The Rise and Fall of Anarchy in America: From its Incipient Stage to the First Bomb Thrown in ChicagoMcLean, George N.
History
The Rise and Fall of Anarchy in America: From its Incipient Stage to the First Bomb Thrown in Chicago
McLean, George N.
Anarchists -- United States; Haymarket Square Riot, Chicago, Ill., 1886
Forgery, murder, and other crimes had to be proved, Mr. Grinnell said,
by such evidence. "The pistol found in the hand of the assassin Guiteau
was forcibly taken from him, and his papers, if I remember rightly,
were overhauled. They were 'there' (that is, in the court), and it was
nobody's business how they got there. That the search and seizure in
this case was an unreasonable search and seizure from the point of view
of the defendants I have no doubt."
In conclusion Mr. Grinnell said: "It strikes us from our standpoint
that the foundation of the constitution is less likely to be impaired
by refusing to grant this writ than by granting it."
THE GENERAL'S INDIVIDUALITY.
After a great deal of rambling talk about the composition of the jury,
dissatisfaction with the record, lack of time for preparation, the
sentencing of the prisoners in their absence and that of their counsel,
the injustice done them by "unreasonable search and seizure," etc.,
General Butler said that if all these things could be done the question
was to be debated whether this government would not be a little better
if it were overturned into an anarchy than if it were to be carried on
in this fashion.
"I have no fear," he said, "of being misunderstood upon this question.
I have the individuality of being the only man in the United States
that condemned and executed men for undertaking to overturn the law.
There were thousands of them. And for that act, please your honors,
a price was set on my head as though I were a wolf, and $25,000 was
offered to any man that could capture me, to murder me, by Jefferson
Davis and his associates, and who, if they were here at your bar,
trying to ascertain whether they should have an honest and a fair
trial for their great crimes, and they called upon me--their lives in
danger--I should hold it to be my duty to stand here and do all that I
might to defend them. That is the chivalry of the law, if I understand
it, and if I don't it is of not much consequence, for I am quite easily
and quickly passing away."
INHERENT RIGHTS OF CITIZENS
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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