The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1858-06-26

.TURDAY, JUNE rs, 1865
How the Administrssasn OF Justice d Do
feased I'm New York.
This morning the courts will witness sin2u
lar. almost an unprecedented spectacle--no-
thing less than an inquiry into indictments
lately found by the Grand Jury against one of
the ablest and most useful Judges this city has
ever had-City Judge Abraham d. Russell
These indictments were procured at the instance
of parties who on a recent occasion went to the
Academy Of Music with the design Of creating
disturbance, and were frustrated in their aim
Judge Russell, who was present, acted as it
was his duty and his function to act, and larg ly
contributed to preserve the public peace
For this official action, which Judge Russell
would have been blameable not to have taken,
the defeated disturbers of the peace have laid,
and Grand Jury has actually found, indict-
ments against the Judge. A motion to quash
them is to be argued before the Recorder this
morning, and the public will see how far
the administration Of justice is defeated in
New York.
BY q singular coincidence, the finding of in
dictments against the most vigorous Judge
of which the city can boast was al
most simultaneous with the failure of the
prosecution Of the man who killed Paudeen.
As usual in such cases, the jury disagreed,
and were discharged, the prisoner going, for
the time, unwhipt of justice In due course,
the man will probably be tried again,
and the same farce will doubtless be repeated
1t has come to be an understood thing that
juries will always disagree in capital cases. and
no one who has had any experience in jury
trials expects to see conviction before the Sc
coDd or third trial The cost alone of such re-
peated efforts to vindcate the laws-to say no
thing Of the disastrous example of systematic
impunity for crime upon the morals of large
section of the community-must in the end
tend to discourage criminal prosecutions alto
gether.
Those who seek the cause of the repeated
failures of justice and of the eutrages of which
the indictment Of Judge Russell is an example,
will find it partly in the defective arrangements
by which the jury system is worked and partly
in the fatal performance of the worst class of
the community at the fountain Of honor and
power-the nominating and primary conven-
tioDs.
But q still more prolific source of mischief is
the paramount influence of the worst people in
the city at the conventions of all parties 1t is
notorious that all nominations are bought and
sold-the sellers being the shoulder hitters,
rowdies and refuse population of the Five
Points and such localities These individuals
WELD despotism over the city of New York
and its inhabitants compared to which the
despotisn of the Emperors of France and Rus
STA is paternaL They hold in their hands the
entire patronage of the city, and dispense it as
their inolnations, their avarice or their sympa-
thies prompt Naturally enough, this class
does not consider its position complete after
the election. The shoulder hitters expect to
be served by their creatures-the officials they
have been the means of having elected. They
expect to exercise influence over every public
officer and every public department; and they
Calculate to use that influence for the acquisi-
ton of money and the rescue of themselves and
their friends from the hand of the law. Nor
are they disappointed. Many of the legal
scandals which have lately been witnessed,
most of the failures Of justice which
have brought shame on the criminal admins
tration, were the natural consequence and the
influence of the rowdy clase. That influence
controlled officials whose business 1t was to
crush it cut. It packed juries, and led some to
acquit murderers, others to find bills of indiet-
ment against the most faithful Judge the city
has. You find 1t everywhere -tainting and de-
fling the whole city government and courts Of
law, from the station house to the court room,
from the Street Department 70 the Treasury.
The remedy sor all these evils lies in the hands
of the taxpayers of New York. Whenever they
shall resolve, once for all, to Gust the control
of the city from the hands Of the rowdes, a.
they can do, the trouble will be over. They
possess the power of electing whom they please
to Office. Whenever they choose to elect none
but well known men, men of standing aud
character, and taxpayers, who have personal
interest in putting an end to the reign of i'm
punity and outrage now existing, New York will
become as orderly and wall governed CITY as
there is in the Union. But till they do, Il must
be expected that things will 60 on from bad to
worse thot the laws will become a byeword
and trials farce that juries will regularly
disagree, and the best judges be subject to in
dictmen. for doing their duty that the whole
administration of justice and civic government
will be disgrace and an opprobrium to the
city and State.
YELrow FEvER-7HE SusoUEHAsNA.-This