Title: Wirges v. Brewer
Citation: 389 S.W.2d 226
Docket Number: 5-3369
State: Arkansas
Issuer: Arkansas Supreme Court
Date: April 19, 1965

389 S.W.2d 226 (1965) Gene WIRGES, Doing Business as Morrilton Democrat, Appellant, v. C. C. BREWER, Appellee. No. 5-3369. Supreme Court of Arkansas. April 19, 1965. G. Thomas Eisele, Little Rock, for appellant. Felver A. Rowell, Jr., and Gordon &amp; Gordon, Morrilton, for appellee. GEORGE ROSE SMITH, Justice. This is an action for libel brought by C. C. Brewer, the county clerk of Conway county, against Gene Wirges, the editor and publisher of the Morrilton Democrat, a weekly newspaper. Wirges appeals from a verdict and judgment awarding Brewer compensatory damages of $50,000 and punitive damages of $25,000. (Brewer died while the appeal was pending; the cause has been revived in the name of his personal representative.) Wirges urges a number of points for reversal, but we find it necessary to consider only his contention that he was entitled to a directed verdict on the ground that the two articles complained of were not libelous. We sustain this contention. Brewer's complaint was based upon the publication of a news article and an editorial in the December 27, 1962, edition of the paper. That part of the news article complained of read as follows: The editorial, which appeared under the caption, "Around the Hub," read as follows: In Studdard v. Trucks, 31 Ark. 726, we drew this distinction between words that are actionable in themselves and words that are not: "Where the natural consequence of the words is a damage, as if they import a charge of having been guilty of a crime, or having a contagious distemper, or if they are prejudicial to a person in office, or to a person of a profession or trade, they are in themselves actionable; in other cases, the party who brings an action for words, must show the damage which was received from them." When the words in question do not on their face appear to be libelous, or when they do not on their face appear to be applicable to the plaintiff, extrinsic evidence may be admissible to show that the plaintiff was in fact defamed by the communication. The function of that proof, however, is explanation; it cannot change the meaning of the words. Restatement, Torts, § 563. It will be observed that neither of the publications complained of even mentioned Brewer or the office of county clerk. At the trial the plaintiff was permitted to introduce a number of other articles that had appeared in the Morrilton Democrat, for the purpose of showing that for some time Wirges had been critical of the Conway county public officers as a group. It is argued that since the county clerk's office is responsible for the distribution, receipt, and preservation of absentee ballots, the effect of the publications in question was to charge Brewer with having participated in an election fraud. This extrinsic evidence, as we have said, cannot serve to enlarge or change the plain meaning of the language that was used. Nowhere in either the news article or the editorial is there a charge of corruption or wrongdoing on the part of anyone, much less of Brewer in particular. It is conceded that the news article was a fair and accurate summary of the complaints in the two election contests. Those pleadings unquestionably alleged irregularities in the conduct of the election, but to say that they charged dishonesty or fraud is to read a meaning into the words which simply is not there. If a newspaper cannot impartially report a matter of public interest such as these election contests, we hardly see how it can be said that freedom of the press really exists. In overruling a demurrer to the complaint the trial judge stated that he considered this language in the editorial to be libelous: "Then the big lopsided Absentee Box came in with the other candidate (guess whose support he had?) getting over 90 per cent of the ballots and thereby winning the election." According to the undisputed proof every statement of fact in this sentence was true. The absentee vote was big, it was lopsided, and it did win the election for the successful candidate. Truth, of course, is a complete defense to a charge of defamation such as this one. Waters-Pierce Oil Co. v. Bridwell, 107 Ark. 310, 155 S.W. 126. *229 Counsel for the appellee insist that the parenthetical question"guess whose support he had?"was defamatory. In the first place, merely to charge a public officer with having supported some other candidate does not, in itself, involve any assertion of wrongdoing. Secondly, there is no indication in the proof that the parenthetical inquiry was understood by anyone as a reference to Brewer alone. It may have been intended as a reference to the entire group that Wirges considered to have controlling political power in the county, but an individual cannot complain of a statement about an indefinite class, especially when, as here, the statement is not actually libelous. Comes v. Cruce, 85 Ark. 79, 107 S.W. 185, 14 Ann.Cas. 327. Reversed and dismissed.