The learned counsel then added: "The opinion I have endeavored to maintain is believed to be the almost unanimous opinion of the profession and certainly is of every judge or court who has expressed any." And he cited the then recent charge of Judge Bond to the grand jury at Baltimore, in which the Judge declared in reference to such military commissions as the present, that, "Such persons exercising such unlawful jurisdiction are liable to indictment by you as well as responsible in civil actions to the parties." And he quoted to the Court that portion of the charge of Judge Rufus W. Peckham to a grand jury in New York City, delivered during the progress of this very trial, wherein the right of a military commission to try was denied: "A great crime has lately been committed that has shocked the civilized world. Every right-minded man desires the punishment of the criminals, but he desires that punishment to be administered according to law, and through the judicial tribunals of the country. No star-chamber court, no secret inquisition, in this nineteenth century, can ever be made acceptable to the American mind. * * * * * "Grave doubts, to say the least, exist in the minds of intelligent men, as to the constitutional right of the Military Commission at Washington to sit in judgment upon the prisoners now on trial for their lives before that tribunal. Thoughtful men feel aggrieved that such a commission should be established in this free country, when the war is over, and when the common law courts are open and accessible to administer justice according to law, without fear or favor. * * * "The unanimity with which the leading press of our land has condemned this mode of trial ought to be gratifying to every patriot." On the twenty-third, General Ewing, too, assailed the jurisdiction of the Court in a short but powerful speech from which are taken the following extracts: "The jurisdiction of the Commission has to be sought _dehors_ the Constitution, and against its express prohibition. It is, therefore, at least of doubtful validity. If that jurisdiction do not exist; if the doubt be resolved against it by our judicial tribunals, when the law shall again speak, the form of trial by this unauthorized Commission cannot be pleaded in justification of the seizure of property or the arrest of persons, much less the infliction of the death penalty. In that event, however fully the recorded evidence may sustain your findings, however moderate may seem your sentences, however favorable to the accused your rulings on the evidence, your sentence will be held in law no better than the rulings of Judge Lynch's courts in the administration of lynch law.