Savannah morning news. [volume] (Savannah) 1868-1887, 1881-09-16
SERGEANT MASONs POSITION
To be Tried Before a Military Court
on n Small Charge.
WASHINGTON Post.

through the latter's cell window at the jail
last Sunday night, will very likely be tried
by court martial, though the detail of the
court has not yet been announced. Under
the rules and regulations of the army he
will be tried for conduct prejudicial to
good order and military discipline" The
court will be convened by Gen Hancock.
The order, it is stated, viii be issued In
a few days, perhaps tomorrow. Ma
sons counsel, Gen. Jonathan g. Bige-
low, is anxious for a civil trial, but
is not likely to get it. A plea
of insanity will be entered for Mason, as it
is clear that he is insane upon the one sub
ject of avenging the assault upon President
Garfield. 1t has transpired that he has
brooded over this matter since the day of
Guiteau's cowardly attack upon the Presi-
dent. Mason was in Texas at that time, and
says that he Immediately resolved to kill
Guiteau II he ever got a chance. He was
ordered to Washington and formed part
of the guard at the jail. AS each day
passed and the President still remained
in q precarious condition Mason's desire
to kill Guiteau became almost un-
controllable, and day and night
he studied how he should carry his
plans into execution. The basis of his de-
sire was, as he states himself, that II Guiteau
were killed and put uHder the sod, where
no ray of light could reach him, the Presi-
dent would live, but If Guiteau lived there
was no hope for the Presidents recovery.
Last Saturday was pay day. Mason drew
his salary and paid off several little debts,
and resolved that Guiteau should die within
the next twenty-four hours. The oppor-
tunity for a shot at the assassin did not
arrive until Sunday night, and when Mason
was informed that he had failed he seemed
generally depressed. He was brighter yester-
day, however, aud conversed freely with
those admitted to see him. and nationally
on all matters except the shooting. He is
still confined in the guard house at the
arsenal. AS heretofore stated, Mason is
native of Virginia. At the age of sixteen
he enlisted in Company D, Seventy-eighth
Ohio Volunteers, under the name of Charles
B. Mason. He received wound In the left
shoulder May Is, 1868, at Raymond, Miss.
After receiving the wound he went into the
Veteran Reserve Corps, and was not mus
tered out until the close of the war. In
1866, In consequence of impecunious cir
cumstances, he enlisted again, and has been
in the service ever since, having served the
last twelve years in the Second Artillery.
AS to the strange freak under which Ma
son was impelled to shoot at Guiteau, there
is no other explanation to offer except his
own. The sympathy,of the public, as far as
Washington is concerned, is with him. On
every side expressions commendatory of his
action may be heard, and so deeply indeed
does the public share In his condition that
subscriptions were started yesterday to de-
fray his legal expenses. In several of the
government departments petitions were
circulated for that purpose, and there was
one paper very numerously signed asking
for his promotion.
General Bigelow, his lawyer. conversing
about Mason last night, said: "He Is a bold,
courageous fellow, and while his attempt
to shoot Guiteau was rash, am sure it won
for him legion of friends. | only wish
they would give us a chance to go to trial
in the local court. Ifeel quite sure | would
secure an acquittal. | am reported" added
the General, with having threatened to get
out a warrant against Mason and bring him
into the court myself. / did make such
remark to the District Attorney, but it was
in joking way"
''Do you believe your client 60 be a sane
man?"
Perfectly SO, except on this particular
subject"
THE LAW IN MAsoN's CASE.
Mason's offense is twofold-against the
army regulations as embodied in the Re
vised Statutes and the criminal law Of the
District of Columbia. The latter otfense is
simply an assault with intent to murder,
and the fact that Sergeant Mason belongs
to the regular army neither alters the charge
or changes the forum.
"No crime for which the common or
statute laws of the country have provided
punishment is cognizable before a court
martial; nor can the military power inter
fere to prevent the punishment of any
soldier guilty of such offenses, or superce-
ded bv any judicial inquiry In a court mar
tial, the ordinary effects of the laws Of the
country" "is the law cited by Attorney-Gen-
eral Gushing in his opinion in Sterner's
case, wherein he held that a man accused
of numbering his superior officer was to be
tried by the civil authorities for murder,
though a court-martial at the same time
sought to try him for mutiny and breach of
the peace, both offenses growing out of the
same killing.
In the case of Mason, his offense against
the military code is conduct prejudicial to
good order and discipline" the specifca-
tion alleging the attempt to kill as such
prejudioial conduct. But these proceed
ings have nothing at all to do with the
offense against the civil law of assault with
intent to murder, and do not interfere with
or prevent a trial before the civil court for
the latter offense. Should a warrant issue
from committing court or a bench war
rant from higher court after indictment,
against Mason, it would be the duty of the
military SuInOrlLleS 10 surrender MIN unQer
article SO, section 1342, chapter 5. of Title
XIV. of the Revised Statutes of the
United States, which provides that "when
any officer or soldier.is accused of a capital
crime, or of any offense against the person
or property of any citizen of any of the
United States, which Is punishable by the
law of the land, the commanding officer,
and the officers of the regiment, troop, bat
terY, company or detachment to which the
person so accused belongs, are required, ex-
cept In time of war, upon application duly
made by or in behalf of the
party injured, to use their utmost endeavors
to deliver him over to the civil magistrate,
and to aid the officers of justice in
apprehending and securing him in order to
bring him to trial. II upon such applica-
tion any officer refuses, or willfully
neglects, except In time Of war, to deliver
over such accused person to the civil magiG-
trates, or to aid the officers of justice In ap-
pretending him, he shall be dismissed from
the service" 1t follows then, that while
the officer holding the accused in charge
ia bound to surrender him to the
civil magistrates, upon pain Of dismissal
from the service, 1t need only be done
"upon due application made" which, in
cases where serious charges are made,
should be accompanied with formal war
rant of arrest, and that soldier In service
may be guilty of two separate and distinct
offenses-one against the military and the
other against the civil law-both, however,
based upon the same criminal act