AN IMPORTANT CIVIL CASE.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 4165, 26 August 1881, Page 3

AN IMPORTANT CIVIL CASE.

A case of considerable importance to ad* vertising and newapaper proprietors was decided at the Magistrate's Conrt this morning. The Lytiellon Times Company took action to recover the sum of £3 6s 8d from Meßßrs Taylor and Papps for advertising. It appeared that there had been an agreement to allow the defendants a certain space for advertising for 12 months. The defendants recently had made use of this advertisement as a medium for giving publicity to matter of » somewhat libellous, or at least objectionable, character, in reference to another tradesman. The Lyttelton Times Company refused to insert the objectionable paragraph as soon as it was brought under their notice, and thedefendants, after requesting that their account should be rendered, had refused to pay the amount claimed on the ground that the agreement had been broken by the action of the plaintiffs in declining to insert the advertisemont complained of. The presiding Magistrate, in giving judgment for the plaintiff, said that the proprietors of a journal were quite justified in refusing to insert advertisements of such a cbaraoter as the one which had been brought under his notice.