Rensselaer Republican, Volume 27, Number 14, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 29 November 1894 — A RULING ON LIBEL. [ARTICLE]

A RULING ON LIBEL.

Appellate Court’s Decision in Pt, Wayne A. P. A. Case. Judge Reinhard, of the Appellate Court, Wednesday ruled against the American Eagle, the A. P. A. newspaper, edited at Fort Wayne by - William P. Bidwell. The American Eagle, some time ago, published a sensational article exposing alleged immoralities in the Catholic Orphans’ Asylum at Fort Wayne. A feature of the printed article charged that a young girt, an inmate of the asylum, was confined in a dungeon for a week because she would not submit to the proposition of a priest connected with the asylum. Bishop Joseph Rademacher, the creator aud superintendent of the institution, began a libel action for damages igainst the proprietor of the paper, and was awarded judgment. Bidwell filed a demurrer during the progress of the case, alleging that the plaintiff had no cause of action. Upon the action of the court the defendant based his appeal to the Appellate Court. Judge Reinhard, in his opinion, decided that the lower court had not erred in overruling the Jemurrer. “That the publication was defam itory and libelous of some person,or persons, unless justified, is certainly beyond controversy,” comments the court. “It can not be claimed with any degree of plausibility that the perpetrator of such a nefarious act as charged would not merit and orobably incur the contempt and obloquy of every right-thinking citizen. The publication charges that a young woman, probably an orphan, admitted to the institution to be taught morals and religion, has, according to her own account, been systematically pursued by one who had been set over her in loco parentis, in an attempt to induce her to yield to his desires, and when she spurned his advances was locked up and fed on bread and water for a week. Whoever is implicated in such diabolical exercise of power over a helpless female deserves the condemnation of every person who upholds decency or even modesty, and that the publication was intended to have that effect is plainly apparent. The charge implicates not only the priest who sought to wrong the girl, but it reflects directly upon the asylum and ind its management, if not upon all the Roman Catholic citizens and churches in Fort Wayne. It plainly intimates in its closing words not only that corruption and crime exist, but that every convent, nunnery, orphan asylum or other institution peculiar to the sect, is tainted with similar corruption and crime, which the writer proposes to expose by turning those places inside out for public inspection. If these charges are true, whoever is familiar with the appellee’s connection with those places would naturally and justly ascribe a large portion of the blame to the bishop, whose duty it is to see and know that proper management and government prevails. “It is required in a declaration of slandm* to show that the plaintiff is the person referred to. Under our . code it is not necessary, in an action for libel or slander, to state extrinsic facts connecting the plaintiff with defamatory matter as the person to whom the words were applied. It is sufficient if there be any averment generally that such matter was published of and coofcerning the plaintiff. If the allegations be denied, it then devolves upon the plaintiff to prove that the defamatory words were spoken of him. It has long been the rule that publications and their character cannot be excused on the ground that they are matters of such public interest as to properly form the subject of comment in a newspaper. Where the words are capable of having a special application to the plaintiff and there is an averrrnent that they were published of him, the action will lie, although at first sight the words used may appear only to apply tc a class of individuals and not to be specially defamatory of any particular member of that class. It is sufficient to say that in our view the complaint states a cause of action.”