Grant County herald. [volume] (Lancaster, Wis.) 1850-1968, 1884-03-20
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my honored friend, Judge Clementson.
My friend, Thomas z. Burnett, prac-
ticing lawyer and eminent in this State
He said that one of his neighbours had
a number of maple trees and that he
turned in and tapped those trees and
got considerable quantity of very
sweet saccharine matter. He then Dor
rowed all the pots and kettles in the
neighborhood aud made a kind of a
furnace and filed one of the kettles and
when that got boiled down little he
put its contents into the second and
then into the third and so on until when
be reached the big pot at the end there
was good deal of syrup or saccharine
matter. Some one had COW strolling
about in the neighborhood, that liked
sugar water. She got at the big pot
full of dense saccharine matter and
swallowed portion of it and liked it
pretty well, so well that she con-
cluded to try another portion and
kept on until she had swallowed the
entire contents of the big pot. Bye
and-bye the COW died and the owner
came to Mr.. Burnett and asked if he
could fiot recover. Burnett did not see
how it could be done; he thought the
COW died of excessive molasses. There
is no dispute about this. If there is no
other error in this case, Mrs. McLimans
has swallowed TO much molassess.
Leave the whole matter to the Supreme
Court and let them decide Just as the
jury would but the Supreme Court has
clearly animated what their opinion
hr I I'd 4
once that it was of no use to lie unless
the people believe it; but he might have
said of that Green County jury that it
was of no use to tell the truth. | wish
to bring two or three matters to your
consideration. So far as this verdict is
concerned we have placed that under
the administrations of the law, so that
as you see such a verdict can be OBJ
tanned. | am somewhat to blame, be-
cause have been in the legislature. A
change of venue was taken on the
ground of prejudice. | do not blame
Bushnell or Carter. 1t was taken to q
county where woman who appears to
be disabled or appears to have one limb
entirely dead and has to drag portion
of dead woman along with living
one; that was the view the jury took of
her condition; was enabled by her testi-
mony and her apparent condition there
amongst those strangers, to set aside
the testimony of such ladies as Mrs.
John G. Clark and Mrs. Beetham,
who swear to seeing her walk with a
crutch before the accident. Another
witness to whom she went to purchase
property for her father who lived in the
state of Iowa and had no concern or in
terest in the verdict, said that she told
him in the State of Iowa, when asked
how are you going to get the money to
pay for it, why | brought suit against
the city of Lancaster and got verdict
for $1,000. The town has already of
fered me $1,000 and / expect when get
that verdict / can pay YOU and that,
Mrs. McLymans swears, is a positive
falsehood. am reminded of the action
of British general in the Sepoy war
He would fasten thirty or forty Sepoy's
together and place them in front of a
cannon SO as to whirl the whole lot into
eternity at a shot. 1t seemed as if the
destruction of witnesses at Court in
Green county was something like the
destruction of Sepoys by that British
general. You can see, to some extent;
the condition of our laws-to some ex-
tent the law was remedied by the last
legislature, in this way: In any Grim
inal matter where prejudice of the Judge
is sworn to, which would take it out of
the circuit, if the Judge believes the oath
is false he can call some other Judge in
the next circuit to take his place. You
ole
that is incurred by this change of venue
All the expenses are taxed against the
county from which this suit comes.
Mrs. McLymans had to say, herself.
that she knew nothing about Judge
Cothfen; that it was the second time
she ever appeared in court, or saw a
Judge on the bench. How, then, could
she swear prejudice against him? l
could not see how. The judge stopped
me there and said | had no right to ask
such questions. There is another thing
for which am somewhat responsible.
There was a law passed in 1880 which
gave the relatives of u person killed
through the negligence of q corpora
ton, the right to recover for the loss of
that relative, but that law limited the
amount that could be recovered to
$4,000; but in injuries of the sort that
person meets when travelling upon
road there is no limitation. 1t lies en-
tirely in the breast of the jury. 1t is in
the hands of the jury and the only
remedy is in the Supreme Court. but
there should be a remedy in the law
There are some towns in this State
where there is not $4,000 of taxable
property in the town, and six or eight
thousand dollar verdict would be simply
ruin. The amount that could be re-
covered ought to be limited by the
amount of taxable property in town,
and should not be more than one per
cent. of the taxable property. In this
case, it is nearly two per cent. and it
should be about one-half of one per
cent, that should be the extreme limit.
In some towns such verdict would OPP
press the people to such an extent as
to affect the price of real estate. You
see we can only have legislation once in
two years, and you must be particular
what kind of men you send up. q shall
never go there myself, we are OBJ
liged to rest under these laws two years,
SO send nobody but the ablest men. You
must so remedy your laws that such
verdict need not fall upon poor towns.
Any reasonable man can see the neces-
sitv of such a limitation. | have no
doubt that after the next legislature
views this case no such verdict can oc-
cur in this State again with reference
to our success in the Supreme Court,
may be mistaken, but | would risk
good deal that there will be no prejudice
in reference to the rights of the city of
Lancaster. There will be on the cold
paper the evidence of these witnesses.
The editor of The Teller actually swore
to falsehood, Mrs. McLimans says,
but do not blame her so much for that
Pollock might lie once in a while, | do
not blame her for that, | blame her for
making a discrimination in his favor,
for he edits newspaper and can defend
himself, but some of us have no news
papers. She also stated that George
| Goldsmith swore to a lie, she did not
slight either paper, she said that he did
not testify to the truth. She said that
Mr.. Goldsmith talked about lending her
a few dollars, and when asked where
she would get the money to repay it,
she patted her erutch and said, ''get it
out of this Our soldiers had to have
wooden legs, but Mrs. McLimans has
got leg of silver and gold. Bushnell
is man having high talents but it is
my opinion that he will fail. | am a
taxpayer as well as the rest of you,
Just say to those gentlemen we will
meet you again, If you will.