Citation Numbers: 64 N.E. 442, 171 N.Y. 538
Judges: PARKER, Ch. J.
Filed Date: 6/27/1902
Status: Precedential
Modified Date: 1/12/2023
The question arises on the defendants' demurrer to the sufficiency of the complaint to state a cause of action. The complaint alleges that, without the knowledge of the plaintiff, the defendants, "knowing that they had no right or authority so to do, had obtained, made, printed, sold and circulated about 25,000 lithographic prints, photographs or likenesses of plaintiff, for the purpose of profit and gain to themselves;" that upon the paper upon which *Page 558
the likeness was printed, are the words above the portrait, in large, plain letters, "Flour of the Family," and below, in large capital letters, "Franklin Mills Flour," and in the lower right hand corner, in small capital letters, are the words "Rochester Folding Box Company;" that upon the same paper are the advertisements of the flour of the Franklin Mills Company; that these 25,000 likenesses of the plaintiff thus ornamented have been "conspicuously posted and displayed in stores, warehouses and saloons, throughout the United States and other countries, and particularly in the vicinity where the plaintiff resides;" that the result has been to greatly humiliate her, by the scoffs and jeers of persons who have recognized her face upon these advertisements, and her good name has been attacked and that, because of these facts, "she was made sick and suffered a severe nervous shock, was confined to her bed and was compelled to employ a physician." The plaintiff, further, alleges that the defendants "are now wrongfully printing, making, using, selling and circulating these lithographs," and that, by reason of these facts, she has suffered damages in the sum of $15,000. The relief demanded is that the defendants be enjoined from making, printing, publishing, obtaining, or using, in any manner, any likeness of the plaintiff in any form whatever. The facts contained within these allegations must be regarded as admitted, under the defendant's demurrer; as must all other facts which can be implied, by reasonable and fair intendment. (Marie v.Garrison,
Our consideration of the question thus presented has not been foreclosed by the decision in Schuyler v. Curtis, (
That the individual has a right to privacy, which he can enforce and which equity will protect against the invasion of, is a proposition which is not opposed by any decision in this court and which, in my opinion, is within the field of accepted legal principles. It is within the very case supposed by Judge PECKHAM in Schuyler v. Curtis. In the present case, we may not say that the plaintiff's complaint is fanciful, or that her alleged injury is, purely, a sentimental one. Her objection to the defendants' acts is not one born of caprice; nor is it based upon the defendants' act being merely "distasteful" to her. We are bound to assume, and I find no difficulty in doing so, that the conspicuous display of her likeness, in various public places, has so humiliated her by the notoriety and by the public comments it has provoked, as to cause her distress and suffering, in body and in mind, and to confine her to her bed with illness.
If it were necessary, to be entitled to equitable relief, that the plaintiff's sufferings, by reason of the defendants' acts, should be serious, and appreciable by a pecuniary standard, clearly, we might well say, under the allegations of the complaint, that they were of such degree of gravity. However, I am not of the opinion that the gravity of the injury need be such as to be capable of being estimated by such a standard. If the right of privacy exists and this complaint makes out a case of its substantial violation, I think that the award of equitable relief, by way of an injunction, preventing the continuance of its invasion by the defendants, will not depend upon the complainant's ability to prove substantial pecuniary damages and, if the court finds the defendants' act to be without justification and for selfish gain and purposes, and to be of such a character, as is reasonably calculated to wound the feelings and to subject the plaintiff to the ridicule, or to the *Page 561 contempt of others, that her right to the preventive relief of equity will follow; without considering how far her sufferings may be measurable by a pecuniary standard.
The right of privacy, or the right of the individual to be let alone, is a personal right, which is not without judicial recognition. It is the complement of the right to the immunity of one's person. The individual has always been entitled to be protected in the exclusive use and enjoyment of that which is his own. The common law regarded his person and property as inviolate, and he has the absolute right to be let alone. (Cooley on Torts, p. 29.) The principle is fundamental and essential in organized society that every one, in exercising a personal right and in the use of his property, shall respect the rights and properties of others. He must so conduct himself, in the enjoyment of the rights and privileges which belong to him as a member of society, as that he shall prejudice no one in the possession and enjoyment of those which are exclusively his. When, as here, there is an alleged invasion of some personal right, or privilege, the absence of exact precedent and the fact that early commentators upon the common law have no discussion upon the subject are of no material importance in awarding equitable relief. That the exercise of the preventive power of a court of equity is demanded in a novel case, is not a fatal objection. (Niagara Falls Int. Bridge Co. v. Great Western Ry.Co., 39 Barb. 212; Sherman v. Skuse,
Instantaneous photography is a modern invention and affords the means of securing a portraiture of an individual's face and form,in invitum their owner. While, so far forth as it merely does that, although a species of aggression, I concede it to be an irremediable and irrepressible feature of the social evolution. But, if it is to be permitted that the portraiture may be put to commercial, or other, uses for gain, by the publication of prints therefrom, then an act of invasion of the individual's privacy results, possibly more formidable and more painful in its consequences, than an actual bodily assault might be. Security of person is as necessary as the security of property; and for that complete personal security, which will result in the peaceful and wholesome enjoyment of one's privileges as a member of society, there should be afforded protection, not only against the scandalous portraiture and display of one's features and person, but against the display and use thereof for another's commercial purposes or gain. The proposition is, to me, an inconceivable one that these defendants may, unauthorizedly, use the likeness of this young woman upon their advertisement, as a method of attracting widespread public attention to their wares, and that she must submit to the mortifying notoriety, without right to invoke the exercise of the preventive power of a court of equity. *Page 564
Such a view, as it seems to me, must have been unduly influenced by a failure to find precedents in analogous cases, or some declaration by the great commentators upon the law of a common-law principle which would, precisely, apply to and govern the action; without taking into consideration that, in the existing state of society, new conditions affecting the relations of persons demand the broader extension of those legal principles, which underlie the immunity of one's person from attack. I think that such a view is unduly restricted, too, by a search for some property, which has been invaded by the defendants' acts. Property is not, necessarily, the thing itself, which is owned; it is the right of the owner in relation to it. The right to be protected in one's possession of a thing, or in one's privileges, belonging to him as an individual, or secured to him as a member of the commonwealth, is property, and as such entitled to the protection of the law. The protective power of equity is not exercised upon the tangible thing, but upon the right to enjoy it; and, so, it is called forth for the protection of the right to that which is one's exclusive possession, as a property right. It seems to me that the principle, which is applicable, is analogous to that upon which courts of equity have interfered to protect the right of privacy, in cases of private writings, or of other unpublished products of the mind. The writer, or the lecturer, has been protected in his right to a literary property in a letter, or a lecture, against its unauthorized publication; because it is property, to which the right of privacy attaches. (Woolsey v. Judd, 4 Duer, 399;Gee v. Pritchard, 2 Swanst. 402; Abernathy v. Hutchinson, 3 L.J. Ch. 209; Folsom v. Marsh, 2 Story, 100.) I think that this plaintiff has the same property in the right to be protected against the use of her face for defendant's commercial purposes, as she would have, if they were publishing her literary compositions. The right would be conceded, if she had sat for her photograph; but if her face, or her portraiture, has a value, the value is hers exclusively; until the use be granted away to the public. *Page 565 Any other principle of decision, in my opinion, is as repugnant to equity; as it is shocking to reason. Judge COLT, of the United States Court, in Corliss v. Walker Co., (64 Fed. Rep. 280-5), a case involving the same question of an invasion of the right of privacy, with respect to the publication of a printed likeness of Mr. Corliss, expressed the opinion that "independently of the question of contract, I believe the law to be that a private individual has a right to be protected in the representation of his portrait in any form; that this is a property as well as a personal right, and that it belongs to the same class of rights which forbids the reproduction of a private manuscript or painting, or the publication of private letters, or of oral lectures delivered by a teacher to his class, or the revelation of the contents of a merchant's books by a clerk." The case itself is not in point in its facts; because the complainant was the widow of Mr. Corliss and thus it came within the limitations of Schuyler v. Curtis.
The right to grant the injunction does not depend upon the existence of property, which one has in some contractual form. It depends upon the existence of property in any right which belongs to a person. In Pollard v. Photographic Co., (40 Ch. Div. 345), it was held that the right to grant an injunction against selling copies of plaintiff's photographs did not depend upon the existence of property and that "it is quite clear that independently of any question as to the right at law, the Court of Chancery always had an original and independent jurisdiction to prevent what that court considered and treated as a wrong, whether arising from a violation of an unquestionable right, or from breach of confidence, or contract, as was pointed out by Lord COTTENHAM in Prince Albert v. Strange, (1 Macn. G. 25)." In Prince Albert v. Strange, Lord Chancellor COTTENHAM sustained the issuance of an injunction, upon the ground that the right of privacy had been invaded by the publication and sale of etchings, made by Prince Albert and Queen Victoria. Upon the original *Page 566 hearing, Vice-Chancellor KNIGHT-BRUCE, in granting the injunction, observed that, "upon the principle of protecting property, it is that the common law, in cases not aided or prejudiced by statute, shelters the privacy and seclusion of thoughts and sentiments committed to writing, and desired by the author to remain not generally known."
It would be, in my opinion, an extraordinary view which, while conceding the right of a person to be protected against the unauthorized circulation of an unpublished lecture, letter, drawing, or other ideal property, yet, would deny the same protection to a person, whose portrait was unauthorizedly obtained, and made use of, for commercial purposes. The injury to the plaintiff is irreparable; because she cannot be wholly compensated in damages for the various consequences entailed by defendants' acts. The only complete relief is an injunction restraining their continuance. Whether, as incidental to that equitable relief, she should be able to recover only nominal damages is not material; for the issuance of the injunction does not, in such a case, depend upon the amount of the damages in dollars and cents.
A careful consideration of the question presented upon this appeal leads me to the conclusion that the judgment appealed from should be affirmed.
O'BRIEN, CULLEN and WERNER, JJ., concur with PARKER, Ch. J.; BARTLETT and HAIGHT, JJ., concur with GRAY, J.
Judgment reversed, etc.
Elmhurst v. Shoreham Hotel , 58 F. Supp. 484 ( 1945 )
Fergerstrom v. Hawaiian Ocean View Estates , 50 Haw. 374 ( 1968 )
Hamilton v. Lumbermen's Mutual Casualty Co. , 82 So. 2d 61 ( 1955 )
Pearce v. Manhattan Ensemble Theater, Inc. , 528 F. Supp. 2d 175 ( 2007 )
Ali v. Playgirl, Inc. , 447 F. Supp. 723 ( 1978 )
Sidis v. FR Pub. Corporation , 34 F. Supp. 19 ( 1938 )
Roach v. Harper , 143 W. Va. 869 ( 1958 )
Hull v. Curtis Publishing Co. , 182 Pa. Super. 86 ( 1956 )
Anderson v. Fisher Broadcasting Companies, Inc. , 300 Or. 452 ( 1986 )
Allen v. National Video, Inc. , 610 F. Supp. 612 ( 1985 )