The Record-courier. [volume] (Gardnerville, Nev.) 1904-current, 1916-02-18
BOOTH ASKS
FOR PARDON.

A petition for the pardon of VIM
Booth, editor of the Tonopah Bonanza,
recently found guilty of libel and sem
fenced to serve six months, In JAIL was
circulated and freely signed through
ont this section this week. Other PEE
titions are being circulated In all
parts of the state and thousands of
signatures have been secured for the
pardon of MIR. Booth.
The Goldfield Tribune has the fol-
lowing to say regarding the Booth
case:
The Tribune has attempted to view
this case without bias. Mr.. Booth
conducts a newspaper. He is a blunt
spoken man, in personal conversation
as well as through his newspaper.
Possibly at times his critism of pub
lie officials or his comments upon men
in public life have been more severe
than conditions warranted possibly
they have been at times wholly un-
warranted; possibly they have at times
shown personal bias, but on the whole
he has stood for the people against
abuses of power or of privilege, and
the public has been his client.
newspaper bears relation to the
public peculiarly its own relation
sustained by no other privately own
ed business. The injection of malice
into its columns is an abuse of this
relation. But the people look to
newspaper to defend them and their
rights against encroachment, and the
newspaper refusing to perform this
function, or assume this RESPONSE
biity, which it either voluntarily as
sumes or which the public places up
on it, will lack the confidence essen
tial TO its usefulness.
II the public places this standard of
moral requirement upon the publish
er of newspaper-and the Tribune
believes it does-then what must be
the public's standard in relation to
malice or personal bias which it
would impose upon those into whose
hands it entrusts the machinery of the
law Without discussing the merits
of this case, we cannot ignore what
appears to be fixed belief in the pub
lie mind that the machinery of the law
has been abused in this case. The
statute gives to the jury in such cas-
es exceptional discretion, when it
says
In all prosecutions for libel
the truth may be given in evil
ueHce W the jury, ana ii II snail
appear to the jury that the mat
ter charged as libelous is true
and was published for good mo-
tive and for justifiable ends, the
party shall be acquitted, and the
jury shall have the right to de-
termine the law and the fact"
In the trial of the first case, the
jury refused to convict; in the trial of
the second case the jury recommended
extreme clemency," and several
Jurors have stated in effect that they
would not have voted to convict ex-
eept for their belief that this recon-
would have been honored.
This recommendation was followed
by jail sentence of six months and a
refusal to accept bail pending further
Or final proceedings.
The Tribune has avoided discussion
Of this case, but without assuming to
pass upon its merits we cannot ig-
lore belief so general that the
spirit in which the case was treated
by the jury was not shared by the
,ourt or the prosecuting officials. and
hat If there was malice on the part
of the publisher, there was even
stronger malice on the part of Off
,ials in whose hands the people had
entrusted the machinery of the law.