False Accusation. - Verbal and real Injury. - Scandal and Defamation. - Does veritas conviti excuse? - Whether a verbal Injury may be retorted by a real one ex intervallo?
Scotlands v. Thomson
Date: 8 August 1776 Case No. No 21.
A clergyman found liable in damages for defamatory language undecently used in the pulpit.
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Mr James Thomson, minister of Dunfermline, in a sermon preached after the Michaelmas election 1774, after congratulating by name Colonel Campbell, whose political interest had prevailed at that election, remarked, “That he and his friends had reason to be thankful that they had escaped the snares laid for them by that person who had betrayed the trust reposed in him, and who was eating his bread and wearing his apparel, yet had lifted up his heel against him, to his own disgrace and that of his generation for ever.” Robert Scotland, who had been political agent for Colonel Campbell, considering himself as the person pointed at in this censure, published a letter in the Caledonian Mercury, denying his ever having betrayed his trust, and adding, that “every report to the contrary, whether from the pulpit, by a blustering blunderbuss of an old military chaplain, or other such busy bodies, is false and slanderous, &c. Soon after the publication of this letter, Mr Thomson delivered a sermon on Ephes. chap. xxiv. verse 25, “Wherefore putting away lying, &c,” in which, after describing the different kinds of liars, looking towards Robert Scotland, then in church, and pointing him out with his hand, “Will any man (said he) pretend to tell me, after the testimony of three incontestable witnesses, that you do not lie, when you maintain that you did not engage to support Colonel Campbell's interest?” Then looking towards David Scotland, the brother of the former, he addressed him in a similar strain, and concluded thus:
“And you, Robert Scotland, who have written a paper which appeared in the Caledonian Mercury, giving me the epithet of an old military chaplain, this is a name I glory in; but when you term me a blustering blunderbuss, I refuse it. Will any man pretend to maintain but that you lie, by saying you are a faithful agent for Colonel Campbell, when the contrary can he proved, &c. I therefore think it is plain that no person is safe to do any business with you or your friend; wherefore, my brethren, refrain from lying,”
Messrs Scotlands having brought an action for damages against Mr Thomson in the Court of Session, the defender pleaded the duty of his function to censure vice and immorality from the pulpit, the veritas convicii, and the provocation received by the publication of the letter in the newspaper, The Lord Ordinary sustained the defences; but the Lords found the defender liable in damages and expenses, in respect of his improper conduct, unsuitable to the character of a minister of the gospel, contrary to the decency, dignity, and purity of the pulpit, and highly injurious to the pursuers; and, on advising a condescendence of damages and account of expenses, modified the latter to L. 52 Sterling, with the expense of extract; and in respect of the behaviour of Robert Scotland, found him entitled only to L. 5 Sterling of damages; but as to John and David Scotland, found them entitled jointly to the sum of L. 25 Sterling of damages, See Apeendix.
