Actual malice

“ I think that commonly malice, intent, and negligence mean only that the danger was manifest to a greater or less degree, under the circumstances known to the actor, although in some cases of privilege malice may mean an actual malevolent motive, and such a motive may take away a permission knowingly to inflict harm, which otherwise would be granted on this or that ground of dominant public good. ”

“ Malice also denotes a wanton or reckless indifference or culpable negligence with regard to the rights of others.' The jury was told that whether 'actual malice or wanton or reckless indifference has been established must be determined from all of the evidence in the case.' The trial court then directed the jury's attention to the circumstances of preparation. ”

“ The complicated mood resulting from this association of sadistic cruelty with inert malice is perhaps the most powerful engine of evil that exists in the world; although a pure unmitigated condition of unsensualized, unimpassioned, motiveless malice is, in its inmost self, more essentially and profoundly evil. For while the energy of sadism renders the actual destructive power of malice much more formidable, we must remember that what really constitutes the essence of evil is never the energy of destruction but always the malicious inertness of resistance to creation. ”

“ Two, that the defendant acted with actual malice in publishing the statements at issue in this case. Actual malice means that Globe International intended, or recklessly failed to anticipate, that readers would construe the publicized matter as conveying actual facts or events concerning Mrs. Mitchell. A finding of actual malice requires a showing of more than mere negligence. ”

“ It may readily be admitted that malice did originally mean a malevolent motive, an actual intent to harm the plaintiff by making a false charge. The legal remedy here, again, started from the moral basis, the occasion for it, no doubt, being similar to that which gave rise to the old law of conspiracy, that a man's enemies would sometimes seek his destruction by setting the criminal law in motion against him. ”

“ An act done with a depraved mind, attendant with circumstances which indicate a willful disregard of the rights or safety of others, indicates malice. 'Malice aforethought' is such wicked intention of the mind previously entertained.' Evidently, there is nothing in this of which the defendant can complain. ”

“ It is something which springs from wickedness, from depravity, from a depraved spirit, from a heart devoid of social duty, and fatally bent on creating mischief. The words 'express' or 'implied' do not mean different kinds of malice, but they mean different ways in which the only kind of malice known to the law may be shown. ”

“ North Eastern Co., supra, malice was defined by Brett, M. R., p. 448, as “a malicious intention in the mind of the defendant, that is, not with the mere intention of carrying the law into effect,” and by Bowen, L. J., as “a malicious spirit, that is, an indirect and improper motive, and not in furtherance of justice.” ”

“ Are we engaged in quarrels and misunderstandings with our neighbours? These were all begun and inflamed by the false, malicious tongues of our servants. Are the secrets of our families betrayed, and evil repute spread of us? Our servants were the authors. Do false accusers rise up against us (an evil too frequent in this country) ? They have been tampering with our servants. Do our children discover folly, malice, pride, cruelty, revenge, undutifulness in their words and actions? Are they seduced to lewdness or scandalous marriages? It is all by our servants. ”

“ Would you accept on his part, in justification of his malignity, an excuse which would render him still more odious, mean, and cruel? Besides, how do you know whether the author of all these reports be not an impostor? So many false reports are circulated in the world; and the malice of men renders them so credulous on the faults of others! ”

“ The root of the principle is that, in any legal question, malice depends, not upon evil motive which influenced the mind of the actor, but upon the illegal character of the act which he contemplated and committed. ”

“ But if the object be to calumniate, or wantonly or maliciously to cause pain or injury to others, by wounding their feelings or corrupting their principles, then it is an abuse of that freedom and the proper subject of criminal legislation. The question of malice is always a question for the jury. ”

“ Whereas it is said all malice, all guile, learn, That one sin, not laid aside, will hinder our spiritual profit and everlasting welfare. (4.) Malice, envy, hatred, hypocrisy, and evil-speaking, generally go together. Evil-speaking is a sign that malice and guile lie in the heart ”

“ If I give a perfect stranger a blow likely to produce death, I do it of malice, because I do it intentionally and without just cause or excuse. If I maim cattle, without knowing whose they are; if I poison a fishery, without knowing the owner, I do it of malice, because it is a wrongful act, and done intentionally. If I am arraigned of felony, and wilfully stand mute, I am said to do it of malice, because it is intentional and without just cause or excuse. ”

“ And if I traduce a man, whether I know him or not, and whether I intend to do him an injury or not, I apprehend the law considers it as done of malice, because it is wrongful and intentional. It equally works an injury, whether I meant to produce an injury or not, and if I had no legal excuse for the slander, why is he not to have a remedy against me for the injury it produces? ”

“ Law has found it necessary to offer to the innocent, security from slanderers — those pests of society — when their crime comes within its jurisdiction. Thus, to evade the penalty of law, and yet with malice aforethought to extend their evil intent, is the nice distinction by which they endeavor to get their weighty stuff into the hands of gossip! Some uncharitable one may give it a forward move, and, ere that one himself become aware, find himself responsible for kind (?) ”

“ Justice Best says, "malice is the gist of this prosecution. Malice in law relative to libel means legal malice." Whatever your opinion may be as regards the contents of the books; however much you may condemn the filthy and immoral allusions in different parts of this pamphlet, still you would not be justified in finding a verdict of guilty, unless you are clearly of opinion that the manner of the publication and circulation does not rebut the inference of malice. ”

“ Malice, the term by which English Lawyers seem in some instances to have had in view the expressing consciousness of blame, presents a wrong idea, since in common language it implies hatred, an affection which in many instances of conscious guilt, may be altogether wanting:—instance offences of mere rapacity, such as theft, robbery, and homicide for lucre. ”

“ It is not, indeed, the bare hearing of a report, which, we cannot but think to be attended with malice and slander, that will render us guilty; for that we may not be able to avoid; but it is our encouraging him that raises or spreads it, which renders us guilty; and, particularly, we sin when we hear malicious reports. ”

“ Should any ill happen to himself, or to another, through his present enlargement—should he take any fit of vindictive malice against any person whom he might view as an accomplice in the plans against his own freedom—and probably many persons in the neighbourhood, medical and non-medical, stood liable to such a suspicion—upon me, I felt, as the abettor of his evasion, would all the blame settle. ”

“ By maliciously is not meant malice against any particular individual, but a mischievous intent. This is the criterion, and it is a fair criterion, if it can be collected from the offensive levity in which the subject is treated, if the matter placed in the indictment contains any such tendency.' If the words had appeared in the course of a written paper you would have entertained no doubt that the person who had uttered these words had uttered them with levity. ”

“ I cannot, for my part, but congratulate the noble person upon his triumph over malice; malice assisted by subtilty and experience, by wealth and power, which is at length obliged to confess its impotence, to call upon us to assist it with new laws, to enable it to offer a reward for evidence against him, and throw down the boundaries of natural justice, that he may be harassed, censured, and oppressed, upon whom it cannot be proved that he ever deviated from the law, or employed his power for any other end than the promotion of the publick happiness. ”

“ I may be thought, perhaps, in this to put my own vindication upon too ticklish a bottom, when it is considered how far the malice of men will go, in these times especially, in maintaining the greatest falsity against others, when they can serve their own purposes by it. ”

“ Stephen's enumeration, that of these two elements of malice the intent alone is material to murder. It is just as much murder to shoot a sentry for the purpose of releasing a friend, as to shoot him because you hate him. Malice, in the definition of murder, has not the same meaning as in common speech, and, in view of the considerations just mentioned, it has been thought to mean criminal intention. ”

“ The most usual illustrations, and the ones best understood generally of the term 'express malice,' are such as lying in wait for the intended victim, and when he approaches he is slain, or the preparation and administration of poison for the purpose of taking life, because in such instances the acts clearly show the formed design and the unlawful intent and its execution, and therefore is said to be killing upon express malice. ”

“ The chief forms of liability in which fraud, malice, and intent are said to be necessary elements, are deceit, slander and libel, malicious prosecution, and conspiracy, to which, perhaps, may be added trover. ”

“ Its authenticity thus shewn, he further says: “Of all the monstrous wickedness with which the age abounds, nothing, I will be bound to say, can parallel the scenes of villainy that are here laid open. In all the Histories I have ever read, of all the barbarous stories I have heard related, never did I meet with an instance where cruelty was carried to such an excess as here. We have an instance of two men suffering the most cruel torments that malice itself could invent, without any provocation given, and for no other crime but a duty to serve their king and country.” ”

“ You acted, coolly, deliberately, with all that premeditated malice, not against us in particular, but against the people in general, which, in the sight of the law, is an ingredient in the composition of murder. ”

“ It has often been said that malice is one of the elements of liability, and the doctrine is commonly stated in this way: that malice must exist, but that it is presumed by law from the mere speaking of the words ”

“ And the result of these authorities, with many others which bear upon this head is this, that if the conduct of the defendant entirely consists of an answer to an inquiry, the absence of malice will be presumed, unless the plaintiff produces evidence of malice; but if a master unasked, and officiously gives a bad character to a servant, or if his answer be attended with circumstances from which malice may be inferred, it will be a question for the jury to determine, whether he acted bona fide or with malice. ”

“ But even after rejecting, as one is bound to do, cases which may be explained by accident, mistake, or the excitement of action, there remains a large residuum of cases which can only be explained by deliberate malice. ”

“ Among these were pride, and oppression, and envy, and malice, and revenge, and covetousness, and secret vanity of mind, and evil thoughts of all sorts, and all sinful wishes and desires. When covetousness, indeed, put men on committing robbery, or when malice drove them to acts of murder, then the common courts immediately judged the criminal, without waiting for these great assizes ”

“ The malice through which anyone sins, may be taken to denote habitual malice, in the sense in which the Philosopher (Ethic. v, 1) calls an evil habit by the name of malice, just as a good habit is called virtue: and in this way anyone is said to sin through malice when he sins through the inclination of a habit. ”

“ I mentioned, as other examples of the use by the law of words drawn from morals, malice, intent, and negligence. It is enough to take malice as it is used in the law of civil liability for wrongs what we lawyers call the law of torts—to show that it means something different in law from what it means in morals, and also to show how the difference has been obscured by giving to principles which have little or nothing to do with each other the same name. ”

“ Express malice must arise from the previous acts or declarations of the party offending, but implied malice may arise from numbers of circumstances relating either to the nature of the act itself, the manner of executing it, the person killing, or the person killed, from, which the law will as certainly infer malice as where it is express. ”

“ Malice is the essential ingredient of the crime. Where killing takes place, malice is presumed, unless the contrary appear; and this must be gathered from the attending circumstances. Malice is a technical term, importing a different meaning from that conveyed by the same word in common parlance. ”

“ Falkland. Defend yourself as well as you can, but do not attack your master. It is your business to create in those who hear you a prepossession in your favour. But the recrimination you have been now practising, will always create indignation. Dishonesty will admit of some palliation. The deliberate malice you have now been showing is a thousand times more atrocious. It proves you to have the mind of a demon, rather than of a felon. ”