USA > Indiana > Early Indiana trials: and sketches. Reminiscences > Part 17
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At the meeting of the Court in the afternoon, the jury returned a verdict of "guilty of manslaughter," two years at hard labor in the penitentiary. Mr. Rariden sprang to his feet, " If the Court please, we let judgment go on the verdiet, and are ready for the case of Saw- yer, for killing the Indian boy at the camp." "Ready for the State."
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The same jury were accepted by both sides - being in the box. They were immediately sworn. The evidence was heard, again conclusive against the prisoner. Gen. Noble opened for the prosecution, and was followed by Charles H. Test, William R. Morris and James Rari- den, with powerful speeches. The jury were referred to their verdict in the previous case, and their judgment was warmly eulogized. This was, by arrangement, my case to close. I saw my position, and that the only point I had to meet, was to draw the distinction between the two cases, so as to justify the jury in finding a verdict for man- slaughter in the one case, and of murder in the case before them. In law there was no difference whatever. They were both cold-blooded murders. The calico shirt of the murdered boy, stained with blood, lay upon the table. I was closing a speech of an hour. Stepping forward, I took up the bloody shirt, and holding it up to the jury, " Yes, gentlemen of the jury, the cases are very different. You might find the prisoner guilty of only manslaughter, in using his rifle on a grown squaw ; that was the act of a man, but this was the act of a demon. Look at this shirt, gentlemen, with the bloody stains upon it; this was a poor helpless boy, who was taken by the heels by this fiend in human shape, and his brains knocked out against a log! If the other case was manslaughter, is not this murder ?" The eyes of the jury were filled with tears. Judge Eggleston gave a clear and able charge upon the law. The jury, after an absence of only a few minutes, returned a verdict of " murder in the first degree." The prisoner was remanded, and Court adjourned.
TRIAL OF BRIDGE-SCENES AT THE EXECUTION
THE next morning, the ease of Bridge, Sen., for shooting a little Indian girl at the camp, was called. The prisoner entered with the sheriff. IIe was more firm in his step, and looked better than Sawyer, though a much older man. A jury was impanneled. The proof was positive. The case was argued by Mr. Morris and Mr. Rariden for the prisoner, and Mr. Sweetzer and myself for the State. The charge was given by Judge Eggleston, and after a few minutes absenec, the jury returned a verdiet of "murder in the first degree." The only remaining case - of the stripling, Bridge, Jr., for the murder of the other Indian boy at the camp-eame on next. The trial was more brief, but the result was the same - verdict of murder in the first degree, with a recommendation, however, to the Governor for a par- don, in consequence of his youth, in which the Court and Bar joined. The trials elosed. Pro forma motions for new trials were overruled,
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the prisoners remanded, to be brought up for sentence next morning, and the Court adjourned.
Morning came, and with it a crowded court-house. As I walked from the tavern, I saw the guard approaching with Sawyer, Bridge, Sen., and Bridge, Jr., with downeast eyes and tottering steps, in their midst. The prisoners entered the court-room and were seated. The sheriff commanded silence. The prisoners rose, the tears streaming down their faces, and their groans and sighs filling the court-room. I fixed my eyes upon Judge Eggleston. I had heard him pronounee sentence of death on Fuller, for the murder of Warren, and upon Fields for the murder of Murphy. But here was a still more solemn scene. An aged father, his favorite son and his wife's brother -all standing before him, to receive sentence of death. The face of the Judge was pale; his lips quivered ; his tongue faltered, as he addressed the prisoners. The sentence of death by hanging was pro- nouneed, but the usual conclusion, " And may God have mercy on your souls," was left struggling for utterance.
The time for the execution was fixed at a distant day ; but it soon rolled around. The gallows was erccted on the north bank of Fall Creek, just above the falls, at the foot of the rising grounds you may see from the ears. The hour for the execution had come. Thousands surrounded the gallows. A Seneca chief with his warriors, was posted near the brow of the hill. Sawyer and Bridge, Sen. ascended the scaffold together, were executed in quick suceession, and died without a struggle. The vast audience were in tears. The exclamation of the Senecas was interpreted -" We are satisfied." An hour expired. The bodies were taken down and laid in their coffins, when there was scen ascending the scaffold, Bridge, Jr., the last of the convicts. His step was feeble, requiring the aid of the sheriff. - The rope was adjusted. He threw his eyes around upon the audience, and then down upon the coffins, where lay exposed the bodies of his father and unele. From that moment, his wild gaze too clearly showed that the seene had been too much for his youthful mind. Reason had partially left her throne, and he stood wildly looking at the crowd, apparently unconscious of his position. The last minute had come, when James Brown Ray, the Governor of the State, announced to the immense assemblage that the convict was pardoned. Never before did an audi- enee more heartily respond, while there was a universal regret that the executive mercy had been deferred to the last moment. - Thus ended the only trials, where convietions of murder were ever had, followed by the execution of white men, for killing Indians, in the United States.
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[INDIANAPOLIS DAILY JOURNAL.
HUSBAND AND WIFE -- SKETCH OF THE SPEECH OF HON. OLIVER H. SMITH.
WE give a brief sketch of the speech of the Hon. Oliver H. Smith in a recent divorce case in this city :
" The distinguished gentleman from New York, Matthew Hale Smith, who opened this case for the plaintiff, in an able argument, spoke of the Garden of Eden, a most unfortunate allusion on his part. Yes, gentlemen of the jury, there was a Garden of Eden, the paradise of God on earth, created by him, to receive the parents of the human family. You who have seen the Panorama of the Bible lately exhibited in this city, can have a very imperfect vision of its gran- denr and sublimity. Our first parents were placed in this garden by the hands of the Almighty, as pure as himself, were declared to be husband and wife, and as such, one flesh. There were no human priests there to solemnize the marriage, no altars erected before which to consecrate the relations of husband and wife ; that holy relation, with all its train of blessings to the human family, was created by the Almighty, and marked divine. Among the trees of that paradise there stood one, more prominent to the eye than any other, called the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, the fruit of which our first parents were forbidden to eat, with the declaration of God, 'that the day thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.' This tree and its fruit I liken to the relation between husband and wife ; they who shall seduce either the one or the other, to violate the sacred marriage vow, shall surely die.
" Our parents, so placed in the garden, were content and happy, and knew no evil. The Almighty walked with and watched over them. They were not only in his own image, but they were a personification upon earth of his purity, honor and glory. Still, not like him, they were mortal, subject to temptation, and to fall from that high estate of purity in which they were created. Direct your mind's eye to the moving canvas of the panorama, look at the serpent, stretching his length around the trunk of the forbidden tree, and protruding his aecursed head from the branches, with the fruit of the tree in his mouth, offering it to Eve, while he quicts her fears by sounding in her ears-' Thou shalt not. surely die.' We sce no more of the serpent, but Adam and Eve hid themselves among the trees of the garden when the voice of God walked therein in the cool of the day. I need not speak of the penalty that was entailed upon the human
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race; but the serpent was accursed by the Almighty above all the beasts of the field, and condemned to go upon his belly, and to eat dust all the days of his life. Such is the Bible account of the first transgression. Yes, gentlemen of the jury, there was a serpent; a seducer, there, to interfere with the happiness of our first parents ; and there is a serpent here, who has dared to intrude upon the holy relations of husband and wife.
The difference between the location of the Paradise of the Scriptures and that of these parties can not change the nature of the transgres- sion. That garden was planted, watered, protected, and cherished by the Almighty himself. The garden in which these parties were domiciled was the City of Washington, inhabited and visited by the upper crust of society, where perhaps the moral sense, though greatly higher than that of the Court of Lewis the XIV. of France, or Charles the II. of England, is not at that high and pure standard that should commend itself to our highest approbation. The Eve of the garden of God, after she had transgressed, hid herself from the eye of the Almighty ; while the Eve of this garden comes unblushingly into court, and meets the gaze of a crowded house. The serpent of the Bible went away from the scene of his seduction, upon his belly, eating the dust of the earth ; and his progeny, to this day, continue to drag their slimy bodies upon their bellies, under the curse of both God and man, while this serpent has the effrontery to present himself upon the witness-stand-a living monument of his own disgrace, and of the ruin of a once happy family. The serpent of the Bible obtruded himself into the presence of our parents, while the serpent of our garden was introduced by a confiding husband to a then innocent wife.
What shall I say of the seducer, under such circumstances ? Who shall I compare him with ? Tell me not of the highway robber ! Tell me not of the midnight assassin !- of the fiend that administers the poisoned cup. They but rob us of some money, or of a few years of life. They leave the character untouched, to be cherished and honored by our friends.
The family relations-the holy relation of husband and wife, are the greatest blessings that were ever conferred upon man by the Almighty, and whoever attempts to violate them, commits a crime against the most sacred of all the institutions of God upon earth, and may read his fate in that of the serpent in the garden. I have often thought of the beautiful idea of Phillips, the Irish orator, when speaking of the state of mind of the disconsolate husband, after the serpent had entered, and alienated the affections of the wife : the orator said, " The silent doors on their hinges were eloquent of his woe."
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I read only this morning in a city paper an extract from a speech of the Hon. Rufus Choate, of Boston, on flirtation. I know Mr. Choate well, he is one of the most eloquent men of this or any other country. I read the sketch of his speech, and while I was delighted with his style, I could not but feel that it was but the effort of a brilliant mind struggling with truth. He, too, was dealing with the holy relation of husband and wife, and his great effort was to prove that there may be flirtation without crime, but even in that he had to admit that crime is the general rule, and flirtation without erime the exception-that the one as a general rule is the premonitory symptom of the other. Bnt Mr. Choate seemed to forget that the premonitory symptom, flirtatiou, is equally effectual to poison and destroy the tender tie that unites husband and wife, if continued against the wishes and request of cither, as is the consummation of the crime. Shakspeare says, "I would rather be a toad and live upon the vapors of a dungeon, than keep a corner in the thing I love for others uses."
I am told by the gentleman, as an excuse, that his client has a kind of universal love for all mankind. I suppose he means the kind of love that the rays of the sun bear to this globe, warming and fructify- ing the whole vegetable kingdom, not even forgetting or neglecting the polar seas. If so, I have only to add to the figure,-and holding in her hand the sun-glass, concentrating her universal love upon the serpent in our garden, whom she had permitted to destroy the rela- tion of husband and wife between those who were once happy in the enjoyment of its blessings.
But it is said that these partics have been protected from criminal improprieties by the presence of the aged mother of one of them. Vain delusion ! Virtue in proper places needs no protection, while vice can not be watched where the will concurs with the consummation of crime iu secret places.
We learn from heathen mythology that Jupiter was cnamored of the princess whom to escape the jealousy of Jnno, he changed into a heifer. Juno set Argus with his hundred eyes to watch her, two of which were to keep awake and constantly to stand guard while the other slept by turns. Mercury, by direction of Jupiter, by the music of his lyre lulled Argus to sleep and slew him ; Juno to reward his services while living, and as a memento of his fidelity, transferred his eyes to the Peacock's train, and forever after gave up the delusion, that willing vice could be watched and guarded by tardy virtue.
Gentlemen, the human passions were given to man for wise and holy purposes, and so long as they are kept under his virtuous will and control, and directed to the purposes designed by the Almighty,
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they are a blessing to him and tend to his happiness on Earth. But when they are suffered to run riot, govern and control his being, they become the greatest curse that can meet him in his journey through life. Such a man may be likened to one of our majestic steamers, crowded with passengers, crossing the Atlantic. She is built with all the modern improvements ; her cabin a beautiful moving palace ; her engines have the necessary power to propel her through the mountain waves like a bird of passage; the steam is up; the officers and crew upon duty ; the passengers seated by the cabin fires ; all is joy, hilarity and good feeling. But hark !- The cry of fire is heard from the lower deck. All start as if the knell of death had sounded. They rush above ; all is confusion there; dismay and despair are depicted in every countenance. The noble ship is on fire ! That dreadful clement is no longer the servant of officers and crew, but now in turn has become master. What shall be done? Escape from the burning vessel is the only hope. The life boats are lowered, filled and foundered the moment they meet the waves, and those who had taken refuge in them are all consigned to an ocean grave. And still the fire rages, the vessel is enveloped in flames ; she is soon consumed to the surface of the briny deep, and lies a blackened hulk, or sinks into the abyss below, carrying with her the charred remains of all on board. That most useful element, fire, had violated the object of its creation and use, and destroyed the magnificent steamer with all her passengers and crew within the time that it has taken me to describe the thrilling calamity.
This, gentlemen, is but a faint resemblance of the dreadful con- sequences of permitting our passions to become our masters. Having said thus much, preliminary to the argument of the facts of the case. I will relieve you for the present and direct your minds to the appli- cation of what I have said, to the case before you.
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[MONDAY MORNING, SEPTEMBER 28, 1857. LAW PRACTICE.
I YIELD this sketch, at the request of my young friends, to the legal profession. With some preparatory study, and thirty-seven years prac- tice in the courts of the State and of the United States, it may be pre- sumed that the subject I touch is somewhat familiar to me, and, as the title of the sketches indicate that they are more or less directed to the bar, this will be considered as appropriate. The profession of the law is of high import and of great responsibility, involving more for deep reflection and mature consideration before it is entered into than any other. Why is it that so many of the profession fall by the way- side ? Why so many hangers-on to the skirts of the profession ? Why so many who never reach a medium position at the bar? Why so few who acquire wealth and fame in the profession ? These are important questions, in which the young man designing to make the law his pro- fession-the father who thinks of the profession for his son-the young professional man, and even the more aged practitioner, is more or less interested.
It is not generally understood that the profession of the law is one of the most laborious that man was ever engaged in ; that the proper preparation of the body and mind for eminent success is found only in the few, and whenever found with the proper habits, integrity, and industry, success will as certainly follow as that effect will follow cause. There never was a greater error, in fact, than that committed by devo- ted parents when selecting professions for their sons. The most fee- ble, the tenderest, and those who are supposed to be unable to struggle physically with the out-door labors of other professions, trades, oecu- pations and businesses, are consigned to the seclusion of a professional office. My experience and observation teaches me that all such should be directed in their youth to some active out-door employment, trade or avocation, giving constant exercise to the body and mind. The student-at-law ean not have too firm a constitution ; his chest and lungs ean not be too much expanded; his voice can not be too elear and strong ; nor his health too good. If he practices the profession only half as long as I have, he will find that he will have use for all the bodily qualifications I have named.
Good common sense is essential. It is the foundation upon which the superstructure of education must rest. And if it is defective, you may build the superstructure to the skies, and it will erumble and fall. If nature has not done her part to make the lawyer, in vain will he struggle, to sink at last into some other professiou or avocation which
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nature has designed him for. The student should have a good, sound English education ; he should spell well, read well, and write well, and understand the principles of arithmetic and English grammar. The higher branches may be added, but I do not hold that in this country a knowledge of the dead languages, and a familiarity with the elassics is essential to the student, nor even to his success as a practitioner, although I do not object to their study where a favora- ble opportunity has been afforded .- But I do mean to say that I have known many graduates of colleges who were so deficient in the English department of their education as to be disqualified for students in my office. A fine-looking young man called upon me one day, desiring to study law with me. I inquired of him as to his education. "I am a graduate of an Eastern college; I understand Latin, Greek and Hebrew ; I stood No, 2 in a large class of graduates." " Do you spell well ?" " I presume so, but I never thought much of that." "Spell balance." " Bal-lance." "That won't do. Do you read well ?" " Certainly." " Read this." " My name is Norval on the Grampian hills." " What was his name off the Grampian hills ?- Do you write well ?" " No, I never could write much ; indeed I never tried to learn. Our great men East can scarcely write their names so that they cau be read." " Let me see you write." He seratched off some caricatures looking like Greek, or turkey tracks. "That is sufficient; your edu- cation is too imperfect for a lawyer ; the dead languages may be dis- pensed with, but spelling, reading and writing can not be." I advised him to go to one of our common schools and begin his education over again, and he might yet qualify himself for the study of law.
The license or diplomas to practice obtained is the test time in the whole of the young lawyer's career. If he thinks that the license quali- fies him, that his studies are ended, that he can then indulge his case upon his cushioned sofa, smoke his scented cigars, eultivate his whis- kers and mustaches, drive his fine horses, give his wine parties, spend his nights at the card-table, and still become eminent in his profession, he will be disappointed in the end. His license will prove his curse, and he will sink to his grave unnoticed and unknown as a lawyer. On the contrary, if he views the matter in the proper light, that his license is only intended to authorize him to unite the study of the books with the practice of his profession, that he is just entering upon his studies that are never to end but with his life, that he will be every day better and better qualified to read and understand, he may with proper habits and perseverance rise high in his profession. After thirty-seven years of reading and practice, I feel that I am, as it were, just beginning to learn my profession.
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The student will learn as he enters the courts, and begins to try his eases, that the learning of the books alone will not sustain him, without a knowledge of the world of men and things. He will have occasion every day to draw upon outside knowledge, and to bring to bear the circumstances that surround him, upon the cause of his client. He should come to his case thoroughly prepared with the facts and the law, as both Court and jury are ignorant of his case. IIe should be ready to place it fairly and truly before them. To do this his library should be looked to as to the law, and his client should be examined and cross-examined as to the facts, and then held responsible if he should have stated them too favorably to himself, as too many will do. The lawyer should maintain the strictest integrity, and the nicest sense of honor. His character is his capital. No personal security is required of him by the public. His faith, his honor stand pledged, and if once violated, he is bankrupt, and his profession only points to his disgrace.
A young lawyer has it in his power to surround himself with friends, or to cut himself off from the sympathy of his brethren. If in his intercourse, his arguments, his competitions, with the other members of the bar, he treats them with the respect and kindness he would like them to observe toward him, it will be reciprocated, and his practice will pass smoothly and pleasantly on. The golden rule applies with great force to the bar. The members are perhaps too sensitive, always ready to repel supposed aggression, and frequently disposed to carry the war further than the occasion warrants. But let the practitioner assume the character of the hyena, and he will always find that there are lions and tigers in the menagerie as well as those of his species.
The great point to be considered before impanneling the jury is to make up the true issue, to try the merits of your case, to which your evidence is applicable, so as to give your client the full benefit of his cause of action, and defense. The right of challenge of jurors for cause will of course be seen to by the practitioner. The peremptory . challenge, although a valuable right, should be exercised with great caution. In one case my client went to the penitentiary because I peremptorily challenged the only juror that knew the prosecuting wit- ness, and who would have saved my client, who was afterward clearly shown to be innocent .- I challenged the juror because I thought he did not like me. I had argued a case against him. At another time I had taken the jurors; they were standing up to be sworn, when I saw one of them wink at the opposite party. I challenged him, and learned afterward that I had saved the case of my client by it.
In questioning and cross-questioning witnesses, counsel frequently do great injustice to the witness, without in the least benefiting their
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cause. The jury is composed of men in all respects like the witness, and if his character stands unimpeached, they are disposed to give him credit for a disposition to tell the truth, unless they see his position or motives would lead him to side with one of the parties. A lawyer inconsiderately looks upon the witness sworn on the side of his adver- sary as hostile to his client, and attacks him in manner, voice, and with a thousand useless questions, plainly showing to the jury the state of the mind of the lawyer, to the prejudice of the cause of the client. As a general rule there are too many questions asked the witness, depending upon the clearness or obscurity of the legal vision of the attorney. He who sees his case clearly can put his questions to the witness so as to come dircetly to the point in issue. I have known many cases lost by counsel cross-questioning their own wit- nesses after the case was made out. In criminal cases, resting on cir- cumstantial evidence, I have never found it difficult to point to the real criminal wherever presence, motive, and opportunity combine. In the absence of stronger outside proof, I fix the criminal. The murder of Dr. Burdell, in New York, although, in the eye of many for a time, a mystery, never looked so to me. I fixed the crime upon those who had the opportunity and the motive. Mrs. Cunningham was there. Mr. Eckel was there. Dr. Burdell was a single man and rich. Mrs. Cunningham, a widow without reputation, pretending to have married Dr. Burdell secretly, would be entitled, if his wife, to a widow's share of his estate upon his death. The "presence " was there, the " motive " was there, and there was no outside circumstance to rebut the violent presumption that Eckel was the tool of Mrs. Cun- ningham, to personate Dr. Burdell at the pretended marriage, and to murder him on the fatal night in Bond street. Such, I believe, is now the universal opinion. The pretended marriage has been declared by the court fraudulent. The procured heir has been returned to its mother, and the author of the crime is now in the tombs.
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