Court Opinion

ID: 8687117
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2022-11-26 00:30:33.812646+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T16:57:38.913024
License: Public Domain

KANE, District Judge.
Col. John H. Wheeler, of North Carolina, the United States minister to Nicaragua, was on board of a steamboat, at one of the Delaware wharves, on his way from Washington to embark at New York for his post of duty. Three slaves, belonging to him, were sitting at his side on the upper deck. Just as the last signal bell was ringing, Passmore Williamson came up to the party—declared to the slaves that they were free—and forcibly pressing Mr. Wheeler aside, urged them to go ashore. He was followed by some dozen or twenty negroes, who by muscular strength carried the slaves to the adjoining pier; two of the slaves at least, if not all three, struggling to release themselves, and protesting their wish to remain with their master; two of the negro mob, in the meantime, grasping Col. Wheeler by the collar, and threatening to cut his throat if he made any resistance. The slaves were borne along to a hackney-coach that was in waiting, and were conveyed to some place of concealment; Mr. Williamson following and urging forward the mob, and giving his name and address to Col. Wheeler, with the declaration that he held himself responsible towards him for whatever might be his legal rights, but taking no personally active part in the abduction after he had left the deck. I allowed a writ of habeas corpus at the instance of Col. Wheeler, and subsequently an alias; and to this last, Mr. Williamson made *685return, that the persons named in the writ, “nor either of them, are not now. nor was at the time of issuing of the writ, or the original writ, or at any other time, in the custody, power or possession of the respondent, nor by him confined or restrained; wherefore he cannot have the bodies,” &c. At the hearing I allowed the relator to traverse this return; and several witnesses who were asked by him, testified to the facts as I have recited them. The district attorney, upon this state of facts, moved Mr. Williamson’s commitment (1) for contempt in making a false return; (2) to take his trial for perjury. Mr. Williamson then took the stand to purge himself of contempt. He admitted the facts substantially as in proof before; made it plain that he had been an ad-visor of the project, and given to his confederates sanction throughout. He renewed his denial that he had control at any time over the movements of the slaves, or knew their present whereabouts. Such is the case, as it was before me on the hearing..
I cannot look upon this return otherwise than as illusory—in legal phrase, as evasive, if not false. It sets out that the alleged prisoners are not now, and have not been since the issue of the habeas corpus, in the custody, power or possession of the respondent; and in so far, it uses legally appropriate language for such a return. But it goes further, and by added words, gives an interpretation to that language essentially variant from its legal import. He denies that the prisoners were within his power, custody or possession at any time whatever. Now, the evidence of respectable, uncontra-dicted witnesses, and the admission of the respondent himself, establish the fact beyond controversy, that the prisoners were at one time within his power and control. He was the person by whose counsel the so-called rescue was devised. He gave the directions, and hastened to the pier to stimulate and supervise their execution. He was the spokesman and first actor after arriving there. Of all the parties to the act of violence, he was the only white man, the only citizen, the only individual haying recognized political right, the only person whose social training could certainly interpret either his own duties or the rights of others under the constitution of the land.
It would be futile, and worse, to argue that he who has organized and guided, and headed a mob to effect the abduction and imprisonment of others—he in whose presence and by whose active influence the abduction and imprisonment have been brought about—might excuse himself from responsibility by the assertion that it was not his hand that made the unlawful assault, or that he never acted as the gaoler. He who imites with others to commit a crime shares with them all the legal liabilities that attend on its commission. He chooses his company, and adopts their acts. This is the retributive law of all concerted crimes; and its argument applies with peculiar force to those cases in which redress and prevention of wrong are sought through the writ of habeas corpus. This, the great remedial process by which liberty is vindicated and restored, tolerates no language in the response which it calls for that can mask a subterfuge. The dearest interests of life, personal safety, domestic peace, social repose, all that man can value, or that is worth living for, are involved in this principle. The institutions of society would lose more than half their value, and courts of justice become impotent for protection, if the writ of habeas corpus could not compel the truth, full, direct, and unequivocal, in answer to its mandate. It will not do to say to the man. whose wife or whose daughter has been abducted: “I did not abduct her; she is not in my possession; I do not detain her, inasmuch as the assault was made by the hand of my subordinates, and I have forebome to ask where they propose consummating the wrong.”
It is clear then, as it seems to me, that in legal acceptance the parties whom this writ called on Mr. Williamson to produce, were at one time within his power and control; and his answer, so far as it relates to his power over them, makes no distinction between that time and the present. I cannot give a different interpretation to his language from that which he has practically given himself, and cannot regard him as denying his power over the prisoners now, when he does not aver that he has lost the power which he formerly had. He has thus refused, or at least he has failed, to answer to the command of the law. He has chosen to decide for himself upon the lawfulness as well as the moral propriety of his act, and to withhold the ascertainment and vindication of the rights of others from that same forum of arbitrament on which all his own rights repose. In a word, he has put himself in contempt of the process of this court and challenges its action. That action can have- no alternative form. It is one too clearly defined by ancient and honorable precedent, too indispensable to the administration of social justice and the protection of human right, and too potentially invoked by the special exigency of the case now before the court to excuse even a doubt of my duty or an apology for its immediate performance.
The cause was submitted to me by the learned counsel for the respondent, without argument, and I have, therefore, found myself at some loss to understand the grounds on which, if there be any such, they would claim the discharge of their client. Only one has occurred to me, as perhaps, within his view; and on this I think it right to express my opinion. I will frankly reconsider it, however, if any future aspect of the case shall invite the review. It is this: that the *686persons named in this writ as detained by the respondent, were not legally slaves, inasmuch as they were in the territory of Pennsylvania when they were abducted.
[Subsequently Messrs. Townsend & Read moved for a rule to show cause why the writ of habeas corpus should not be quashed, which application was refused. See Case No. 16,726.]
Waiving the inquiry, whether for the purposes of this question they were within the territorial jurisdiction of Pennsylvania while passing from one state to another upon the navigable waters of the United States—a point on which my first impressions are ad-, verse to the argument—I have to say: 1. I know of no statute, either of the United States, or of Pennsylvania, or of New Jersey, the only other state that has a qualified jurisdiction over this part of the Delaware, that authorizes the forcible abduction of any person or any thing whatsoever, without claim of property, unless in aid of legal process: 2. That I know of no statute of Pennsylvania, which affects to divest the rights of property of a citizen of North Carolina, acquired and asserted under the laws of that state, because he has found it needful or convenient to pass through the territory of Pennsylvania. 3. That I am not aware that any such statute, if such an one were shown; could be recognized as valid in a court of the United States. 4. That it seems to me altogether unimportant whether they were slaves or not. It would be the mockery of philanthropy to assert, that because men had become free, they might therefore be forcibly abducted.
I have said nothing of the motives by which the respondent has been governed. I have nothing to do with them; they may give him support and comfort before an infinitely high tribunal; I do not impugn them here. Nor do I allude, on the other hand, to those special claims upon our hospitable, courtesy, which the diplomatic character of Mr. Wheeler might seem to assert for him. I am doubtful whether the acts of congress give to him, and his retinue, and his property, that protection as a representative of the sovereignty of the United States, which they concede to all sovereignties besides. Whether, under the general law of nations, he could not ask a broader privilege than some judicial precedents might seem to admit, is not necessarily involved in the cause before me. It is enough that X find, as the case stands now, the plain and simple grounds of adjudication, that Mr. Williamson has not returned truthfully and fully to the writ of habeas corpus. He must, therefore, stand committed for a contempt of the legal process of the court
As to the second motion of the district attorney, that which looks to a committal for perjury, I withhold an expression of opinion in regard to it. It is unnecessary, because Mr. Williamson being under arrest, he may be charged at any time by the grand jury; and I apprehend that there may be doubts whether the affidavits should not be regarded as extrajudicial and voluntary.
KANE, District Judge, said he would give the defendant a full hearing upon any motion his counsel should choose to present.
The court then took a recess.
After the decision by the court, United States Marshal Wynkoop took the prisoner into custody, and conveyed him to Moya-mensing prison; in a carriage, and handed him over to the keepers. A number of Williamson’s friends requested the marshal to put the prisoner into the custody of one of his deputies, and thus avoid sending him to prison, but the marshal declined, by replying that he would comply strictly with the mandate of the court.