The labor journal. [volume] (Everett, Wash.) 1909-1976, 1922-09-09
"SAN FRANCISCO IS HELL" SAYS THE
REVEREND NJ. GREEN JOHNSON
San Francisco Is Just a LegaIistic LeprOus Spot
on the Moral Map Between San Quentin
and Folsom Prisons

deserves the appellatior of HELL
for it's treatment of Tom Mooney anC
Warren X. Billings.
"What possessed the American
Bar Association to choose San Fran
cisco as a meeting place this year?'
he asks, "For, surely, there isn't q
place under the sun where the spirit
of law has been so openly and VIC
| lently outraged, or whore it is kept
so continuously and so apologetically
in durancc vile.
"From the standpoint of the spir-
it Of law, San Francisco is hell"
He further defines San Francisco
as "A legalistic leprous spot on the
mora! map between San Quentin and
| Folsom prisons!"
The Reverend Mercer Green John
ston is a graduate of the University
Of Virginia. He was at one time in
| charge OF the Cathedral of st. Mary
and ST. John il Manila, p. l., and
later held the post of Rector of
| Trinity church. Newark, N. j. He re-
signed the rectorship of Trinity
Church to go to France when the
United States entered the war with
Germany. For his services in France
he was awarded the Distinguished
Service Cross and the Croix de
Guerre. Since his return from
France he has been actively inter-
ested in the fight for the freedom
of Mooney and Billings. His article
on the convention of the Bar Asso-
citation follows:
1t is the live ones. not the dead
ones, we are thinking of. The writer
is connected with so many lawyers
in one way or another that it would
not be becoming in him to express
an opinion as to where dead lawyers
go. He refuses to commit himself
on the dictum that hell is a legal
necessity, or on the appropriateness
of the inscription on the lawyers
grave: "Here lies a lawyer" The
fate of dead lawyers does not con-
Germ him for the time being. He is
thinking of the live Ones-the ones
who went to San Francisco to at
tend the annual meeting of the
American Bar Association.
What possessed the American Bar
Association to choose San Francisco
as meeting place this year? San
earth! Or under it, for that matter
the sunwhere the spirit of law has
been so openly and violently out
ragged, or where it is kept so con-
durance vile.
From the standpoint of the spirit
of law, San Francisco is hell.
Within the past few years there
is no kind of indignity to which law
an Id ln +1l L
put upon the law in San Francisco.
If it had been the deliberate pur-
pose to destroy forever every atom
of human respect for law, San Fran
cisco's recent treatment of the law
has been nicely adjusted to that end
SO far as we know-and we are
not unread in such matters-history
affords no example of the cold
blooded way in which justice has
been raped in the halls of justice in
San Francisco in broad daylight and
beaten into insensibility and buried
alive under the courtroom floor,
without any sort of adequate pro-
test on the part of the citizens of
San Francisco, and with the mani
fest approval of the governor and
the supreme court of the state. We
know of no place, in any age, in
which the rape of justice has ever
been so nearly regarded as a relig-
ous act as it is in San Francisco to-
day.
This is not reckless random talk.
We speak the words of truth and
soberness. We speak in the light of
the known facts in the cases of Tom
Mooney and Warren Billings now ly-
ing in California prisons as the re-
suit of San Francisco's criminal pros
titution of law, unrepented of. And
we challenge the City of San Fran
cisco; we challenge the bar of San
Francisco; we challenge the judges
of the courts of San Francisco; we
challenge the supreme court of the
state of California and Governor
Stephens, who share the shame of
San Francisco in this matter, to
make decent defense, or even a
halfway decent defense, against the
charge we make. But it is waste
of words to make the challenge.
None dare accept it. Guilt is brand
ed on the conscience of every Cali
fornian who has not long ago sin
ned his conscience away and now
glories in his shame.
Strange that the American Bar
Association should have selected
shameless San Francisco as the place
in which to hold its annual meeting
San Francisco. with prison on
either side in which an innocent man
lies bound. San Francisco, which is
just legalistic leprous spot on the
moral map between San Quentin and
Folsom prisons.
And now listen. The press report
says: "A need for the better under
standing of the law as the peoples
guardian and defender, the cham
pion of equal rights for all, was the
keynote address at the opening of
the annual American Bar Association
convention here today"
Just think of the words of that
keynote address striking against the
walls of San Quentin and Folsom
prisons. And against the ears of
Tom Mooney and Warren Billings,
listening behind the prison bars.
Why did the American Bar AS
ISOLATION go to hell to hold its con-
vention this year? Why did the
American Bar Association go to the
hell hole in which San Francisco has
sunk its courts to indulge in a talk
fest? Is it party to the conspir-
acy to destroy such faith as yet re-
mains in just bosoms in "the law
as the peoples guardian and defend
er, the champion of equal rights for
all? Or is it that the American Bar
Association has no sense of humor
and. therefore, no sense of eternal
fitness of things?
| ----:O:--
Meet greatness face to face and il
| will not amman so hinh. crinnn hn-