John Archibald Campbell

“ If the plaintiff were not permitted to prove these consequences, necessarily resulting from facts specifically avowed, then he would be debarred presenting a very essential part of his case, and would be prevented from recovering the whole amount of damages actually sustained. This would occasion gross injustice. When a person is made deaf, his memory and understanding injured and impaired, it is hardly possible that any pecuniary damage can make him good: he cannot be fit for business ”

“ A man who could not hear, and whose brain was injured and affected, and his memory and understanding injured and impaired, was not competent to pursue the business in which the plaintiff was engaged, even though he might have been able to attend to some kinds of business, like tending a porter's lodge, where very little memory or understanding is required. ”

“ If his business were small, and easily managed, the damage would be less than if it were large, and managed with difficulty. The manager of a large plantation would sustain more damage by loss of his time than the manager of a smill patch of land. A lawyer earning ten thousand dollars per annum would sustain a greater loss in being rendered unfit for business, than would a pettifogger who could only earn a hundred or two. ”

“ The most they can do is to bring to the discharge of their duties a careful and diligent consideration of the particular case, a knowledge and experience of the general condition and business affairs of mankind, to which all are more or less subject, a sound and enlightened judgment, and honest desire to arrive at truth and justice between the parties. ”

“ THIRD.-The damage alleged in the declaration was special, as distinguished from particular damage.
Particular damage is where the particular instance of damage is avowed; special damage is where the loss follows from a specific statement of a fact, which generally or naturally results from the statement, as a cause competent to entail such a consequence.
The declaration avers that the injury affected the plaintiff's brain, and affected his memory and understanding, which were impaired thereby ”

“ This change in the condition of a person cannot be made without producing injury to him in his pecuniary circumstances and in his enjoyments. Such an injury would lessen, if not destroy, his ability to maintain and support his family by his own exertions. ”

“ It required no averment in the declaration to apprise the defendant that such consequences must result from the injuries specified. They are so necessary and natural that no one could mistake them. Every common understanding must arrive at the same conclusion.
FIFTH.-The evidence offered tended to prove necessary and natural injurious consequences arising from the injury to the plaintiff, within the settled rules of law. ”

“ These the law presumes, and they need not be alleged with any particularity, nor even proved.
II. Special damages are such as result from some cause not notified to the defendant by the very description of the injury complained of, as necessarily resulting from it. Any fact which rendered it more hurtful to the plaintiff than it would have been to any other person, under the same circumstances set forth, is a special damage; and, consequently, it cannot be given in evidence, unless specially set forth in the declaration. ”

“ If the mind is destroyed, the loss to a young man, who is supposed to have more years before him than an old one, is much greater than with one whose years are drawing to a close. It follows, that the probable future of the injured party is a proper subject of consideration. ”

“ THIS case came up from the Circuit Court of the United States for the southern district of New York, on a certificate of division in opinion between the judges thereof.
The case is stated in the opinion of the court.
It was argued by Mr. Gillet for the plaintiff, on which side there was also filed a brief of Mr. Reed, and by Mr. O'Connor for the defendants, on which side there was also a brief of Mr. Silliman. ”