Robert Green Ingersoll

“ The experience of thousands of years, the experience of the English-speaking people, of the Anglo-Saxon people, the only people now upon the globe with a genius for law, is that the jury is a breastwork behind which an honest man is safe from the attack of an entire nation. We esteem it, I say, a privilege, a great and invaluable right, that we have you twelve men to stand between us and the prejudice of the hour. We believe that you will hear this case without passion, without hatred, and that you will decide it absolutely in accordance with the law and with the evidence. ”

“ Do you want to go to the penitentiary with that kind of witnesses against you? Do you want to be locked up on that kind of testimony? Do you want to be separated from your wife or your child on that kind of evidence? Do you want to be rendered infamous during your life upon the testimony of such men as Golsen and Conklin and Rehm? Do you? Do you? Do you? Does any man in the world imagine that twelve honest men can be found that can rob another of his citizenship, of his honor, of his character, of his home, and of his entire fortune, simply upon the testimony of such scoundrels? No, gentlemen. ”

“ Now, gentlemen, if what the prosecution claims is true, not only Stephen W. Dorsey, not only Thomas J. Brady, not only John R. Miner, not only H. M. Vaile, and John W. Dorsey are guilty of conspiracy, but hundreds and hundreds of other people. Do you believe it is possible that all the persons who petitioned for an increase of service, who petitioned for expedition—do you believe they were in a conspiracy? Do you believe they were dishonest men, and do you believe they asked for what they did not want? ”

“ I appeal to you for my clients, because the evidence shows that they are honest men. I appeal to you for my client, Stephen W. Dorsey, because the evidence shows that he is a man, a man with an intellectual horizon and a mental sky, a man of genius, generous, and honest. And yet this prosecution, this Government, these attorneys representing the majesty of the Republic, representing the only real Republic that ever existed, have asked you, gentlemen of the jury, not only to violate the law of the land, they have asked you to violate the law of nature. They have maligned mercy. ”

“ I want you to understand that all the suspicious circumstances in the world are good for nothing. All the evidence on earth tending to show a thing does not show it. Anything that only tends that way never gets there; never.
You cannot infer a conspiracy. Unless you have the facts proved, you cannot infer the fact and then infer the conspiracy. There has not been—I want to say it again—there has not been a solitary fraudulent act proven against Stephen W. Dorsey. They have not done it and they cannot do it. All I ask of you, gentlemen, is to find a verdict in accordance with this testimony. ”

“ If I am an honest man I suppose I will jump the contract, won't I? Not much. If I am an honest man I will say, "Well, you made five hundred dollars; I am glad of it; good for you." But the idea of the prosecution is that the moment Brady saw a subcontract for less than the original contract he should have had a moral spasm, and said, "I won't carry out the contract; I will swindle you, I will rob you, and I will do it in the name of virtue." And that is the meanest way a man ever did rob—in the name of virtue, reform. ”

“ And yet you are asked to take from men their liberty, to take from citizens their reputation, to tear down roof-trees, on testimony about conversation that happened years and years ago, as to which the party testifying had not the slightest interest. As a rule, memory is the child of attention—memory is the child of interest. Take the avaricious man. He sets down a debt in his brain, and he graves it as deep as graving upon stone. A man must have interest. His attention must be aroused. Tell me that a man can remember a conversation of four or five years ago in which he had no interest. ”

“ All that you have read, all the press has printed, must find no lodgment in your brains. You must regard them no more than you would the noises of animals made in sleep. You must stand by the testimony. You must stand by the law that the Court gives you. That is all we ask. These articles in the newspapers were not printed in the hope that justice might be done. They were printed in the hope that you may be influenced to disregard the evidence, in the hope that finally slander might be justified by your verdict. Gentlemen, you ought to remember that in this case you are absolutely supreme. ”

“ I want facts, and I hope as long as I live that I shall never win a case that I ought not to win on the facts. No man should wish or endeavor to win a case that he knows is wrong.
I say there is not a man on this jury but believes in his heart and soul this minute that this will was made. You have to throw aside the testimony of a perfectly good man, and no matter whether what he said about Erwin Davis to Judge Knowles was true or not—and I must say that I never saw a witness on the stand in my life more eager to tell his story than Judge Knowles was. ”

“ How long would a fraud like that last and live? How long could the money be drawn for that service in that country? They say no human being lived there. Who was to be postmaster? Who was to make the reports? How long, in your judgment, would it be before the department would find out that there was no such post-office, no postmaster, and no mail? No one could think of a more shallow device than that Stephen W. Dorsey, a man who is blest with as much brain as any man it is my pleasure to know, would never dream of such an idiotic device. And yet, that is the testimony of Mr. Rerdell. ”

“ The higher you get in the scale of being, the grander, the nobler, and the tenderer you will become. Kindness is always an evidence of greatness. Malice is the property of small souls. Whoever allows the feeling of brotherhood to die in his heart becomes a wild beast. You know it and so do I:
"Not the king's crown, nor the deputed sword, The marshal's truncheon, nor the judge's robe, Become them with one-half so good a grace as mercy does."
And yet the only mercy we ask in this case, gentlemen, is the mercy of an honest verdict. ”

“ Why didn't Miner tell him then, "What did you get up a conspiracy like this for, just to abandon it"? Why did not Miner say to him, "This is your child. I became a criminal at your suggestion. I entered into this conspiracy because you urged me to, and now after we have got the routes, you are going to abandon it"? Why did he not say to him, "Dorsey, if you are not going on with this conspiracy I am going back to Sandusky"? Did Dorsey at Saint Louis treat it as his bantling? or did he say to Miner, "This is all I will do"? Did he mean for himself? No. "All I will do for you." ”

“ What is the use of taking a sublime stand in favor of the right with the world against you? What is the use of being true to yourself? What is the use, I say, if all this character, if all this noble action, if all this efflorescence of soul can be blasted and blown from the world simply by a word from the mouth of a confessed felon? And yet we are assured here in this august tribunal, in a Federal court of the United States, where the defendant stands under the protection of the the Constitution of his country, that his character is absolutely worthless. ”

“ I have shown you that they are false; that they are without the slightest shadow of foundation in fact. Now, gentlemen, after you hear all this evidence, it is for you to determine. It is for you to say whether these men entered into a conspiracy to defraud this Government. It is for you to say whether our testimony is to be believed, or whether you are to decide this case upon the suspicions of the Government. It is for you to say whether you will believe the contracts and the witnesses, or whether you will take the prejudice of the public press ”

“ There is not a man of this jury that can prove a better reputation. There is not a judge on the bench in the United States that can prove a better reputation. There never was and there never will be an attorney at this bar that can prove a better reputation. There is not one in this audience that can prove a better reputation. And yet we are told that that splendid fabric called a good character cannot stand for a moment against a word from a gratuitous villain—not one moment. ”

“ Every man always had a right to petition the king. There is no government so absolutely devoid of the spirit of liberty that the meanest subject in it has not the right to express his opinion to the king—to the czar. Upon what meat do these officers feed that they are grown so great that an ordinary citizen may not address a petition to one of them? Now, I ask you, if you were living in Colorado and could get a mail once a week, have you not the right to petition your member of Congress to have it three times a week? ”

“ Rerdell, I will tell you what I am going to do with you: I am going to have you prosecuted for perjury." Let us imagine that conversation. Rerdell replies, "What are you going to have me prosecuted for?" "For making the affidavit of June, 1881." "Why," says Rerdell, "in that affidavit I swore you were innocent." Says Dorsey, "Don't you know you swore to a lie? Do you think I would stand a lie of that kind, sir? Do you think I will allow any man willfully, maliciously, and with malice aforethought, to swear that I am an innocent man? I will have you arrested to-night, sir." ”

“ Gentlemen, you cannot believe any witness unless his evidence is reasonable. Every witness has to be corroborated by the naturalness of his story. Every witness is to be corroborated by his manner upon the stand and by the thousand little indications that catch the eye of a juror or of a judge or of an attorney. Congress has passed a law allowing defendants to swear when they are put upon trial. Will you tell me that that law is a net, a snare, and a delusion, and the moment a defendant takes the stand the prosecution is to say, "Of course he will lie"? ”

“ If I have taken the route from the Government, and contract to carry the mail, tell me that I cannot suggest to my fellow-citizens that they ought to have a daily mail instead of a weekly? Tell me that I have not the right to talk it on the corners, in every postoffice for which I start, and that if I do I am liable to be pursued and convicted of an infamous offence? Every man has the right to attend to his own affairs, and he has the right to get all the people he can to help him. ”

“ Even under that rule you could not find a verdict of guilty against John W. or Stephen W. Dorsey. If the rule were that you are to find guilty if you have a doubt as to innocence you could not do it; how much less when the rule is that you must have no doubt as to their guilt. The proposition is preposterous and I will not insult your intelligence by arguing it any further.
Now, then, there is another thing I want to keep before you. When a man has a little suspicion in his mind he tortures everything; he tortures the most innocent actions into the evidence of crime. ”

“ Do you not think that it is better to get a man out of the Cabinet than to put another into the penitentiary? And do you not think it is better that a man be put out of office than that he be put into the penitentiary, his family destroyed, and his home left to ruin, upon the oath of a man who swears that the oath was a lie? Dorsey was an awfully wicked man to try to get Mr. MacVeagh out of office on Rerdell's testimony. But now they turn around and want to put Mr. Vaile and Mr. Miner into the penitentiary on the same testimony. ”

“ I believe in the diffusion of intelligence. I believe the men in Colorado or Wyoming, or any other Territory, that are engaged in digging gold or silver from the earth, or any other pursuits, have just as much right, in the language of Henry M. Teller, to their mail as any gentleman has to his in the city of New York. We are a nation that believes in intelligence.
We believe in daily mail. That is about the only blessing we get from the General Government, excepting the privilege of paying taxes. Free mail, substantially free, is a blessing. ”

“ Can you believe this man? Can you believe this man who has been contradicted by every one brought upon the stand? Can you take his word after he has sworn as he has? I tell you, gentlemen, you cannot do it, and as Judge Doolittle told you, if there is an infamous crime in the world, it is the crime of perjury. All the sneaking instincts; all the groveling, crawling instincts unite and blend in this one crime called perjury. It clothes itself, gentlemen, in the shining vestments of an oath in order that it may tell a lie. ”

“ There must be evidence; there must be absolute, solid testimony. A case is tried according to the rocks of fact and not according to the clouds and fogs of suspicion. No juror has a right to make a decision until he feels his feet firmly fixed upon the bed-rock of truth.
So I say, gentlemen, that we are glad of the opportunity to make a statement of this case to you, and to tell you exactly the manner in which my clients became interested in what is known as the star-route service. You have to be guided in this case by the indictment. ”

“ It is an infinitely mean trait in human nature. Suspicion is only another form of cowardice. The man who suspects constantly suspects because he is afraid. Whenever you find a man with a free, frank, generous, brave nature, you will find that man without suspicion. Suspicion is the soil in which prejudice grows, and prejudice is the upas tree in whose shade reason fails and justice dies. And allow me to say that no amount of suspicion amounts to evidence. No case is to be tried upon suspicion. No case is to be tried upon suspicious facts. ”

“ It is for you to say whether there shall be left to these defendants and to those they love, a future of agony, of grief and tears. Nothing beneath the stars of heaven is so profoundly sad as the wreck of a human being. Nothing is so profoundly mournful as a home that has been covered with shame—a wife that is worse than widowed—children worse than orphaned. Nothing in this world is so infinitely sad as a verdict that will cast a stain upon children yet unborn. ”

“ A lie is unnatural. A lie, in the nature of things, is a monstrosity. A lie is no part of the great circle, including the universe within its grasp, and consequently, as I said before, will fit nothing except another lie. Now, then, to examine the testimony of a witness, you examine into its naturalness, into its probability, because you expect another man to act something as you would under the same circumstances. ”