Court Opinion

ID: 9808235
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 20:31:01.426637+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:10:16.672502
License: Public Domain

ClabK, C. J.,
concurring: The act of Congress, 18 June, 1888, ch. 394, sec. 2 (2 H. S. Compiled Statutes, sec. 3894, subsec. 5, p. 2661), provides that “All matter, otherwise mailable by law, upon the envelope or outside cover or wrapper of which, or'any postal card upon which, any * * * language of a * * * libellous or defamatory * * * character, or calculated by the terms and manner, * * * and obviously intended to reflect injuriously upon the character or conduct of another, may be written or printed or otherwise impressed or apparent, is hereby declared nonmailable matter; * * * and any person who shall knowingly deposit or cause to be deposited for mailing or delivery” any such matter “shall, for each and every offense, upon conviction thereof, be fined not more than $5,000 or imprisoned at hard labor not more than five years,, or both, at the discretion of the Court.”- It should seem too clear for argument that, when any act is made indictable and punishable by heavy penalties by the Federal Government, which has sole jurisdiction of any criminality attaching thereto, the defendant cannot be held privileged or quasi privileged to commit such act when sued in the State Court.
This act of Congress is a part of the law of the land. No one who violates the criminal law can claim that he is privileged or quasi privileged to do so. The defendant’s'communication was not addressed to one charged with the public *45duty of investigating the charge. Even if it had been, the defendant should have sent it, if through the mail, in a sealed envelope. Being made openly on a postal card, this was in violation of law, if libellous, and his only defense is to prove that it was true and, therefore, not libellous.
It is not unusual for a Judge to file a concurring opinion giving his reasons, or additional reasons, for assenting to the opinion of the Court; but, of course, no other member of the Court is in any wise responsible for the views expressed in a concurring opinion.