The true Democrat., 1854-10-25
Case of Dr. Graham.

Judgment on the verdict in this case has been suspended. The object we presume. is to allow time for the preparation of papers. with view to obtain a new trial. Of the grounds of exception to the form of the yer- dict, or the substance of the late trial we are not informed. Dr. Graham had excellent counsel, and there is no point of law or of fact in his favor which will be left unimproved.
 We have not yet received the report of the whole testimony on which the verdict was ren- dered. The verdict, however, is very con- elusive proof that the testimony was essentially different from newspaper reports which created such torrent of popular prejudice against Dr. Graham at the time of the homicide. They made him out desperate, assaulting an unof- tending man, without provocation, and killing him with savage determination. The tele graph transmitted his name to all quarters of the Union, as that of deliberate assassin and the New York journals, for time, were hot for demanding blood for blood
 We do not desire to extenuate the fault of Dr. Graham's temper, orthe rashness into which 1t may have led him in this unhappy affair; but we may be permitted to remark upon the very different character of his offence as found by the New York jury from that imputed to him, with so much furious zeal by the New York press. They have acquitted him of all malicious or fe loniuos purpose. They decide that he was not actuated by malice or with any design to kill. They go further, and say that he was not the aggressor in the atfray which led to the death of Col. Loring. They affirm in substance, that he was resisting violence, or was the subject of violence to himself; but carried his resistance too far. He killed Col. Loring unnecessarily" not wantonly O. wickedly.
 Such is the nature of the verdict The le- gal offence of manslau ghter in the second de- gree," of which they found him guilty is sta- tute offence defined in New York, thus:
 Every person who shall unnecessarily kill an- other, either,
 l. While resisting an attempt-by such oth- CT person to commit any felony, or to do any unlawful act; or,
 1 2. After such attempt shall have failed: And in convicting him the jury decided that he killed Col. Loring, while that gentleman was doing some act which was unlawful; but which might and ought to have been opposed, and might have been repelled without taking | life.
 These are nice distinctions as to the extent to which resistance to unlawful acts may be car ried, and the degree of responsibility which at taches for putting forth more strength than is pieCisciN HeeucO, oI DelllS uuTTleU Uy prOVOCa- tion into excesses of passionate resentment. In New York they measure these responsibilities by statute definition, and take it out of the power of sympathy to make allowances for the violence of hot blood and offended self-respect, in repelling insult beyond the exact limits of absolute self-preservation. It is sometimes hard upon poor human nature, and with some passionate temperaments it is impossible even to remember the statute metes and bounds to the exercise of the rights of elf-protection; and it is perhaps necessary for the preservation of social order that such offenders should some- times suffer for the want of the self-control so hard to be acquired. Yet it is impossible to at tach to such involuntary offences the opprobri- um which belongs to deliberate premeditated acts of violence upon the rights or persons of others The personal friends of Dr. Graham, and those of his estimable and afflicted family, have the right to find some consolation, at least, in the fact that the jury which investigated his case has relieved him of the imputation of any premediated or malicious killing and placed the offence upon the ground of having "unnec- essarily" exceeded the rights of self-defence.- M o. Picayune.