Odger's English Common Law

UUINN V. LEATHEM. 631
of this whole class of actions by Darling, J., in the case
of Huttley v. Simmons and otlws, 1 in which he laid down
that a conspiracy to do certain acts, which are not in
themselves criminally punishable, gives a right of action
only where the acts agreed to be done and in fact done
would, had they been done without preconcert, have
involved a civil injury to the plaintiff, for which he
would have had a right of action. His Lordship relied on
the elaborate judgment given by Palles, C. B., in the Irish case
of Kearney v. Lloyd and others* in which that learned judge
laid down the law in very similar terms. But the decision
in Huttley v. Simmons has met with adverse comment. In
Quinn v. Leathern, 3 Lord Lindley said : " In Huttley v. Simmons
the plaintiff was a cab-driver in the employ of a cab-owner.
The defendants were four members of a trade union, who
were, alleged to have maliciously induced the cab-owner
not to employ the plaintiff and not to let him have a cab
to drive. The report does not state the means employed
to induce the cab-owner to refuse to have any dealings
with the plaintiff. The learned judge who tried the case
held that as to three of the defendants the plaintiff had no
case, and that as to the fourth, against whom the jury
found a verdict, "no action would lie because he had done
nothing in itself wrong, apart from motive, and that the
fact that he acted in concert with others made no difference.
It is difficult to draw any satisfactory conclusion from this
case, as the most material facts are not stated." Lord
Brampton, in the same case, after remarking 4 that " the
essential elements, whether of a criminal or of an actionable
conspiracy, are in my opinion the same, though to sustain
an action special damage must be proved," dwelt upon the
important distinction between the unlawfulness of the object
of the conspiracy and the unlawfulness of the acts by which
it is carried into effect. He appears to have held that,
if the object of the conspiracy as proved is not unlawful,
' [1898] 1 Q. B. 181.
2 (1S90). L. ' R. Ir. 263, approved ia Sweeney v. Coote, [1906] 1 Ir. R. 51 ; [1907]
A. C. 221.
8 [1901 J A. C. at p. 540.
* lb., at pp. 528, 529.