HeinOnline is a subscription-based resource containing thousands of academic and legal journals from inception; complete coverage of government documents such as U.S. Statutes at Large, U.S. Code, Federal Register, Code of Federal Regulations, U.S. Reports, and much more. Documents are image-based, fully searchable PDFs with the authority of print combined with the accessibility of a user-friendly and powerful database. For more information, request a quote or trial for your organization below.
![handle is hein.slavery/ssactsengr0771 and id is 1 raw text is: GLYN V. CAULFEILD
sufficient grounds have been shewn for his interference. Undoubtedly, the Attorney-
General has a right to represent the public, either in equity or by prosecution at law,
in cases where the public interests are exposed to danger or mischief, and in the
course of the argument several authorities were cited to shew that such interference
is recognised in equity ; but the informations in all those cases were directed to the
repression of acts which the parties had no legal right to do, and which were not only
not authorised to be done, but were, in fact, acts of public nuisance. I cannot
extract from this information any grounds to warrant the exercise of such a jurisdic-
tion in the present case; and, under these circumstances, I think the demurrers must
be allowed.
July 29. The appeal motion having been refused,
Mr. G. L. Russell now asked for the costs of the motion before the Lord Chan-
cellor, ultra those of an abandoned motion, on the ground that the relators had given
notice of their intention to read affidavits which had been filed in support of the
motion in the Court below; he submitted that the case fell within the equity of the
order of the 5th August 1818.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR (Truro], however, refused the application, observing that
the Defendants had not been put to any additional expense by the notice to read the
old affidavits.
[463] GLYN V. CAULFEILD. Feb. 27, March 1, 3, 5, August 5, 1851.
The Defendants in a suit were shareholders in a company and had been authorized
by the other shareholders to wind up its affairs, and for this purpose, among other
things, to send out agents to India. The Plaintiffs in the suit having brought
actions against the Defendants as shareholders, in respect of certain debentures
issued by the company, the Defendants thereupon filed a bill on behalf of them-
selves and the other shareholders to restrain the actions, and to obtain relief in
respect of the debentures. The Plaintiffs then filed a bill against the Defendants
for discovery in aid of the actions. From the answers of the Defendants to this
bill it appeared that they had in their actual possession certain letters which had
passed between the Defendants and the directors and shareholders of the company
and the agents in India, after the dispute had arisen, and in contemplation of and
pending proceedings in respect of the dispute and for the purpose of assisting the
defence of the Defendants and the other shareholders. On a motion by the
Plaintiffs for the production of these letters the Defendants submitted that they
were not bound to produce them: first, because they held them on behalf of them-
selves and also of the other shareholders of the company, who were not parties to
the suit; and, secondly, because the letters fell within the class of privileged com-
munications. Held, ordering the production, that the Defendants sufficiently
represented the whole body of shareholders for the purposes of the litigation, and
that so far as the parties by or to whom the letters were sent were shareholders of
the company, the letters were not privileged. Held, also, that the circumstance,
that the letters related to the matters in dispute and arose out of communications
between the shareholders themselves with a view to their defence in the suit,
formed no ground of protection.
Professional privilege, as a ground of exemption from production of documents, is
adopted simply from necessity, and ought to extend no further than absolutely
necessary to enable the client to obtain professional advice with safety.
The decision of the Vice-Chancellor Lord Ciranworth, in Goodall v. Little (1 Sim. N. S.
155), that there is no protection as to letters between parties themselves, or from
a stranger to a party, merely because such letters may have been written in order
to enable the person to whom they were sent to communicate them in professional
confidence to his solicitor, approved.
This was an application by three of the Defendants in the suit, Elliott, Wilson
and Brownrigg, to discharge an order made by the Vice-Chancellor Knight Bruce,
directing the production of certain documents, appearing by the answers of the said
Defendants to be in their possession.
'339
3 MAC. & G. 463.](ViewImageLocal?handle=hein.slavery/ssactsengr0771&div=1&collection=&method=preview&ext=.png&size=3)