The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1896-06-21

pose. 1t is the guardian Of the fire
side; it springs from the instinct of
self-preservation. It exists in the
breast of the humblest creatures of the
earth. 1t is embedded in the human
heart. I have read to you the divine
law, but not only was that the law of
the Bible, but it was the law of Scion,
the wise man, for he wrote that if the
husband caught the adulterer in the
act and killed him on the spot, the kill
ing was justifia BILE if the adulterer WAS
found in the husbands hpmse. thus
looking upon the trespaSS to the house
to the home of the husband, as mag
nlfy1ng the offense. No man has the
right to cross your threshold without
your permission. 1t is the old common
law, that Every mans home is his
CASTLE and it. has been said, that the
king in all his power cannot enter
there, even though it be so humble
that the rain drips through the tha:tch-
ed roof and the snow beats through
the crevices and falls upon the in
mates. No man has the right, then,
W1shout your permission, to cross your
threshold. And that was recognized by
the civil law of the Romans. 1t was
likewise the law OF the ancient Goths,
that the killing of the aduiterer was
Justffable. But in ENGLAND, at the
present day and in most of the states
of the Union, while the law that is
written u2on the heart of every hui
man man, every man who is worthy of
being called man, worthy to have the
care and custody of a woman, justifies
the slayer of an adulterer, it is said by
the common law, to be manslaughter:
though Blackstone, the great law writ
er, says that it is the lowest kind of
manslaughter, and therefore, the court
always directed that the burning in
the hand should be done as lightly as
possible.
THE CASE OF JOHN MANNING.
In an early day it was the law that
homicide committed as it was in this
case, was unsuitable. For $50 years il
remained the law in England 1t was
the law until what is known as the
Manning case, Which will be found re-
ported in a book 200 years old, printed
in 1896 (ThOmas Raymond's Reports).
| Until the time of joan Manning, and
! for $50 years prior thereto. it was the
| law Of England that the killing of
man. under circumstances such as are
! developed in this case, was justifiable
John Manning lived in the time of
King Charles. 1t wus an age of adul-
terry. It was an age of gross corrup-
ton. The king filed his royal palaces
with harlots; he surrounded himself
with lechers and adulterers, and he
/ conferred titles upon harlotS and lech-
ers, One night John Manning, an hum
! bic citizen, going to his Hume, which
was dear to him. found there a man
| with his wife, and they were in the
! very act Of adultery. So enraged was
Manning with this discovery, that he
/ grabbed stool from OF the floor and
! hurried it with that unerring aim with
which God always directs a
blow struck at the adulterer
The man was killed 1t happened that
! he was one of the courtiers of King
/ Charles. The case came before a judge
who had been appointed by the king
and who was under great obligations
/ to him, and the king demanded that
some punishment be nated out So,
for the first time in $50 years, the
] judge took the case from the jury and
fixed the grade of the offense and held
| it TO BE- "a felony. And that was the
court, that was the judge, that sent
! jurors to jail for refusing to find YER
diets contrary to their consciencesi 1t
was the-sarnfss cauSt (which hunted and
| bounded Quakers, Catholics and Non
Conformists to death. 1t was the same
court which prosecuted John Howe and
Richard Baxter, and which sent John
Bunyan, the author of pilgrim s Pro-
! greSs,' to the pillory and the Jail be-
poor. This case was reported and it
I is often referred to as the law of Eng
land; and from that polluted bench
! Sprang the law that a killing under
circumstances such as have developed
here, is manslaughter 1t has become
! the law of England and is the law of
the states of this Union, except where
it has been changed by statute. But,
! while it is so written in the books,
while it is so considered by the judges,
sitting coolly and calmly upon the
! bench and reviewing the facts there
after and deciding as to how a man
should have conducted himself, with
out placing themselves in the position
Of the man who was under great stress
of circumstances, 1 say, notwithstand-
ing that, it has never been the law
in the hearts of the people. AS was
said in the case of Biggs against the
State, by that learned judge, Where is
the jury, the American jury, that ever
convicted a man of murder or man
slaughter for Staying the one who had
destroyed his home?
THE CELEBRATED SICKLES CASE.
The Sickles case, to which counsel
called my attention, was a noted case.
Sickles was a public man. He was a
general in the Union army during the
war. In 1859 he was a member of
congress. He was residing diagonally
across from the old Arlington hotel in
Washington and opposite the little
park in which Guiteau sat so many
days when he was plotting and plan
ming against the life OF Garfield. The
Sickles house has since become his
toric. In it resided Seward when he
was attacked by assassins the same
evening that Abraham Lincoln was
killed. 1t is the house in which Blaine
lived and it is pointed out in Wash
ing'ton today as one Of the landmarks
and as a building within whose walls
there originated much that has been
woven into the history of the land
Sickles had a. beautiful and accom-
plished wife. The district attorney of
the District of Columbia was one Bar
ton Key, a son of the author of-the
Star Spangled Banner Mrs. Sickles
and Key became intimate. They had
a meeting place at the house of a
colored woman, a distance away from
the Sickles home, and where, as a, sig
nal string was hung from one of the
windows when one or the other was
there; and it was usual for Key, when
he desired to make an appointment
to pass opposite the residence of Mrs
Sickles and faunt his handkerchief in
the air. Mrs Sickles, overborne by
the pangs of conscience, on a Saturday
evening confessed her sin to her hus-
band. He was naturally greatly dis
tressed, and the following Sunday
morning he called about him his
friends, men in whom ne had conf.
denca, and he sat in his library, ar
upper room, considering with them as
to what he ought to do AS he sal
there he happened to look out of the
window, and across the street, comins
UP the sidewalk, was Philip Barton
Key, who, as he passed along, gave
the adiIlterers' signal To the urifa IL