Montgomery County sentinel. [volume] (Rockville, Md.) 1855-1974, 1859-11-25
ROCKVILLE, MARYLAND, FRIDAY MoRxING, NOV

much think | have shown.
And now let us turn to the prisoner.
If Virginia, through you, can afford to
be clement, your inquiry will then be, is
the object on whom you are asked 70 be-
stow your clemcncy worthy to receive it?
| know the field on which now cutter is
filled with preconeeived ideas, but in the
spirit of truth | shall explore it and by
the truth of what | say | am willing that
my unfortunate client may be JUDI 5y
you, and moreover by that God y Sc
lpresence no hidden things exist 4ae
fore whom, at no. distant daT4
shah Stand with Tim ana sex ,H.,d
know him as he is, and not as we sec
him and know him now, eneompassed by
the dread and awful calamities of the
present hour.
VINO IS JOHN Il. Cook? He has the
right himself to be heard before you; but
| will answer for him. Sprung from an
ancestry of loyal attachment to the
American Government, he inherits no
blood of tainted impurity. His grand
father an officer of the Revolution by
which your liberty as well as mine was
achieved, and his gray-haired father,
who lives to weep over him, soldier of
the war of 1912, he brings no dishonored
lineage into your presence. If the blood
which flows in his veins has been offered
against your peace, the same blood 10
the veins of those from whose loins he
sprang has been offered in fierce shock
of battle and foreign invasion in behalf
of the people of Virginia and the Union
Born of parent stock occupying the
middle walks of life, and possessed of all
those tender and domestic virtues which
escape the contamination of those vices
that dwell on The frozen peaks, or in the
dark and deep cayerns Of society, he
would not have been here had precept
and example been remembered in the
prodigal wanderings of his short and
chequered life. Poor deluded boy way
ward, mislcd child! An evil star pre-
sided over thy natal hour and smote it
with gloom The hour in which thy
mother bore thee and blessed thee as her
blue-eyed babe upon her knee is to her
now one of bitterness as she stands near
the bank Of the chill river of death aud
looks back on a name hitherto as unspot-
ted and as pure as the unstained SHOW.
May God stand by and sustain her, and
preserve the mothers Of Virginia from
the waves Of sorrow that nov roll sser
her
Not only the ancestry of john Il.
Cook, but all with whom his life Is now
bound up, stand before the country as
your friends, and the friends Of the con
stitution as handed down to us By the
valor and wisdom Of Washington /
will not shrink from the full and abso-
lutte recognition of my position. You
and [, gentlemen Of the jury, can have
no secrets in this case from one another |
We will withdraw the curtains, and look |
each other fully iu the face. A citizen
of the State in which / live, who, by
virtue of his brilliant and commanding
intellect, and because Of his sound and
national principles, has been placed at
an early period of his life in the highest
position in the power of State to give
is here beside me, and wears near his heart
sisters Likeness to this boy. And there
is not in the wide world, on the broad
green face Of the earth, man, whose
heart is not wholly abandoned to selfish
deprayity, who will not say that his pre-
sonce here is commended by honor, love,
duty, and fidelity TO all that ennobles our
poor fallen race. Let poor, miserable,
despised, loathed, spurned, and abhorred
miscreants cayil and rcvilc at this proud
act of painful duty. The true and etcr-
nal impulses Of the human heart, the
world over, constitute our appellate court.
But the governor Of the State Of In
diana needs neither vindication nor de-
fence as a statesman Of catholic opinions,
nor as a man fully approaching the duties
of domestic life Rather do / allufe to
his presence here and his position as the
agitating questions of the day to show
that something else besides. ancestral in
heritance or the teafhings Of family con
neetions has given the fatal bias 10 the
prisoners mind, which led bin awa7
from the worship of his owa boz VIII
gods, and into the communion OF laoia- (
tiers, aliens, and enemies to the pure faith
Of an American citizen. And it seems
to me, in view Of the services which
those who love this boy have rendered
to their country, and in view Of their
devotion TO the true construction OF the |
Constitution aud the injunctions Of our
fathers, | might rehearse and quote 10
you with propriety passage from the
history Of the latter years Of the wisesi
king Israel ever had
For it came to pass when Solomon
was Old that bis wives turned away bis
heart after ether gods and his heart was
not perfect with the Lord his God as was
the heart Of David, his father. For
Solomon went after Ashtoretb the god
dcss Of the Ioniaps, and after the abom-
nations of the Ammonitcs.
"And Solomon did evil 10 the sight
Of tho Lord, and went not fully after the
Lord az did David his father
"And the Lord was angry with Solo
mon because his heart was turned from
the Lord God of Israel which had appear
cd unto him twice.
"And had commanded him concerning
this thing that he should not go after
other gods; but he kept not that which
the Lord commanded.
"Wherefore the Lord said unto Sol
ONION, forasmuch as this is done usto thee
and thou hast not kept my covenant and
my statutes which ! have commanded !