Stewart v. Sonneborn/Opinion of the Court

by William Strong

United States Supreme Court

98 U.S. 187

Stewart  v.  Sonneborn

The errors now assigned are exclusively to the charge given by the court to the jury. The instruction given was (inter alia) as follows: 'But if they (the defendants) had no legal claim or demand against the complainant (Sonneborn), then, whether they had probable cause or not, they had no right to institute the proceedings (in bankruptcy). They cannot go back and allege that, though they had no legal claim against him, they thought they had; in other words, that they had probable cause to believe that they had such a demand. Unless they had a debt, they cannot allege probable cause for proceeding in bankruptcy at all. Their defence cannot stand on two probable causes, one on top of the other. . . . As it has been adjudicated by the Circuit Court of Barbour County, and affirmed by the State Supreme Court, that the defendants never had a legal claim against the plaintiff, and therefore had no right to institute proceedings in bankruptcy against him, the plaintiff is entitled to recover in this action the damages he has sustained by those unlawful proceedings. The court therefore rules that the defence in this case cannot be sustained by proving that the defendants had probable cause to believe that the plaintiff had committed an act of bankruptcy; but it being shown by judicial determination that they had no legal claim or debt against the plaintiff, and had, therefore, no right to institute bankruptcy proceedings, they are liable for the damages sustained by the plaintiff thereby, and the only question for the jury will be the amount of the damages, under the circumstances of the case. . . . We charge you, therefore, that the plaintiff is entitled to recover his actual damage, or the loss he has actually sustained at all events.' . . . And again: 'The actual damages sustained by the complainant, that you will give him a verdict for at all events.'

This construction, we think, was erroneous, and emphatically so in view of the facts which appeared in evidence. It ignores totally the question whether the conduct of the defendants had been attended by malice, though the plaintiff's declaration charged malice, and it denied all importance to the necessary inquiry, whether they had probable cause for their action. More than this, it disregarded entirely evidence of facts which have been determined to be in law a perfect defence to an action for a malicious prosecution. The jury were positively instructed to return a verdict for the plaintiff independently of any consideration of malice in the institution of the bankruptcy proceedings, or want of probable cause therefor. If the charge was correct, then every man who brings a suit against another, with the most firm and reasonable belief that he has a just claim, and a lawful right to resort to the courts, is responsible in damages for the consequences of his action, if he happens to fail in his suit. His intentions may have been most honest, his purpose only to secure his own, in the only way in which the law permits it to be secured; he may have had no ill-feeling against his supposed debtor, and may have done nothing which the law forbids. Such is not the law. It is abundantly settled that no suit can be maintained against an unsuccessful plaintiff or prosecutor, unless it is shown affirmatively that he was actuated in his conduct by malice, or some improper or sinister motive. Malice is essential to the maintenance of any such action, and not merely (as the Circuit Court thought) to the recovery of exemplary damages. Notwithstanding what has been said in some decisions of a distinction between actions for criminal prosecutions and civil suits, both classes at the present day require substantially the same essentials. Certainly an action for instituting a civil suit requires not less for its maintenance than an action for a malicious prosecution of a criminal proceeding. Nicholson v. Coghill, 4 Barn. & Cress. 21; Webb v. Hill, 3 Carr. & P. 485; Burhams v. Sanford, 19 Wend. (N. Y.) 417; Cotton v. Huidekoper, 2 Pa. 149.

In Farmer v. Darling (4 Burr. 1791,) one of the earliest reported cases, if not the earliest, Lord Mansfield instructed the jury that 'the foundation of the action was malice,' and all the judges concurred that 'malice, either express or implied, and the want of probable cause, must both concur.' From 1766 to the present day, such has been constantly held to be the law, both in England and this country. See a multitude of cases collected in Vol. 8, U.S. Digest, first series, 942, pt. 95. And the existence of malice is always a question exclusively for the jury. It must be found by them, or the action cannot be sustained. Hence it must always be submitted to them to find whether it existed. The court has no right to find it, nor to instruct the jury that they may return a verdict for the plaintiff without it. Even the inference of malice from the want of probable cause is one which the jury alone can draw. Wheeler v. Nesbit et al., 24 How. 545; Newell v. Downs, 8 Blackf. (Ind.) 523; Johnson v. Chambers, 10 Ired. (N. C.) L. 287; Voorhees v. Leonard, 1 N. Y. Sup. Ct. 148; Schofield v. Ferrers, 47 Pa. St. 194. In Mitchell v. Jenkins (5 Barn. & Adol. 588), Lord Denman said: 'I have always understood the question of reasonable or probable cause on the facts found to be a question for the opinion of the court, and malice to be altogether a question for the jury.' He added, that inasmuch as in that case the question of malice had been wholly withdrawn from the jury, there ought to be a new trial. In the case we have in hand, the question was withheld from the jury, and nothing was submitted to them but an estimate of damages.

There was also error in the charge in so far as it took away from the defendants the protection of probable cause for their instituting the proceedings in bankruptcy. The court ruled that the defence could not be sustained by proving they had probable cause for believing the plaintiff had committed an act of bankruptcy, because, after the proceedings had been commenced, it was established by a verdict and a judgment thereon that the plaintiff was not indebted to them, and consequently that they had no right to institute bankruptcy proceedings against him. It was further charged that 'if they had no legal claim or demand against the plaintiff, then whether they had probable cause or not, they had no right to institute the proceedings. They cannot go back and allege that though they had not a legal claim or debt against him, they thought they had, or that they had probable cause to believe they had such a demand. Unless they had a debt they cannot allege probable cause for proceeding in bankruptcy at all.' To this we cannot assent. The existence of a want of probable cause is, as we have seen, essential to every suit for a malicious prosecution. Both that and malice must concur. Malice, it is admitted, may be inferred by the jury from want of probable cause, but the want of that cannot be inferred from any degree of even express malice. Sutton v. Johnstone, 1 T. R. 493; Murray v. Long, 1 Wend, (N. Y.) 140; Wood v. Weir & Sayre, 5 B. Mon. (Ky.) 544. It is true that what amounts to probable cause is a question of law in a very important sense. In the celebrated case of Sutton v. Johnstone, the rule was thus laid down: 'The question of probable cause is a mixed question of law and of fact. Whether the circumstances alleged to show it probable are true, and existed, is a matter of fact; but whether, supposing them to be true, they amount to a probable cause, is a question of law.' This is the doctrine generally adopted. McCormick v. Sisson, 7 Cow. (N. Y.) 715; Besson v. Southard, 10 N. Y. 236.

It is, therefore, generally the duty of the court, when evidence has been given to prove or disprove the existence of probable cause, to submit to the jury its credibility, and what facts it proves, with instructions that the facts found amount to proof of probable cause, or that they do not. Taylor v. Willans, 2 Barn. & Adol. 845. There may be, and there doubtless are, some seeming exceptions to this rule, growing out of the nature of the evidence, as when the question of the defendants' belief of the facts relied upon to prove want of probable cause is involved. What their belief was is always a question for the jury.

The Circuit Court thought in the present case, and so charged, that the fact after the institution of the bankruptcy proceedings a judgment was given in the Barbour Circuit Court against the defendants, thus determining that the plaintiff was not indebted to them, precluded them from setting up that they had probable cause for their action. That was giving undue effect to the judgment. The conduct of the defendants is to be weighed in view of what appeared to them when they filed their petition in the bankrupt court,-not in the light of subsequently appearing facts. Had they reasonable cause for their action when they took it? Not what the actual fact was, but what they had reason to blieve it was. Faris v. Starke, 3 B. Mon. (Ky.) 4, 6; Raulston v. Jackson, 1 Sneed (Tenn.), 128.

In every case of an action for a malicious prosecution or suit, it must be averred and proved that the proceeding instituted against the plaintiff has failed, but its failure has never been held to be evidence of either malice or want of probable cause for its institution; much less that it is conclusive of those things. Cloon v. Gerry, 13 Gray (Mass.), 201; 1 Hilliard, Torts, and cases there collected. The final judgment in the Circuit Court of Barbour County did not, therefore, justify the court in charging either that there was no probable cause for the bankruptcy proceedings, or that the presence or absence of such cause was immaterial. If when they filed their petition to have the plaintiff declared a bankrupt, the defendants believed, and had reasonable cause to believe, that the plaintiff was indebted to them for the goods sold to E. Leipzeiger & Co. in 1867, and had reasonable cause to believe that he had committed an act of bankruptcy, there was probable cause for their action, and the plaintiff was not entitled to recover. That they had reasonable cause to believe an act of bankruptcy had been committed must be conceded in view of the manner in which the judgment of Jonas Sonneborn against him had been obtained on the 12th of June, 1873, and in view of the decision of this court in Buchanan v. Smith, 16 Wall. 277. If, therefore, they had an honest and reasonable conviction that the plaintiff was their debtor, that he was liable to them for the bills of goods sold by them in 1867 to E. Leipzeiger & Co., they had probable cause for instituting the proceedings in bankruptcy, and their defence was complete. The jury should have been so instructed.

We think, also, there was error in refusing to charge the jury as requested in the defendants' first point, which was as follows: 'If the jury believe, from all the evidence, that A. T. Stewart & Co. acted on the advice of counsel in prosecuting their claim against Sonneborn in the Circuit Court of Barbour County, and upon such advice had an honest belief in the validity of their debt, and their right to recover in said action; and in the institution of the bankruptcy proceedings acted likewise on the advice of counsel, and under an honest belief that they were taking and using only such remedies as the law provided for the collection of what they believed to be a bona fide debt, they having first given a full statement of the facts of the case to counsel,-then there was not such malice in the wrongful use of legal process by them as will entitle the plaintiff to recover in this form of action.' This the court refused to affirm, 'except as contained and qualified in the preceding charge.' An examination of the charge, however, reveals that the instruction was not contained in it, nor alluded to. The defendants, we think, had a right to have it affirmed as presented. There was enough in the evidence to justify its presentation. It was proved that, before they commenced their suit in the Circuit Court of Barbour County, the defendants were advised by an eminent lawyer of Alabama, of twenty-five years' standing in the profession, respecting their legal right to recover the debt from the plaintiff, that, in his opinion, the plaintiff was liable therefor. It was further testified that the same lawyer advised them that, in his opinion, the plaintiff had rendered himself liable to involuntary bankruptcy proceedings by suffering his brother's judgment to go against him by default, and by advertising his entire stock of goods at and below New York cost. It was not until after this advice had been given that the petition in bankruptcy was prepared and filed.

That the facts stated in the point proposed, if believed by the jury, were a perfect defence to the action; that they constituted in law a probable cause, and being such, that malice alone, if there was such, was insufficient to entitle the plaintiff to recover,-is, in view of the decisions, beyond doubt. snow v. Allen, 1 Stark. 502; Ravenga v. Mackintosh, 2 Barn. & Cress. 693; Walter v. Sample, 25 Pa. St. 275; Cooper v. Utterbach, 37 Md. 282; Olmstead v. Partridge, 16 Gray (Mass.), 381. These cases, and many others that might be cited, show that if the defendants in such a case as this acted bona fide upon legal advice, their defence is perfect.

The remaining exceptions to the charge require but brief notice. They relate to the assessment of damages, under the positive instruction to find for the plaintiff. Of these but a single one need be noticed. The court was asked to charge that the jury, if they found for the plaintiff, could not, in estimating the damages, consider the fees of counsel in prosecuting the case. The instruction was not given. It was refused, and erroneously, as we think. The fees of counsel in prosecuting this case were no part of the consequences naturally resulting from the action of the defendants in suing out the decree and warrant in bankruptcy. They were not what the defendants ought to have foreseen. That such fees are not recoverable, and why they are not, was clearly shown in Good v. Mylin, 8 Pa. St. 51; vide also Alexander v. Herr, 11 id. 537; Stopp v. Smith, 71 id. 285; Hicks v. Foster, 13 Barb. (N. Y.) 424. The rule asserted in these cases we think is correct, and it should have been given to the jury in the present case. The defendants were the more injured by the refusal to give it, because evidence was given of the cost of prosecuting the suit calculated immensely to influence the damages,-evidence which should not have been offered or received.

The other exceptions to the charge require no notice.

The judgment of the Circuit Court will be reversed, and the case remanded with instructions to award a venire de novo; and it is

So ordered.

MR. JUSTICE BRADLEY dissenting.

Notes