown v. Memphis & C. R. Co.
(Circuit Court, W. D. Tennessee. April 25, 1881.)
1. Carriers of Passengers—Female Passenger—Unchastity—Exclusion from Ladies' Car.
A railroad company may rightfully exclude from the ladies' car a female passenger whose reputation is so notoriously bad as to furnish reasonable grounds to believe that her conduct will be offensive, or whose demeanor at the time is annoying to other passengers; but she cannot be excluded for unchastity not affecting her conduct, or furnishing reasonable ground to believe she will misbehave herself in the car, when her demeanor at the time was lady-like and unexceptionable. The charge of the court in this case (5 Fed. Rep. 499) reaffirmed on motion for a new trial.
2. Reasonable Regulation—Mixed Question of Law and Fact.
It is not error for the court, in charging the jury, to say that a given regulation is unreasonable, when the court explains to the jury what what would be the rules of law by which the reasonableness or unreasonableness is to be tested, and leaves to the jury the determination of the facts of the particular case. The ruling in this case on demurrer (4 Fed. Rep. 37) explained and applied.
3. Damages—Compensatory and Punitive—Absence of Malice—Good Faith in Discharge of Duty.
It was not error to refuse a charge that the absence of malice on the part of the conductor, and good faith in what he regarded as his duty, would deprive the plaintiff of a right to punitive damages, and reduce her claim to such as are purely compensatory, when the court modified it by adding that such facts, if true, should be taken in mitigation of the punitive damages the jury should see proper to give. The jury may protect the public and enforce the legal duty of a carrier of passengers by inflicting punitive damages, where an unreasonable regulation is insisted on by the carrier, and a bona fide belief in the right to enforce the regulation is only a matter of mitigation.
