NOTES. 131 be like the right to the use of public highways ; but this analogy involves the recognition of a right, not often considered, to have other people come to you upon a highway if they will. Benjamin v. Storn, L. R. P. C. 407. If it fall within this class of public rights, the private action in the principal case well lies ; for the damage suffered is different in kind, and not simply in degree, from that suffered by the community in general. Dantzer v. / U. Ry. Co., 39 N. E. Rep. 223 (Ind.). If a final basis is sought for the right recognized in the principal case, the interesting speculation arises whether there may not be a broad right to enter into such beneficial relations and to receive such temporal bene- fits as would accrue in an undisturbed course of events. The infringe- ment of such a right must, upon authority, be considered to consist in an act tortious />^r j-^, directed against a third i^axiy , prima fade a tort against him only, and preventing him from entering into beneficial relations with the plaintiff. Tarleton v. M^Gauky, i Peake, N. P. C. 270. A notable example of such a right to enter into beneficial relations would seem to be the right to trade urged so insistently to-day. This appears to have no other true basis. Moreover, the principal case involves not a private benefit, but a public benefit. The courts may well hold that an obstruc- tion to the conferring of such a public benefit due from a governmental body to one of its members is actionable when they might deny such a right in a private benefit ; for the right to such a public benefit may be considered as existing though it is not enforceable. But upon the whole, does not the principal case at all events appear to require, as fundamental in the law of torts, the recognition of so broad a right as that to receive a benefit ? Injunction and Specific Performance. — Contracts of actors and theatrical companies have furnished abundant material for the develop- ment of the rules governing injunctions and specific performance ; this is as true to-day as in the days of Kean. An important case recently arose in Chicago, in which not the actors but the theatre refused to perform ; and the manager of the Black Crook Company sought an injunction against the manager of the Alhambra Theatre. Welty v. Jacobs, 49 N. E. Rep. 723 (111.). There was a bilateral contract between the two par- ties. The terms of the plaintiff's contract are immaterial except in so far as he agreed to furnish his company to act for seven stated nights, and also to furnish certain printing ten days in advance. The defendant agreed to furnish the theatre with equipments, attendants, house pro- grammes, and innumerable other small matters. Before the day for the first performance, the plaintiff had furnished his printing as agreed ; but the defendant had let the theatre to another company. The plaintiff thereupon asked for an injunction restraining the defendant, in effect, from hindering the plaintiff's company in making use of the theatre, from using, or allowing any other company to use, the theatre during the seven days, and from " refusing to furnish " the plaintiff with all the things con- tracted for. The bill, it must be confessed, was most ingeniously framed ; and the lower court granted the injunction. The Supreme Court of Illinois, however, on reviewing the case, supports the appellate court in the view that the injunction was improper. The decision of the Supreme Court is admirable in its discussion of the principles of equity ; and its conclusion cannot be doubted. The case raises the question, among others, to what extent a court of equity will
