Omaha daily bee., 1899-08-06
OF PROOF IS SHIFTED
Prosecution Must Undertake the Task Of
Showing Dreyfus' Guilt.
ONLY ONE COUNT R.MAlNS IN THE CHARGE
single Question before the Court
Martial Is whether Certain Docu-
mcnts Were Communicated to
u Foreign Power.

NEW YORK, Aug. 5.-The Paris corre-
spondent of the Tribune, discussing the
questions on which the coming Dreyfus
court-martia will hinge, says: one of the
consequences of the judgment delivered by
the court of cessation on June 3 has been
to shift the burden of proof from the pris-
oner to the prosecution. At the court
martial Of 1894 1t vas incumbent upon Cap
tain Dreyfus to prove that he was innocent
of the charges brought against him. This
vas in accordance with French law, which
places the burden of proof upon the accused.
But at the Rennes court-martial Captain
Dreyfus will appear as an officer who has
been illegally condemned and will not be
Obliged to prove his innocence. 1t will be
for the prosecution to prove he is guilty. The
issue relegated by the court OF cessation to
the Rennes court martial for trial is mar
rowed down to the single question, whether
or not Captain Dreyfus communicated to a
foreign power the precise documents emu
merated In the bordereau. There Is nothing
in the bordereau to show that Captain Drey-
fus had been following reasonable practices
or to connect him in any manner with 1t,
beyond an alleged similarity between the
handwriting of Dreyfus and that of the au-
tor of the bordereau. The court Of cessation
has decided that the bordereau was written by
Esterhazy and not by Dreyfus.
The court of cessation has already passed
judgment upon all the other evidence ad-
duced against Dreyfus in 1894, including the
confession Of guilt falsely alleged to have
been made by Dreyfus in January, 1895, to
Captain Lebrun- Renaud and to Sergeant De-
pert, as well as the famous secret dossier,
with its forgeries and criminally manipu.
lated documents. All that is legally LETT
standing after the elimination by the court
of cessation of the Irregularities that visited
the conviction of 1894 is the bordereau, which
the court of cessation on June 3 declared was
not written by Dreyfus. The functions of
the Rennes court-martial are now limited
to hearing evidence and deciding upon the
subject of the alleged communication by Cap
tain Dreyfus to a foreign power of the docu-
ments enumerated in the bordereau, now
| known to have been written by Esterhazy,
as he himself has confessed. Dreyfus was
| unacuuainted with Esterhazy when the Dor
| dereau was written and it may be safe to
| predict that it will be practically impossible
| for the prosecution to prove at the forth
coming trial at Rennes that Captain Drey-
fus handed over to a foreign power the doc
uments in question.
General de Gallifet, minister OF war, has
issued instructions to Major Carriere, gov
eminent commissary at the Rennes court
| martial, to insure that the court martial
| shall not invalidate it's own future decisions
by deciding upon matters not involved in
the immediate issue. These instructions
simply pin the c~ourt-martia down to the
| bordereau and at the same time leave the
| prosecution the utmost freedom as to the
methods 1t may see fit to use in order to
prove its case.