business as a news seller. Furthermore, the plaintiff was entitled, and indeed obliged, under the contract to advertise its articles as under the “London Times News Service.” Its readers would naturally attribute less value to that service if they learned that it was shared with the defendant. These consequences are real injuries, and, if they result from false statements by the defendant, they are actionable.
Thus the second cause of action is good to some extent, and a motion to dismiss will not lie. Whether the relief should go beyond the false statement I need not now discuss. There must, in any event, be a trial, and the extent of the remedy can probably be better measured after the proofs are in than from the mere allegations of the bill. It may well be that to the degree of the “time differential” news collectors have a kind of property in what they collect for publication. Contemporaneous history may be property in the hands of such collectors for so long as the sun takes to travel from place to place, and, if there be a hitch in the cables, possibly for even longer. But with all that I shall not deal now; it is enough that the plaintiff is entitled to some relief.
The allegation of the jurisdictional amount is sufficient on such a motion as this. Blackburn v. Portland Gold Mining Co., 175 U. S. 571, 575, 20 Sup. Ct. 222, 44 L. Ed. 276.
Motion granted as to the first cause of action; denied as to the second. Defendant to answer in 20 days after order filed.
DEXTER & CARPENTER, Inc., v. UNITED STATES.
(District Court, D. Delaware. July 30, 1921.)
No. 3 Dec. Term, 1920.
135—Action for price of coal, requisitioned by Director General as agent of Fuel Administrator, held not against Director General.Though neither Act Aug. 29, 1916 (Comp. St. § 1974a), authorizing the appointment of, nor the President’s proclamation appointing, the Director General of Railroads, conferred on him the power to requisition property, the United States Fuel Administrator, under the order delegating to him the President’s power under Lever Act, § 10 (Comp. St. 1918, Comp. St. Ann. Supp. 1919, § 3115⅛ii), to requisition foods, fuels, etc., might make the person holding the office of Director General his agent, so that an action against the United States to recover a balance owing for coal requisitioned for the use of a railroad, the petition in which, though it alleged the Director General requisitioned the coal, made it clear he did so individually, as agent of the Fuel Administrator, is not one against the Director General.
127—Held proper defendant in action for balance owing for coal requisitioned by Director General as agent of Fuel Administrator.Under Lever Act, § 10 (Comp. St. 1918, Comp. St. Ann. Supp. 1919, § 3115⅛ii), and in view of the constitutional obligation of the United States to compensate the owner of property taken for public use, from which the law will imply a promise to make such compensation, action will lie against the United States to recover the balance due for coal requisitioned by the Director General of Railroads as agent of the United States Fuel Administrator.
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