Case Name: Phil. E. Peareson vs. Charles Picket; Oats vs. the same
Court: Constitutional Court of South Carolina
Jurisdiction: South Carolina
Decision Date: 1821-11
Citations: 1 McCord 472
Docket Number: 
Parties: Phil. E. Peareson vs. Charles Picket. Oats vs. the same.
Judges: Justices Gantt, Huger, Nott and Colcock, concurred.
Reporter: South Carolina Law Reports
Volume: 12
Pages: 472–474

Head Matter:
Phil. E. Peareson vs. Charles Picket. Oats vs. the same.
Bail is allowable in slander,
In an affidavit to bold to bail in slander, the words spoken must be alie god to be false.
Tried at Fairfield district, Fall Term, 1821, before Mr. Justice Huger.
Motion to reverse the decision of the Circuit Court.
¶1:115 was a motion to discharge an order for bail, founded on the following affidavit: “ Personally came Phil. E. Pearcson and saith on oath, that he has been informed and belive.s, that Charles Picket has repeatedly slandered him by charging him with corruption in his office as an attorney,” sworn to, &c. (In Oats's case, the affidavit en ded, ‘e by charging him with forgery and perjury.”)
The clerk of the court gave an order for the sheriff to take bail in the sum of $2500, and this motion was to discharge that order. The court refused the motion.
The defendant moved to reverse that decision, and that the bail be discharged on the following grounds :
1st. Because bail cannot be demanded in an action of slander.
2nd. Because the affidavit in this case was not sufficient to warrant the clerk in making the above order.
See Starkie on Slander, 278. R.

Opinion:
Mr. Justice Richardson
delivered the-opinion of the court.
The practice of ordering parties to be Holden to bail upon a charge of slander, has been so general in South-Carolina, that it may be fairly considered either as a practical and received construction of the act of 1798, or else allowed upon general principles.
Whatever then may be the decisions found in the reports of adjudged cases in England or even in our sister States, our own practice probably growing out of the act before noticed, is to be respected. Especially too, when no reason can be presented why an injury inflicted by a malicious and false slander, may not be redressed in the same manner and to the same extent, as any other wanton mischief. Is reputation, often so dearly earned, so deeply regarded by honest men, and so beneficial in its example, to be so easily tarnished by malicious slander? Is it to be less protected than all the other earnings of man in society; and is this disregard of reputation to be exercised too in favour of a slanderer ? While law is based upon reason, or regards consistency, or has for its end the protection of the citizens, our practice will ever be admitted to be bottomed upon true principles.
The second ground presents for the first time, a question of practice, i. e. must the affidavit to hold a defendant to bail state that the slander was false ?
To determine this, we must reason from principle, analogy and convenience. Before the person of a free man can be arrested, the charge against him should be manifest and not merely inferable. In practice too, affidavits to hold to bail whether in debt or for damages, have been always required to be so explicit and certain as that if true, the defendant must be liable; as for instance, that he " is justly indebted in a named sum or that he unlawfully assaulted and beat, &c." Now in the cases before us unless the slanderous words were false he is justifiable. The falsity of the slander then should'be plainly averred. If such averments were not required, not only inconvenience but injustice would follow ; for then any convict might arrest a person who conversed about his conviction and crime, and he might order such arrest without; the fear of being punished for perjury, having only to charge that he had been slandered, &c. A reasonable and convenient restriction therefore, upon the power of holding to bail for slander, requires that the plaintiff should charge that it is false in fact.
Williams, for the motion.
Gregg, contra.
The motion is therefore granted upon the second ground taken.
Justices Gantt, Huger, Nott and Colcock, concurred.