Smith v. Jensen

120 S.E. 417, 156 Ga. 814, 1923 Ga. LEXIS 337
CourtSupreme Court of Georgia
DecidedNovember 17, 1923
DocketNo. 3862
StatusPublished
Cited by6 cases

This text of 120 S.E. 417 (Smith v. Jensen) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Georgia primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Smith v. Jensen, 120 S.E. 417, 156 Ga. 814, 1923 Ga. LEXIS 337 (Ga. 1923).

Opinion

Hines, J.

(After stating the foregoing facts.)

1. In the absence of an express provision to the contrary, the lease of a building or a portion thereof, for business purposes, gives the lessee-the exclusive right to the use of the outside walls of that portion of the building embraced in his lease for advertising purposes. The tenant has the right to make reasonable use of the front walls of the leased building for such purpose. The tenant can put any sign or signs thereon which will work no injury to the freehold. The landlord in such a lease retains no right to permit signs or advertisements of other persons to be put upon the outside walls of the leased building. Riddle v. Littlefield, 53 N. H. 503 (16 Am. R. 388); Broads v. Mead, 159 Cal. 765 (116 Pac. 46, Ann. Cas. 1912C, 1125); Forbes v. Gorman, 159 Mich. 291 (123 [819]*819N. W. 1089, 25 L. R. A. (N. S.) 318, 134 Am. St. R. 718); Snyder v. Kulesh, 163 Iowa, 748 (144 N. W. 306, L. R. A. 1915B, 1057, Ann. Cas. 1916C, 481); Lowell v. Strahan, 145 Mass. 1 (12 N. E. 401, 1 Am. St. R. 422); Salinger v. North Am. Woolen Mills, 70 W. Va. 151 (73 S. E. 312, 39 L. R. A. (N. S.) 350); Baldwin v. Morgan, 43 Hun (N. Y.), 355; Law v. Haley, 9 Ohio Dec. 785; Scott v. Pitts, 6 L. J. N. S. 368; Carlisle Cafe Co. v. Muse, 77 L. T. Rep. N. S. 514, 67 L. J. Ch. N. S. 53; Goldfoot v. Welch, L. J. 1914, 83 Ch. (Eng.) 360; Joseph v. London County Council, 111 L. T. N. S. (Eng.) 276; Stahl & Jaeger v. Satenstein, 233 N. Y. 196 (135 N. E. 242, 22 A. L. R. 798); Hope v. Cowan (1913), 2 Ch. 312, 82 L. J. Ch. N. S. 439; Hilburn v. Huntsman, 187 Ky. 701 (220 S. W. 528); 16 R. C. L. Landlord & Tenant, § 226. This does not authorize the tenant to lease to strangers space on the walls or roof of the leased buildings for advertising purposes. Louisville Gunning System v. Parks, 13 L. R. A. (N. S.) 587 (126 Ky. 532, 104 S. W. 331); Forbes v. Gorman, supra. The lessee of a part of a building has no right to place signs on the outside wall not enclosing his part of the leased premises. Broads v. Mead, Salinger v. North Am. Woolen Mills, supra. Where there are different tenants of the several stories or floors of a building, the tenant of one floor has no right to prevent the tenant of another floor from placing signs upon the walls outside of his story or floor. Broads v. Mead, supra. The tenant, in the absence of a restriction, has the right to use the roof, as well as the walls, of a building leased by him, for advertising purposes, provided he does no injury to the freehold. Alfred Peats Co. v. Bradley, 149 N. Y. Supp. 613. It has been held that the tenant would not have such right if he only leased a storeroom and part of a basement in a one-story building. MacNair v. Ames, 29 R. I. 45 (68 Atl. 950, 16 Ann. Cas. 1208). The right of the tenant to use the walls of a building for advertising purposes can not be so exercised as to cause material injury to the building. Hayman v. Round, 82 Neb. 598 (118 N. W. 328, 45 L. R. A. (N. S.) 623). Thus, by the great weight of the authorities, a tenant who leases an entire building has the right to use the outer walls thereof to advertise his own business. Neither his landlord nor strangers can interfere with this right; and injunction will lie to prevent the landlord or others from interfering therewith. Goldfoot v. Welch, 1 Ch. (Eng.) 213, 83 L. J. Ch. 360. Hilburn v. Huntsman, supra.

[820]*8202. But the plaintiff insists that his right of ingress and egress to and from the premises leased by him in No. 82 Whitehall Street, through the stairway between Nos. 78 and 80 Whitehall Street and the hallway through the building leased by the defendant, gives to him the right to attach his signs to the walls of the building leased by her. We can not agree to this view. The right of ingress and egress does not confer upon the tenant any other use of the stairway and hallway. The right to use the stairway for the purpose of ingress and egress does not confer upon the tenant the right to make any other use of these passages. Certainly the right of ingress and egress would not give the tenant of portions of the other building the right to attach signs to the outer wall of the building leased by the defendant. The right of the defendant to use the building leased by her is subject to only one restriction, and that is the right of the plaintiff to use the stairway and hallway in her building in going 'to and returning from the rooms occupied by him as dental offices in the other building. After considerable search and research, we have been unable to find any ease in which the exact point involved in this case has been decided. The nearest approach to such a case are cases involving the right to use party walls. In Lappan v. Glunz, 140 Mich. 609 (104 N. W. 26), it was held that the party to a party-wall agreement could not be restrained from using his side of the wall for advertising purposes because of his covenant that the other party who built the wall should have peaceful possession of one half of a foot of the former’s lot, there being a further covenant that the wall when constructed should be the common property of both parties in equal proportions. In Shiverick v. Gunning Co., 58 Neb. 29 (78 N. W. 460), where a party wall was erected upon the boundary line between two lots, the owner of each lot paying one-half of the cost, and one erected a building on his lot joining the same to the party wall, it was held that the other owner had the right to use or lease the face of the wall on his lot for advertising purposes. These cases are different from the instant case. Party walls are owned by the owners of the lands on which they are built or which they adjoin. Both owners are entitled to the use of such walls. Each owner is entitled to use his part thereof in any reasonable way. In case of the mere right of one to use a stairway or hall in going to and returning from premises leased in another [821]*821building, the party does not own such stairway or hall. He does not own the walls thereof. The use of the walls is not necessary to his enjoyment of the right of ingress and egress. Such right does not confer upon him another and additional right. He cannot use the stairway or hallway for any other purpose or to exercise any other right. He can not place a show-case in the stairway. He can not fasten signs to the walls of the building in which the stairway is located..

We have seen that a tenant in a building, by the bare right of ingress and egress to and from premises leased by him therein, has no right to place signs at the doorways, or in the hallways and stairways of the building, or attach signs to the outer walls except such portions as are embraced in the premises leased. If this is so, much less has a tenant of premises leased by him in one building the right to place signs at the doorway and in the hallway of another building owned by one other than his landlord, because of his hare right of ingress and egress through the latter building to the premises leased by him in the first. The mere right of ingress and egress through the second building gives to the tenant of the premises in the first building no such signal rights.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
120 S.E. 417, 156 Ga. 814, 1923 Ga. LEXIS 337, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/smith-v-jensen-ga-1923.