The Washington herald., 1914-01-15
Statesmen, Real and Near.
BY FRED G. KELLY.

Statesmen, Real and Near.
By FRED C. KELLY.
The first time Associate Justice Joseph
Hucker Lamar ever appeared In court
was as attorney for bright young Chi
nese murderer.
Everybody knew the Chinafnan was
guilty and had no chance of escape.
And that was why the court appointed
Lamar to defend him. Lamar had never
considered q great joke. even In those
crude days, for q judge to place a prom
ising young attorney In the midst Of a
losing cause. You see, IL a young lawyer
were appointed dozen times or 30 to
defend men certain to- be found guilty.
the lawyer could gradually work up a
reputation for getting his clients con-
victed. Then the young lawyers friends
would twit him about the inevitable out
repartee this would stir up there would
be great increase In the gayety of the
community.
Well, anyhow, young Lamar was to de-
fend this Chinaman, and the Chinaman
was guilty; one of the defendants own
countrymen had seen him fire the fatal
shot and was prepared to swear his life
away.
Now. Lamar cared almost nothing at
all about his client. personally. but 1t
occurred to him that II would be rather
amusing IL he could devise some way to
get him OF after, ALL So he set to work
on the case and gave considerable effort
TO searching for some technically by
which he could upset the weli-laid plans
OF blindfolded justice. He tried to find
misplaced comma In the Indictment or
grammatical error In some Of the Latin
words in the legal phraseology by which
he could show conclusively, the way law
yers will. that his client was being done
serious wrong.
But all this search was In vain. and
Lamar entered the trial OF the case with
out knowing how he was to save his
man from an unpleasant fate.
The trial proceeded and the Chinaman
who was the prosecuting witness swore
away the life OF the other Chinaman.
Then at last Lamar grasped an idea
and dragged 1t out or nowhere into there.
He had been in Chinese laundries many
times and knew a number OF the strange
customs the Chinese are addicted to. For
example. he knew that, for some reason,
laundrymen usually work in threes, ara
that they take a nap every afternoon
at O'Clock. Another odd fact he had
picked up was that the cnlnese metnod
of taking oath is entirely unlike the
average form OF oath. Whereas almost
any one else swears by placing one hand
on the Bible any saying, II DO soIemniy
swear" &C, a Chinaman swears by
killing a chicken and smearing part OF
its blood on 4 plate and then breaking
the plate-or some such scheme as that
Lamar said nothing about this until
the trIaI was nearly over and then ne
pointed out that II the jury paid any
heed TO the testimony of the Chinese wit
ness 1t would be sending a man TO his
doom on unsworn testimony which IS
little better than mere idle chatter. Be-
cause, ne said. the Cninaman mad taken
oath on a Bible and the Chinese do not
believe in the Bible. Hence he might as
well have been sworn on a copy OF
Aesop's fables. Lamar then explained
how Chinese oath must be taken. and
the court looked about for a chicken ana
a plate. But there was no chicken or
plate to be had, and the court ruled that
they would have to get along the best
they could with the white folks form OF
oath.
That made II all the easier for Lamar.
He tOIQ the jury NHdI "oulu hdppth "
them in the hereafter If they were parties
TO convicting a man on evidence not
sworn to with a dead chicken and broken
plate.
And so they let the prisoner go free.
4 stranger dropped into the office of
Representative Hensley. of Missouri. the
other morning and inquired il Hensley
knew him. The Representative. without
even handing him the old one about his
face being familiar, said frankly that he
did not remember him
You met me several years ago. the
stranger told him, .when you were
prosecutor out our way. You came out
to our house one day and took my dying
statement"
Though not a vain man, Champ Clark
has never had a photograph OF himself
that suited him. 1t isn't that he thinks
he is SO well favored: he simply doesn'
think any picture he ever had taken
/ looks quite like his face as II appears in
real life. He has one picture of himself
| that is his favorite. but he likes 1t only
/ because il seems less Objectionable than
| the others As a matter of fact this Is
| simply a whim on the part OF the
Speaker. Almost any picture one ever
sees OF him looks precisely like him.
| Copyright. leli ly Fred c. Kelly. All rights
| reserved.