Rock Island daily Argus., 1893-06-27

prominent citizens of Chicago, which as
cunning the prisoners to be guilty stated
the belief that the prisoners have been
punished enough, but a number of them
ly base the appeal on entirely different
grounds and assert
/. That the jury which tried the case
was packed jury, selected to convict.
:. That according TO the law as laid
down by the supreme court both prior to
and again since the trlai of this case, the
jurors, according to their own answers,
were not competent jurors, and the trial
was therefore not legal trial.
3. That the defendants were not proven
to be cIilty Of the crime charged in the in
dictment.
/. That az TO the defendant Neebe, the
states attorney had declared at the close
of the evidence that there was no case
against him, and yet lie had been kept in
prison all these years.
5. That the trial judge was either so
prejudiced against the defendants, or else
SO determined to win the applause of
certain class in the community that ne
could not and did not grant fair trial.
The governors statement confirms the
five specified points in the appeal referred
to, and says that the facts tend to show
that the bomb was thrown an act of
personal revenge, and that the prosecution
never discovered who threw it. Speaking
of Judge Gary, he says: 1T is further
charged with much bitterness by those
who speak for the prisoners that the record
of the case shows that the judge conducted
the trial with malicious ferocity, and
forced eight men to be tried together; that
in cross-eXamining the states witnesses
he confined counsel for the defense
to the specific points touched on by
the state, while in the cross-eXamination
of the defendants witnesses he permitted
the states attorney to go into all manner
of subjects entirely foreign to the matters
on which they We're examined in chief; also
that every ruling throughout the long trial
on any contested point was in favor of the
state.
Further, that page after page of the re-
cord contains insinuating remarks of the
judge. made IN the hearing of the jury and
with the evident intent of bringing the
jury to his way of thinking; that these
speeches coming from the court, were
much more damaging than any speeches
from the states attorney could possibly
have been: that the states attorney often
took his Gu" from the judges remarks.
That the judges magazine article recent
ly published. although written nearly Six
years after the trial. is yet full of venom;
that, pretedting to simply review the case. he
had to drag iEto his articlea letter written
by an excited woman to newspaper
fore had nothing whatever to do with tie
case and was put into the article simply
to Great a prejudice against the woman, as
well against the dead and the living.
Not content with this, it IS further
charged that he in the same article makes
nsinuatiug attack on one of the law
yers for the defense, not for anything
done at the trial, but because more than
year after the trial, when some of the de-
PENDANTS had been hung, he ventured to
express a few kind-if erroneous-senti-
ments over the graves of his dead clients.
whom he at least believed to be innocent.
1t is urged that such ferocity or subservi-
ency is without a parallel in all history;
that even Je4-ries in England contented
himself with hanging his victims, and did
not stoop to berate them after they were
dead.
These charges are of a personal char
acter and while they seem to be sustained
by the record of the trial and the papers
before me and tend to show that the trial
was not fair, l don't care to discuss this
feature of the case any further, because it
is not necessary. I am convinced that it is
my duty to act in this case for the reasons
already given, and, therefore. Srant an alb
solute pardon to Samuel Filden, Oscar
Neebe and Michael Schwab, this Goth day
of June, 1898 -