Lancaster daily intelligencer. [volume] (Lancaster, Pa.) 1864-1928, 1880-04-09

by the district attorney. When the suit
was tried, evidence was produced
sustaining the fact that the Origi-
nal case had been disposed of by
mere political influence. A second indict-
ment was found against Snyder, but upon
trial, Judge Patterson ruled that there was
no case on account of the previous acquit-
tai. The lawyer-editors, Messrs. Hensel
and Steinman, criticised the whole pro-
ceeding with becoming severity in their
newspaper, and Judge Patterson, in an
opinion Of great length and Of strength in
inverse proportion to its length, declares
that the editors are bound by tho obliga-
tions of the lawyers, as officers of the
court, and are guilty of misbchavior in Of
ticc, for which he strikes them from the
roll of the Lancaster county bar. Judge
Patterson talks great deal of tho law, in
his voluminous opinion, but he cannot
talk away the plain meaning Of the we'll
known act Of 1886, declaring that
"Nopublication out of court, respecting
tho conduct of the judges, officers Of the
! court, jurors, witnesses, parties or any Of
| them, of, in and concerning any cause de-
pending in such court, shall DO construed
| into a contempt of the said court so as to
render the author printer, publisher, or
| either Of them, liable to attachment and
summary punishment for the same.'
No man of ordinary common sense will
doubt the purpose Of the law or deny that
! it is in exact accord with that liberty of
public criticism that it secured by the con-
| stitution of the state. Even the Lancas-
ter judge was forced to admit that there
! had been no contempt of court" COM
mitted but he seem to have been unable to
see that in that admission he debarred
himself from the intliction of that "sum-
mary punishment which is only entrusted
to him in cases Of such contempt.
! But the legal technicalities Of this high
| handed procedure will all be settled by tho
! supreme court and need not be discussed
! by the newspapers. The general principle
| involved lies at the root Of the freedom Of
the press and the purity of the administra-
! tion of justice in Pennsylvania. Judge
Patterson's court lay under the gravest OF
all possible imputations. A respectable
newspaper, edited by two lawyers familiar
| with all the facts of the case, had distinctly
charged that an acquittal of an active pol
| itician had been secured "by pros
titution of tho machinery Of Justice
| to serve the exigencies of the Re-
publican party" Judge Patterson an
| swers the grave charge, not by disprov-
| ing it, but by summary and what must
| and will be held to be vindictive punish
| mert of the editors of the paper, who
| happen to be lawyers. He has not vindi-
| Gated his court from the charge by this ar
| bitrary act. He has not protected it from
! the criticism about which he is so sensi-
! tive. lie has not done public justice any
| service. He has followed two of the Off
GERS of his court into a sphere where he
| had no right to know them at all in any
| official relation, and he has inflicted pun
ishment upon them that is ordinarily re-
garded as infamous, but which carries no
such stigma with it in this case. Judge
| Patterson has ruled, in effect, that no
lawyer in Pennsylvania shall edit
newspaper except in the interest of
the court. He interpolates into the
act of 1886 clause of his own
that excepts lawyers from tho benefit of
that act And in his ill-judged attempt to
crush out criticism upon his court by
single local newspaper he has brought his
court into the exact focus of observation
and criticism of tho whole state. The
judge who shrinks from criticism is always
the judge to be watched and criticized.
| The man who keeps his own erHine clean
and suffers no pollution Of any corner of
the temple in which he ministers has
| rarely any fear of public discussion of his
! acts. The arbitrary behavior of Judge
! Patterson throws the whole weight of
| proof upon his court, and he will find
himself forced to show that there has
! been no tampering with justice and no ad-
mission of political favoritism within it's
jurisdiction.
Now that Judge Patterson has stricken
these two lawyers from his roll, and has
remanded them to the undivided function
of journalism, what will be the immediate
effect upon thom as editors? He has
silenced them as lawyers; but if he has
not silenced them as editors, what then
Suppose Messrs. Steinman and Hensel
should again say that the acquittal of Sny-
der "was secured by prostitution
of the machinery of justice, "
what will Judge Patterson do about
it? Is there any process of law by
Undoubtedly there is. And if they have
falsely charged corruption upon the court
they can be punished for it. But if this is |
so, the perplexing question for Judge Pat |
terson will be why he did not proceed |
against them in due course of law in the !
first place. The only apparent answer is
that he could punish them as lawyers |
without law, while he cannot punish them |
as editors until he has proved that there |
was no ground for the serious charge
which they have made. And it is a pretty |
good answer-so far as it goes.
Only One Opinion.
Philadelphia Press, Rep.
Without exception the press of the state
unite in condemning the recent action of |
Judge Patterson of Lancaster county in
disbarring Messrs. Hensel and Steinman
for an Offeuse which he admits was not
contempt in them as attorneys, and for
which, if it were libelous on their part as
journalists he should have sought redress
through the courts instead of revens-
ing himself as he did. The entire news
paper press of the state sustain the
plucky editors of the INTELL1GENCER, and
demand that the real question at issue.
which is the right of public journal to
criticise a judicial proceeding, be decided
by the court of last resort. The press of
Pennsylvania had congratulated itself that
it was enancipated by the new constitu-
ton, and the rulings of the courts and YER
diets of the juries in the cases which have
arisen since the adoption of that instru-
ment, but if Judge Patterson's decision is
to stand it will be bound hand and foot
TIGHTER than II ever WAS bafore