The Ocala evening star. [volume] (Ocala, Fla.) 1895-1943, 1921-07-12
G's REPLY TO z
Or a Long Story Made Short

Or a Long Story Made Short
Editor Star: There are doubtless
many who remember the time, a num-
Der of years ago, when Florida was
beset with criminal class of negroes
who went about armed with Winches-
ter repeating rifles and other weap-
ons, to the terror of law-abiding citi-
zens, especially those in the rural dis
tricts. To put stop to this practice
our legislature passed a law making
it criminal offense for any person
to carry certain classes of weapons,
including pistols, unless having a
license so to do from the board of
county commissioners, and this priv
ilege was not to be granted to any
person under twenty-one years of age,
in any event. There might be other
reasons satisfactory to the board why
a license should be refused, but the
substance of the crime, as l interpret
the law, was to have manual possess
sion of such weapon without having a
license so to do, it mattered not why
the license was refused.
One Saturday night not long since,
as / am informed, little dickey bird
fiew.oyer Ocala leaving word with our
sher Md his able deputy that things
had 6gk9he little too lively in the
immediate vicinity of Oak Mounting
their tin :lizzie our two efficient Off
GERS of u, law were soon at the loca-
tion ofsae disturbance" where, for
good sand sufficient reasons, they took
charge 81. a couple of colored youths
from Anthony who had, come down
that evening to enioyts. themselves.
This hapWSpaiE was brought up be-
fore Judge Futch on two charges:
l, Observation-Disclosures; 2. having pos
session Of pistol without license,
to which they sentered pleas of not
guilty, and secured the services of our
learned friend 2. to extricate them
from the legal holes they found them
selves in.
At the trial z. contended to Judge
Futch that it was no crime to be
drunk in Florida any more, but the
Judge disagreed with him; and the
correctness of this ruling was con-
firmed two days later by an opinion
from the office of our attorney gen
eral. 2. then took up his case before
the jury, and they disagreed with him.
The "pistol totin'" case was then
taken up, when, as / understood it,
rs. position was that any person un-
der twenty-one could carry a gun
without license because the law re-
fused him license.
This he argued with no little fer
vor, but again the Judge disagreed
with him; whereupon he tried to con-
vince the jury of the innocence of his
clients-but again the jury disagreed
with him; in fact, it was one disagree
ment after another between 2. and
the supposed upholders of the law;
and, Judging by the tone of his article
III yCSOGIh6S Has 6SAO S@A&A
eaten something which has disagreed
with him.
At the conclusion of the trials G..
did something which z. seemed never
to have thought of. viz: intimated to
the court that, in view of the ignor
ance, youth, previous good behavior
and the fact of there having been no
great violation of the law. light SEN
tence would vindicate the states de-
mands, and upon receipt of such SEN
tence the parents of the boys, after
consulting with a white friend who
had testified in their behalf, concluded
it best to use their money in payment
OF these fines rather than to friend z.
in order that he might have the pleas
ure of further attempts at securing
their release from the clutches of the
law.
Now, dear people. don't you think
they showed good Judgment G.