Wellington Libel Cases.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume XI, Issue 3487, 17 April 1890, Page 2

Wellington Libel Cases.

The following is the opinion expressed by the tradi organ of fhe colony 011 thel'ocent libel cases For giving decisions in libel cases on purely abstraotgrounds, altogether apart from the evidence, Wellington juries are unequalled in the colonies. Last year tboy coolly gavo Mr . Larnach £SOO damages against the Auckland Herald, MrLarnaok had not been libelled, and had not bean damaged; but the Herald, the leading newspaper of a rival city, had been in the habit of making unkind, unjust, and sarcastic remarks abont the Empire City, and Mr Larnaoh's aotion, judioiously heard in Wellington, afforded twolve good men and true an excellent opportunity, to wipe off an old score. The late libel case against the Wairarapa Star was dooided on abstract grounds, equally foreign to the owo. Id many parts of the colony, the community is divided into two political factions, and the first question that arises when a candidate appears—whether he is ambitious to become Mayor or to obtain a stonebraaking contract—is not, Is be fit for the duties ? but For whom did he vote at the last general eleotion 1 The trouble in fclio Wairarapa arose , out of a Mayoral eleotion last November, The Star's man was defeated, and the newspaper next day published an angry article accusing the plaintiffs of bringing - about' that defeat by maligning the candidate, and by misrepresentation and falsehoods securing- his opponent's return. On this tho charge of libel was based, Defendants pleaded truth and justification, but their counsel, Sit Robert Stout, practically abandoned thoso lines of defence, the alleged faiso statements of the plaintiffs having bsen proved to. be true, and the falsehood fixed upon the Star. The able counsel for the defence took the painfully weak grounds (I) that it wad ridiculous to formulate a libel case out of the fact that a man had accused another of" lying at oleetion ( time," and (2) that plaintiffs "were j probed on" by a rival paper" who wanted to crush the Star out of exia- § tenoe." For this latter assertion'he could adduce 110 proof. Never was 1 there a clearer oaso'of" No caseabuse plaintiffs." The issue as put to the jury was simply this: The Star had accused plaintiffs of " misrepresentation and falsehood," the ■ oharge is found to be entirely unfounded, the plaintiffs claim £IOOO, Tho jury found a verdiot for tho plaintiffs—they could not do otherwise—but gavo dam ages one iar tiling I A more inconsequent verdiot was never recorded. It meant neither one of two things; that a character for truthfulness is. worth no more than the amount awarded; uv that the utmost power of tlie Mar for mischief is represented by the smallest coin of the realm. Really, however, the jurymeu meant neither one nor the other. Their feeling (or that of the majority of the twelve), was well expressed by contemporary that rejoiced in the result, inasmuch as the' Star was a determined enemy to land-grabbers. That is to say, party sympathies alone decided the verdict. The damages claimed pre unreasonable -probably much mo/e than the value of the entiro j but in a gross libel like this, by jt paper which endeavors to p|e up for its insignificance by its scurrility, the verdict should at least have carried costs. Jurymen sometimes forget that their oath binds them to give verdict according (o evidence, If political verdiots are juries may at length descend tq such burlesques of justice as fashion ia Ireland, and when an ex-prisoner dies from the effects of whisky, return a verdict of wilful murder againstauunpopular Minister oMstlcWtypo, "