Public defender

“ If, in the ordinary administration of justice in cases of private rights, or personal claims, oaths are required of those, who try, as well as of those, who give testimony, to guard against malice, falsehood, and evasion, surely like guards ought to be interposed in the administration of high public trusts, and especially in such, as may concern the welfare and safety of the whole community. ”

“ Free defense, that is, light thrown on all the elements of the suit; public sentiment being heard in the bosom of the judgment hall, the right to say everything in the most respectful manner, and also the courage to dare everything, these must be put at the service of the unfortunate one, of justice and law. ”

“ It may be true that a ministerial officer, in a secret and private investigation, may strive to ascertain the truth and to do justice, but unless we blind our eyes to the history of the long struggle in the mother country to secure protection to the liberty of the citizen, we must realize that a public investigation before a judicial tribunal, with the assistance of counsel and the privilege of cross-examination, is the best, if not the only, way to secure that result. ”

“ Not one of the agents, employed in the atrocities above described, was ever punished. The people see that all the members of the Government are accessaries, either before or after the fact, in all these dreadful cruelties and outrages, and, that the more of them a public officer commits, the more secure is he of protection and favour at Court. ”

“ The reply to all this is that every exercise of the police power must be reasonable, and extend only to such laws as are enacted in good faith for the promotion for the public good, and not for the annoyance or oppression of a particular class. ”

“ We must conclude, therefore, that the divisions between public and private wrongs and between crimes and civil injuries are not coincident but cross divisions. Public rights are often enforced, and private wrongs are often punished. ”

“ We wish further, from the evidence that has been placed before us, to express our fullest confidence that the same force that has protected us by its bravery in the face of the enemy, aided by the skill and legal ability of our Prosecuting Attorney and his assistants, is quite competent to hunt these public enemies down, and to bring them before our courts of law with sufficient evidence of guilt to insure what they so richly deserve. ”

“ The detective officer is needed. Some of the officers are very able, bright men and I have known some who have been fair-minded and good at heart but that great abuses of power have been practiced and many men made victims to the old idea that the once marked man has no rights, no honor, and can come to no possible good, is an incontestable fact. Public opinion, steered by Christian charity regarding the rights of those who cannot protect themselves, is the safe-guard to which we must appeal. ”

“ The official men who have the conducting of the prosecution, are not only, generally speaking, men of much smaller abilities than those who have the conducting [195] of the defence, but upon political grounds, as well as from that general aversion which men have to the sanguinary operations of the law, the feeling of the public is opposed to them, and in favour of their antagonists. ”

“ To some extent, however, a similar protection may be obtained when an accused may in essence appeal to the community at large, by focusing public attention upon the facts of his trial, exposing improper judicial behavior to public view, and obtaining, if necessary, executive redress through the medium of public indignation. ”

“ He is a trustee of the public interest, bearing the burden of great and total responsibility to his public employer. Unlike the lawyer who is directly responsible to his client, the policeman is either responsible to the State or to no one. ”

“ The State pays an officer to sift, probe, collect and array the evidences of crime, with which the criminal is stoned to death; does it likewise commission and compensate an equally painstaking, lynx-eyed official whose sole duty is to hunt and proclaim proofs of the innocence of the accused? The great body of the commonwealth is committed in revengeful zeal to prosecution; upon whom devolves the doubly sacred and imperative duty of defence? ”

“ That it shall be the duty of each officer assigned as aforesaid to protect all persons in their rights of person and property, to suppress insurrection, disorder, and violence, and to punish, or cause to be punished, all disturbers of the public peace and criminals, and to this end he may allow local civil tribunals to take jurisdiction of and to try offenders, or, when in his judgment it may be necessary for the trial of offenders, he shall have power to organize military commissions or tribunals for that purpose ”

“ Against such as would commit offences upon the property or persons of men, with the form of law and by means of its machinery,—against unjust legislators, corrupt Judges, and wicked magistrates; against such it is a shield defending the public head. ”

“ Contemplating the various existing evils detailed in this Work, and which form so many prominent features of Police, requiring the constant and watchful eye of the Magistrate, it seems clear to demonstration, that unless official duties become the sole business and pursuit of the parties engaged in them, the Public Interest must suffer; and (although imperceptible in their progress) , Crimes will increase and multiply; at a time when the comfort, happiness and security of Society, require that they should be diminished. ”

“ The peculiar duty of the defender-general is, to act on behalf of the administrative authority in its capacity of defendant, and on behalf of every defendant who has not the means of engaging another advocate, and to obviate any prejudice he sees likely to result to justice from want of skill or other causes on the part of a defendant who pleads his own cause, or on the part of the advocate who pleads it for him. ”

“ Such considerations may suggest to some that public opinion is influencing the course of judicial proceedings. We must respond that this is a correct observation. All of these things are both indicators and causes of the public's concern about the legitimacy of the criminal justice system and its operation; all of them go to the question of the vulnerability of public confidence in our system of criminal justice. ”

“ The second you rank under the denomination of practice, and here, considering the injury which may be done to society, and the presence of magistrates who look after the public peace, you take care, in order to keep yourselves on the safe side of the law, not to approve always in practice the murders and other crimes which you have sanctioned in speculation. ”

“ Furthermore, for those who will not acknowledge themselves subject to the civil magistrate, and will be exempt from all public burthens, and yet will live under his jurisdiction, and look for protection from the violence and injuries of others, that you would not look on them as fellow-subjects, but esteem them for enemies and spies ”

“ In order to guard the public against losses and injuries arising from the fraud or mistake or rashness or indiscretion of their agents, the rule requires of all persons dealing with public officers the duty of inquiry as to their power and authority to bind the government; and persons so dealing must necessarily be held to a recognition of the fact that government agents are bound to fairness and good faith as between themselves and their principal. ”

“ I have prevented many a suicide and many a crime.
It is not likely that the venerable judge, the State's attorney or the gentlemen of the jury can see in Mme. Thomas a greater benefactress to society than they; any more than they can grasp the deep importance of the concluding words of the counsel for the defense in this great social tragedy.
Counsel for the Defense. Their crime is not an individual crime; it is a social crime.... It is not a crime against nature. It is a revolt against nature. ”

“ Private Offences being the source of public crimes, the best method of guarding Society against the latter is, to make proper provisions for checking the former.—A man of pure morals always makes the best Subject of every State; and few have suffered punishment as public delinquents, who have not long remained unpunished as private offenders. ”

“ Unfortunately, the officer, as a rule, though acquainted to some extent with the law governing the right of private defence of public servants acting in an official capacity, does not take full advantage of it; he has not been bred to kill ”

“ Public police is in effect defined by the great commentator of the common law as the due regulation of domestic order, whereby the citizens of a State are bound to conform to the rules of propriety and good conduct, and to be moral, industrious, and inoffensive in their respective stations. ”

“ There is a manifest difference between the case of a private individual who intercepts a message from motives of curiosity or to further personal ends, and that of a responsible official engaged in the governmental duty of uncovering crime and bringing criminals to justice. ”

“ Citizen confidence in law enforcement can be enhanced through increased citizen participation, by informing citizens of police and prosecutor policies, assuring that police departments reflect a cross-section of the communities they serve, establishing neighborhood forums to settle simple disputes, restoring the grand jury to fair and vigorous independence, establishing adequate victim compensation programs, and reaffirming our respect for the individual's right to privacy. ”

“ This trial by jury has long been regarded as one of the most important of the secondary safeguards of society. It has served to defend the community against bad citizens, and the citizens against an evil establishment—bad institutions, bad constitutions, bad statutes; against evil officers—bad rulers, bad judges, bad sheriffs. If the community has much to fear from bad citizens, here is the offensive armour, and the jury do not bear the sword in vain. ”

“ While the defendants and the prosecutors stand before you as individuals, it is not the triumph of either group alone that is committed to your judgment. Above all personalities there are anonymous and impersonal forces whose conflict makes up much of human history. It is yours to throw the strength of the law back of either the one or the other of these forces for at least another generation. ”

“ Good Heaven! gentlemen, how can it protect the people against the government, if it be a crime to say of that government that it has committed errors, displays little talent, and has no striking features?49 Did the prosecutor mock you, when he talked of the protection the Press afforded to the people? If he did not insult you by the admission of that upon which he will not allow you to act, let me ask, against what is the Press to protect the people? When do the people want protection? When the government is engaged in delinquencies, oppression, and crimes. ”

“ And when an accused rises to defend himself before such an officer he is met by a statement that 'We have evidence that you are guilty of something, but we cannot tell you what, nor who gave us the evidence.' If, taking the Bill of Rights seriously he complains, he is met by the rather impatient rejoinder that the Government's safety would be jeopardized by according him the kind of trial the Constitution commands. ”

“ And society's awareness of the heavy personal strain which a criminal trial represents for the individual defendant is manifested in the willingness to limit the Government to a single criminal proceeding to vindicate its very vital interest in enforcement of criminal laws. ”

“ Given your escalating pattern of criminal conduct, it is apparent to the Court that you have decided that this is the way you are going to live your life and that the only thing I can do now is to try and protect the community from your actions. ”

“ To help accomplish these purposes, it is necessary that efficient officers are elected who will enforce the laws and that public sentiment be aroused in support of these officials; in some communities sympathy for law-breakers is so easily awakened that justice cannot be enforced and law and order are placed in contempt. ”

“ Divested of all complications, our task is to defend ourselves against the criminal population,—the professional criminals; to guard society against their outrages and depredations in the most prompt, effectual, and enduring fashion we can devise. ”

“ If I am attacked by a malefactor in the streets of the town, I invoke the help of the magistrates, the legal protection of authority; but if, singlehanded, I am attacked on the high road, I become a magistrate in my own cause, and I defend myself from anything and everything.... ”

“ It seems inconsistent with the most rudimentary principles of our system of criminal justice, a system carefully developed and preserved throughout the centuries to prevent oppressive enforcement of oppressive laws, to concentrate this much power in the hands of any officer of the state. ”

“ If the whole country be in arms, the prosecutor for the commonwealth can get a good jury, by challenging improper jurors. The right of challenging, also, is sufficient security for the person accused. I can see no instance where this can be abused. It will answer every purpose of the government, and individual security. In this whole business we have had argumenta ad hominem in abundance. A variety of individuals, and classes of men, have been solicited to opposition. ”

“ His character is under the protection of the court.”
“No, sir!” said the advocate, with energy; “no court, however high,—no tribunal, beneath that of Heaven itself, whose decrees we dare not question,—can throw a shield over a man like this. There are crimes which stain the nation they occur in; which, happening in our age, make men sorry for their generation, and wish they had lived in other times.” ”