Ostrom v. Calkins

Decided July 15, 1830

New York Supreme Court · decided 1830-07-15

This was an action of slander. The plaintiff was the owner of a distillery, and carried on the business of distilling extensively, purchasing large quantities of coarse grain.

Key passage — most relied on by later courts

“'Words are actionable which directly tend to the prejudice of any one in his office, profession, trade, or business, in any lawful employment by which he may gain his livelihood.'”

quoted by 1 later decision, including Gary v. Crouch

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1830-07-15

How this case has been cited

Cited by 7 later decisions — most recently May 2003

7 state decisions

Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.

View the full empirical analysis of this case →

¶1By the Court,

Savage, Ch. J.

¶2Two points arise in this case; 1. Whether the words spoken are actionable7 2. Whether the damages are excessive 7 The general rule is, that words are actionable which directly tend to the prejudice of any one in his office, profession, trade, or business, in any lawful employment by which he may gain his livelihood. To say of any one to whom credit is important in the prosecution of his business, that he is insolvent, must be actionable on the same principle that it is actionable to say so of a merchant. To say therefore of a distiller, the course of whose business is to purchase grain on credit, that he must fail, that his time has come, is actionable. In actions for torts, verdicts are not set aside for excessiveness of damages, unless the amount evince passion, prejudice, or partiality in the jury. We discover nothing of the kind in this case.

¶3New trial denied.