The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1884-04-08
HTHE CRIMINAL LAWYER

"Great criminal lawyers are powerless to
infiict injury if the laws and the courts and
juries are modelled in justice. Chicago Inter
Ocean.
In view of the notorious fact that Infamous
injustice is often done in the unwarranted re-
lease of murderers and assassins, must we
conclude that our laws, courts and juries are
not modelled in justice? This is a paradox
that defeats itself. Our laws, courts and
juries are modelled in justice, but being the
work of fallible humanity, they are not and
never can be perfect. The English language
is so capable of double construction, and so
incapable of judicial accuracy, that it affords
'the great criminal lawyer" ample oppor-
turity to clothe his sophistry with
false logic to the utter bewilder-
ment of honest but supplemented
iurymen, and he is enabled, as Mr.. Tom
Campbell boosted, to make them believe
what he himself knows to be false and de-
structive to justice. TIL average citizen who
is called in to sit in judgment upon the case
Of any accused man is presumably honest and
DESTROYS of doing his duty according to law
and Justice. But what chance does he
stand in the hands of the men noted as crimi-
nal ~lawyers2 To his unschooled judgment
the sOphistry of the pleading is the straightest
talker to persuade one or more of the jury to
believe wrong to be right, and to secure a
chung" jury if not absolute acquittal.
THE great criminal lawyer cares not what
the law is. His ambition is to clear his client
in spite of law and justice. Right i'll face of
the verdict in the Berner case at Cincinnati,
Tom Campbell publicly boosted that he could
have secured his acquittal had he so desired,
and that he (Berner) was the first murderer
that he had not turned loose on society.
Campbell further boosted that he had pursued
methods wholly at variance with law and JUS
tiee, and that upon these methods he
always confidently counted on acquit-
tai, no matter what the evidence
might be, and despite the s~trictest enactment.
A 'great criminal lawyer" or any other citi-
Washington, but that does not say that that
structure is not built in accordance with the
best rules of architecture. The justice of
law is directed as much against the attorneys
for murderers as against the murderers them
selves. The attorney stands for the muir
derer-that is all. Shall he, then,
be allowed to make a false pleading
through his attorney? Shall he be
permitted, by false logic and specious
argument, to secure an undeserved acquittal2
Is the court to sit and see law and justice out
ragged simply because the accused is entitled
to a full and fair defense2 How much above
the law, above justice and out of the reach Of
the people is this great criminal lawyer that
the people cannot reach him, nor question the
methods he has been impudent enough to
adopt to secure the a~cquittal of those nOtori-
ously guilty. The Journal is still of opinion
that he must go; that our courts
musU reach ouC anu HG HIS 1eSdl
scalp if necessary. No man or men should be
licensed to make a mockery of law and JUS
tice, and if any attempt it, they should be
held for contempt of court, and a repetition
should work perpetual disbarment. The good
of the whole people is above that of any per-
son, and the good of the people demands that
the pestiferous, professional, law-defying
criminal lawyer should go. He has done too
much to encourage crime to be longer toler-
ated.