The Highland weekly news. [volume] (Hillsborough [Hillsboro], Highland County, Ohio) 1853-1886, 1867-02-07

! dgalnSJ himself He comes into Court
to recover what he claims as statutory
damages, inflicted upon him, wherein
he says that he has been injured in
his legal rights. He it is that appeals
to the law he calls upon the law to
help him; he invOkes the protection
Of the law; he asks its remedies, its
redress. Now I do not inquire what
he is in his secret heart, what he is in
his real nature, what he is in the esti-
nation of the community. I admit
these matters are immaterial. But
there is one matter that in my iudg-
meht is not immaterial, and that is
that he who so readily and so persis-
tently, day after day, is calling upon
this Court, invoking the aid of these
universal principles Of Jurisprudence
which constitute the foundation and
source of all our rights, is himself, il
not confessed, yet convicted by the
proof in this case, of being not only a
law breaker in his practice from time
to time-not merely an habitual law
breaker, but more than that, beyond
all that-a man that makes his living
by trampling upon and defying the
law whose aid he now invOkCs. lie
lives by it. He gets his daily bread,
not from his Heavenly Father, but by
trampling upon that very code of law,
humane law, State law, yea, gentle
men, that very criminal code which
he now seeks to put in operation to
degrade, to disgrace these people. And
for what? For interrupting him in
that very vocation, for stopping that
very practice, for interfering to pre-
vent that very outrage, for collecting
together in order to vindicate, as against
him, the offended majesty of that very
law. That is the attitude, in this case,
of VIM. S. Linn.
CONVENTION OF LIQUOR VENDERs.
But, gentlemen, although the record
fails to show it, VIM. S. Linn is not
the only plaintiff in this case. 1t is
not VIM. S. Linn as an individual
citizen that now sues. lie is not here
in his private capacity, as one of the
people. He is here as a representa-
tive of his class and vocation he is
here as a delegate sent by a convention
Of liquor venders, pushed forward to
vindicate them, pushed forward to
punish those who are opposed to them;
not to pay him merely for his alleged
loss, but to triumph over the adverse
sentiment Of the public, and to win a
victory over that very law which he
asks to help him.
Now, gentlemen, I am rot indulg-
ing in amy rhetoric; l am not rxcr-
cising my imagination; 1 am speak
ing by the card and upon the proof
for Charles Robinson tcstifiCs that in
company with eleven others engaged
in similar business, he had contributed
to pay the expenses of this proscCu-
tion, and gave his reason for it-and !
took him, from that reason, to be an
lrishman-that inasmuch as the Ia
dies had Classed him with the liquor
venders, he had determined to throw
his lot in with them and make COM
mon cause. So, gentlemen, this litiga-
tiOn, this controversy, is not merely to
make restitution to Wm. S. Linn; it
is to vindicate the respectability and
the good repute OF the business ofsrlI-
ing intoxicating liquor in the State OF
Ohio in cOntravCntiOn OF the COnstitu-
tion Of the State, the law of the Gen
eral Assembly-a traffic so ruinous,
so immoral, so wrctched in all its con
sequences, that in order To brand il as
infamous above all other inrrartions
Of divine and moral law, our runda-
mental constitution has by II special
vote Ofthc people placed, as one Of its
provisions, that the General Assembly
shall never give it the decent respect
of a license-singIcd out in that way
for special rcprobatiOn, marked and
branded and made forever impossible
to b. otherwise than infamous. And
this is the interest, and that is the sen
timent which gathers itself in head
here in this cause, to strike for tri-
umph and victory in an effort tc
achieve respectability not by clevat,
ing itself, for the Constitution forbids
that, but by dragging down these
turning to the ladies' to n level with
itself; aud you, gentlemen, have been
selected to accomplish this thing.
And now, gentlemen,
WHO ARE THE DEFENDANTS
Are they young lads and halrgrown
men, reckless, immoral, dissipatcd
who, having been cultured and bred
in the purlieus of these places of lille.
gal drunkenness, under the tutorugc
of the principles sucked i'm there will
their toddiCs, and their drums, and in
a moment Of drunken frenzy have
turned upon their bar tenders and
spilled their liquors? Are they LOT
Of rowdies and FOUNDERS, knowing nc
law, and caring for no law, either hu,
man or divine, making war upon so,
ciety, careless Of everything but the
display of their own brutality, having
from pure fun and mischief, or want
Onness, gone to work and smashed
everything that could be smashed, in
order to hear the rattle and crash >
Oh 10, gentlemen, they are not eithel
of these, nor are they a mob of trcmb
ling and palsied tOpers that have dunl
and drank by day and by night, til
they have wasted their substance by
dropping, dime at time, into the til