PARSONS MAINTAINS HIS INNOCENCE.
“In the decision affirming the sentence of death upon me the Supreme Court of the State of Illinois says: ‘It is undisputed that the bomb was thrown that caused the death of Degan. It is conceded that no one of the defendants threw the bomb with his own hands. Plaintiffs in error are charged with being accessories before the fact.’ If I did not throw the bomb myself it becomes necessary to prove that I aided, encouraged, and advised the person who did throw it. Is that fact proved? The Supreme Court says it is. The record says it is not. I appeal to the American people to judge between them.
“The Supreme Court quotes articles from the Alarm, the paper edited by me, and from my speeches running back three years before the Haymarket tragedy of May 4, 1886. Upon said articles and speeches the court affirms my sentence of death as an accessory. The court says, ‘The articles in the Alarm were most of them written by the defendant Parsons, and some of them by the defendant Spies,’ and then proceeds to quote these articles. I refer to the record to prove that of all the articles quoted only one was shown to have been written by me. I wrote, of course, a great many articles for my paper, the Alarm, but the record will show that only one of these many quoted by the Supreme Court to prove my guilt as an accessory was written by me. This article appeared in the Alarm December 6, 1884, one year and a half before the Haymarket meeting. As to Mr. Spies, the record will show that during the three years I was editor of the Alarm he did not write for the paper half a dozen articles. For proof as to this I appeal to the record.
“The Alarm was a labor paper, and, as is well known, a labor paper is conducted as a medium through which working people can make known their grievances. The Alarm was no exception to this rule. I not only did not write ‘most of the articles,’ but wrote comparatively few of them. This the record will also show.
“In referring to my Haymarket speech the court says: ‘To the men then listening to him he had addressed the incendiary appeals that had been appearing in the Alarm for two years. The court then quotes the incendiary article which I did write, and which is as follows: ‘One dynamite bomb properly placed will destroy a regiment of soldiers, a weapon easily made, and carried with perfect safety in the pockets of one’s clothing.’”