Court Opinion

ID: 9865057
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-25 16:21:56.856522+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:37:00.252382
License: Public Domain

Mb. Chief Justice Adams,
specially concurring.
I concur in the main opinion, as written by Mr. Justice *77Alter, which. I think is unanswerable. The evidence of the defendant’s .crime is overwhelming. These facts should be kept in mind: John Kolkman, a member, if not the leader, of an organized gang of hog thieves, was convicted and sentenced to the penitentiary. The paper shafts of the honorable dissenting justices are so directed that they may tend to divert attention from the fact that Kolkman and his band of marauders stole Charley Bur-son’s bacon on the hoof.
Legal questions involved have been so exhaustively treated that there is little to add in this respect, but I am struck with the significance of the fact that the efforts of the American Bar Association are directed toward the extension of the rule as to comments by judges on the evidence, instead of its restriction. If such rule is as bad as its enemies paint it, it seems strange, after a century and a half of experience with it, the American bar does not try to have it abrogated altogether, instead of securing its extension to the states.
I have no doubt that the weird admonitions and quizzical warnings gratuitously bestowed by Mr. Justice Hilliard on the majority members of the court as to their judicial duties and conduct are well meant, but his hint that if our opinions do not meet with popular acclaim, we may be swept away by a coming flood, contains a political philosophy so pernicious and shocking that it cannot be overlooked. If courts are to be intimidated, or if they must weigh their judgments in fear of reprisals at the polls, they stain the judicial ermine and are basely unworthy of public confidence. My undisturbed faith in the integrity of my worthy brother is such that I cannot believe he means that which his words imply.
No one can fail to be entertained by Mr. Justice Hilliard’s dissertation on the subject of French kings, but what about Charley’s hogs?
Judgment affirmed.