The Birmingham age-herald., 1911-02-26
PLACE CURB ON
 BERLIN POLICE Many of Them Are Accused
 of ExcesSes A INDUSTRIOUS WRONG Is Partly Righted-Paul Singer Was Prosperous Business Man.
 Curious Statements Re- 8
 garding a Letter

Berlin. February 25.-(Special) )-A
 curb is to be placed on the city police who are accused of having initiated the police of New York city recently constituting themselves captors, judges and executioners.
 | At its last meeting the city council | unanimously passed resolution calling on the government to adopt suitable measures to prevent the excesses of
 the police in any action it may be nec- essary for them to take to restore pub lie order, and especially injury to the
 persons and property of innocent peo- pie"
 This shows what Berlin thinks of the
 outcome of the Moabit labor strike trials.
 | What has long been considered even
 by government officials as monstrous | Judicial wrong has in a measure been
 undone, though It's baneful oonse- quences can never be made good in this
 world. as two of the victims are dead.
 Flfteen years ago six miners were lsentenced at Essen to penal servitude
 for perjury. One of the accused, a
 man named Schroede, had only short | time previously been received as a
 member of the miners deputation by
 the Emperor He had, however, joined a socialistic trade union, and became its president. In this capacity he at I tended meeting which was being held I In connection with the formation of a | Christian organization among the miners of the district He was, how ever. told that the gathering was. not public, and ordered to leave. As he was demanding his penny back from
 the man at the door he was seized by a policeman named Munter and flung. to the ground.
 What appears to have been truth full account of the incident was pub lished in the socialist paper, and Mum ter prosecuted the editor for libel. What he said had happened was that he had accident tally brushed against Schroeder and so caused him to fall 3s He called number of witnesses who however, could say no more than that they had not seen Munter fling him down. On the other side were Schroeder and many witnesses. who concurred exactly in their evidence. Schroeder and his comrades were put
 on trial for perjury, the charge. being trumped up, convicted and sentenced to terms of two sandsa half. three, and three and a halftyears penal servitude. The editor was sconvict ed also
 The. six men who had protested their innocence served out their severe pun ishmefts ands ref used to sign an appeal for the remission of the whole or any part of it. As soon as released they set to work to secure the reopening of the case. All these years they have been accommodating evidence to dis credit the testimony of Munter and at Hast they established so overpowering a case that the higher courts ordered --. ,4>r who like two of his victims, is now dead was disreputable character. whose word was. not to be trusted and so what was the whole foundation on
 which the conviction had been based collapsed. .Aaf.f
 When the time came for the crown
 counsel to address the jury at the rehear- ing he astonished the court by announc- ing that he did not attach the slightest importance to Hunters evidence and asking for an acdllittal The jury did not
 waste much time in acquiescing in his de- mand. -t@Hal
 These deeply wronged men, will have to be satisfied with their moral. There is TO legal machinery for furnishing them with pecuniary compensation. the in justices done to them and their families and their loss of wages for years. The late Paul Singer. the socialist leader in parliament. was a prosperous business
 man when he, was elected to the munich
 ral council .27 years ago. Later he was elected to parliament. In 1886 he was ex- peled from Berlin under the law against socialism. He gave up business alto gether and devoted himself to politics. r | Although the Berlin order of expulsion was repeated at -Frankford and at Or enbach, Singer remained member of the | reichstag, of which as president in an- nouncing his death remarked he was one | of the oldest members. He returned when the law against socialism was dropped, l and for 20 years he had controlled the destinies of the socialist party and was l responsible in high degree for it's ex- | traordinary expansion. He was an ex- | treme radical, and yet a typical bour- | geoise, fearless in strong measures and | yet a cautious leader who achieved not the least of his successes by discipline which made him an unrivalled authority | on parliamentary procedure. Abuse. based | largely on the fact that he remained "a
 man of property" did him little harm. whether he believed in the early Utopian