New-York tribune., 1870-08-13
THE NATH1N INQUEST.


thOrOughness certainly leaves no ground for
complaint, the Nathan inquest has adjourned
without day, and the mystery is still as great
as ever. Our best, if not our only, hope now
is that accident may disclose the secret which
has thus far baffled the ingenuity of cOroners
and detectives, and withstoOd the temptation
of the most enormous rewards. The inquest
has shown cOnclusivey that the son of the
murdered man, against whom at one time s'ls-
pcion was wiCkedly and groundlessly excited,
is perfectly innocent as all decent men felt
assured he was from the first. Beyond that II
has developed nothing whatever. The failure
of the rewards may be taken as strong pre-
sumptive evidence that the murderer had no
accomplices, either before OF after the fact,
and so far confirms the opinion we have ex-
pressed from the first, that the crime was the
work of some common thief who crept into
the house for the purpose of robbery, and
when surprised at the safe was driven to
brutal murder Various objections to this
theory have been urged from time to time In
the city papers, but all of them have been
disspated by the cOrOner's inquest, and the
conviction that a sneak thief committed the
crime is now, we believe, pretty general.
While we commend Coroner Rollins, how
ever, for the zeal and common sense with
which he has pursued the inquiry, we must
most earnestly protest against a grave abuse
which has been committed under his sanction,
and which, if persisted in, would change our
whole system of criminal procedure. In the ex-
animation of Washington Nathan, William Kelly,
and Mrs. Kelly, the proceedings seem to have
1oo faH fha harb French
pie of Jurisprudence, namely, that every one is
to be considered guilty until he has proved HIM
self innocent. There was always the strongest
presumption that young Mr.. Nathan was lnno-
cent; nevertheless, he was subjected to cruel
inquiry into his private life, his domestic
relations, his business affairs, and all those
thousand personal matters which no man likes
to parade before the world Mrs. Kelly was
compelled to publish her autobiography, in all
its unattractive details, and William Kelly was
subjected to O crOss-examinatlon IN when
there was evidently desire to trap him into
ACCOMMODATIONS. We need hardly say
that it was not the duty OF
coroner's jury to do anything like this
In the French administration of justice,
the prisoner or the suspected person Is
examined by the Bench with a severity which
amounts almost to conflict of wits. 1t is ap-
.parently assumed that anybody upon whom
the police may have fastened an eye is a bad
character, whose infamy it is the duty OF the
Court to draw out, and skillful lawyers are not
ashamed to put such unlucky persons to
species of moral torment under which, as under
the rack and thumb-screw, innocence is apt to
break down and become confused, while stoical
wickedness retains its self-pOssession. There
is no justification in our law for such an ex-
animation as that of Washington Nathan, and
no palliation of the scandalOus attempt to con-
fuse William Kelly. Both, fortunately for
them, bore the tortures with frmness; but II
they had broken down it would have been no
wonder, and no proof of guilt. 1t is cardinal
principle of our system of criminal practice
that while the dead have wrongs to be avenged,
the living, too, have rights to be respected.
This principle has been entirely overlooked IN
the present case, and in the fierce search after
the unknown criminal private character has
been scandalously assailed, and the sacredness
of fial sorrow wantonly invaded. system
which permits such wrongs is a reproach to
Christianity.