The St. Johns herald., 1889-11-07
An OverShadOwing Evil.

Uy Iil0 uIdlIIlSI III WHlCH IhO oOiS'' of justice has been attempted in the Cronin murder case, ably discourses at length upon some of the dangers that beset it's administration under the loose American system of the equel right of all persons to aspire to pnblic position, and its remarks possess a general rather than a special bearing It says:
 "To none," swore King John be- fore the barons of England at Run nymede, 'well we sell, to none will we deny or delay right of justice. '"
 And that this oath might have better chance of accomplishment the swore also: I've will not make any justices, constables, sheriffs, or bai- liffs, except of such men as know the law of the realm and mean duly to observe it"
 The United States has embodied the spirit of the first quoted clause of King John's oath in the fourth and sixth amendments to it's Con- stitution, and many States have in- corporated it's very form of words in their bills of rights; in every State has it's meaning been made to pervade one or more passages of the organic law.
 The second quoted clause either has been omitted from our State constitutions or has fallen into sad desuetude. We have made jus tice, constables, or bailiffs" in obed- lence to the demand of leagues, clans, orders, associations, and cab als which not only do not "mean duly to observe the law" but which were formed specially to defy and violate the law.
 Constables. bailiffs, sheriffs often have been found working together with criminals to "deny or delay right or justice" it's due operation, and. though happily but seldom, justices have soiled the bench by bribes or contempt of law. Not to m ake any protracted excursion through the history of legal mal- feasance, the Flack scandal in New York, with it's infamous Sheriff, its vile referee. its venal or grossly neg ligent judge, and the Cronin scan- dalwith its obstructive police shield ing a detective against whom true bill has been found as party to the dreadful murder, it's bailiffs in sympathy with the murderers, its other bailiffs acting as corrupters of the jury, it's legions of men in places of major or minor office, and appointed thereto by influence of those who are chiefs of an or ganization whose object is to make the law of the organization domin- ant over "the law of the realm" may be cited as proofs of the ugly facts of an unworthy departure from the terms of King Johns oath and of American liberty.
 When the Administration of law is polluted the source of civil lite is polluted. And the scoundrels in brOad-cloth and political power who have first plotted murder and next plotted miscarriage of justice from their guilty tools are the fel- lows whose arrest and conviction most supremely is to be desired. Pending this, and aiding toward it, should be the instant removal from the police force, from the corps of bailiffs, and from any and every place of great or small public trust of all men who owe allegiance to any order or league whose com mands are held by them to be more imperious than the commands of the written law Except such as know the law of the realm and mean duly to obey it," there should be neither Justices. constable, sher- ifs, nor bailiffS," or officers of any kind or degree. It is absolutely