TRIAL OF THE CHICAGO ANARCHISTS.
Question. What do you think of the trial of the Chicago Anarchists and their chances for a new trial?
Answer. I have paid some attention to the evidence and to the rulings of the court, and I have read the opinion of the Supreme Court of Illinois, in which the conviction is affirmed. Of course these men were tried during a period of great excitement—tried when the press demanded their conviction—when it was asserted that society was on the edge of destruction unless these men were hanged. Under such circumstances, it is not easy to have a fair and impartial trial. A judge should either sit beyond the reach of prejudice, in some calm that storms cannot invade, or he should be a kind of oak that before any blast he would stand erect. It is hard to find such a place as I have suggested and not easy to find such a man. We are all influenced more or less by our surroundings, by the demands and opinions and feelings and prejudices of our fellow- citizens. There is a personality made up of many individuals known as society. This personality has prejudices like an individual. It often becomes enraged, acts without the slightest sense, and repents at its leisure. It is hard to reason with a mob whether organized or disorganized, whether acting in the name of the law or of simple brute force. But in any case, where people refuse to be governed by reason, they become a mob.
Question. Do you not think that these men had a fair trial?
Answer. I have no doubt that the court endeavored to be fair— no doubt that Judge Gary is a perfectly honest, upright man, but I think his instructions were wrong. He instructed the jury to the effect that where men have talked in a certain way, and where the jury believed that the result of such talk might be the commission of a crime, that such men are responsible for that crime. Of course, there is neither law nor sense in an instruction like this. I hold that it must have been the intention of the man making the remark, or publishing the article, or doing the thing—it must have been his intention that the crime should be committed. Men differ as to the effect of words, and a man may say a thing with the best intentions the result of which is a crime, and he may say a thing with the worst of intentions and the result may not be a crime. The Supreme Court of Illinois seemed to have admitted that the instructions were wrong, but took the ground that it made no difference with the verdict. This is a dangerous course for the court of last resort to pursue; neither is it very complimentary to the judge who tried the case, that his instructions had no effect upon the jury. Under the instructions of the court below, any man who had been arrested with the seven Anarchists and of whom it could be proved that he had ever said a word in favor of any change in government, or of other peculiar ideas, no matter whether he knew of the meeting at the Haymarket or not, would have been convicted.
I am satisfied that the defendant Fielden never intended to harm a human being. As a matter of fact, the evidence shows that he was making a speech in favor of peace at the time of the occurrence. The evidence also shows that he was an exceedingly honest, industrious, and a very poor and philanthropic man.
Question. Do you uphold the Anarchists?
Answer. Certainly not. There is no place in this country for the Anarchist. The source of power here is the people, and to attack the political power is to attack the people. If the laws are oppressive, it is the fault of the oppressed. If the laws touch the poor and leave them without redress, it is the fault of the poor. They are in a majority. The men who work for their living are the very men who have the power to make every law that is made in the United States. There is no excuse for any resort to violence in this country. The boycotting by trades unions and by labor organizations is all wrong. Let them resort to legal methods and to no other. I have not the slightest sympathy with the methods that have been pursued by Anarchists, or by Socialists, or by any other class that has resorted to force or intimidation. The ballot-box is the place to assemble. The will of the people can be made known in that way, and their will can be executed. At the same time, I think I understand what has produced the Anarchist, the Socialist, and the agitator. In the old country, a laboring man, poorly clad, without quite enough to eat, with a wife in rags, with a few children asking for bread—this laboring man sees the idle enjoying every luxury of this life; he sees on the breast of "my lady" a bonfire of diamonds; he sees "my lord" riding in his park; he sees thousands of people who from the cradle to the grave do no useful act; add nothing to the intellectual or the physical wealth of the world; he sees labor living in the tenement house, in the hut; idleness and nobility in the mansion and the palace; the poor man a trespasser everywhere except upon the street, where he is told to "move on," and in the dusty highways of the country. That man naturally hates the government—the government of the few, the government that lives on the unpaid labor of the many, the government that takes the child from the parents, and puts him in the army to fight the child of another poor man and woman in some other country. These Anarchists, these Socialists, these agitators, have been naturally produced. All the things of which I have spoken sow in the breast of poverty the seeds of hatred and revolution. These poor men, hunted by the officers of the law, cornered, captured, imprisoned, excite the sympathy of other poor men, and if some are dragged to the gallows and hanged, or beheaded by the guillotine, they become saints and martyrs, and those who sympathize with them feel that they have the power, and only the power of hatred—the power of riot, of destruction—the power of the torch, of revolution, that is to say, of chaos and anarchy. The injustice of the higher classes makes the lower criminal. Then there is another thing. The misery of the poor excites in many noble breasts sympathy, and the men who thus sympathize wish to better the condition of their fellows. At first they depend upon reason, upon calling the attention of the educated and powerful to the miseries of the poor. Nothing happens, no result follows. The Juggernaut of society moves on, and the wretches are still crushed beneath the great wheels. These men who are really good at first, filled with sympathy, now become indignant—they are malicious, then destructive and criminal. I do not sympathize with these methods, but I do sympathize with the general object that all good and generous people seek to accomplish—namely, to better the condition of the human race. Only the other day, in Boston, I said that we ought to take into consideration the circumstances under which the Anarchists were reared; that we ought to know that every man is necessarily produced; that man is what he is, not by accident, but necessity; that society raises its own criminals—that it plows the soil and cultivates and harvests the crop. And it was telegraphed that I had defended anarchy. Nothing was ever further from my mind. There is no place, as I said before, for anarchy in the United States. In Russia it is another question; in Germany another question. Every country that is governed by the one man, or governed by the few, is the victim of anarchy. That is anarchy. That is the worst possible form of socialism. The definition of socialism given by its bitterest enemy is, that idlers wish to live on the labor and on the money of others. Is not this definition—a definition given in hatred—a perfect definition of every monarchy and of nearly every government in the world? That is to say: The idle few live on the labor and the money of others.
Question. Will the Supreme Court take cognizance of this case and prevent the execution of the judgment?
Answer. Of course it is impossible for me to say. At the same time, judging from the action of Justice Miller in the case of The People vs. Maxwell, it seems probable that the Supreme Court may interfere, but I have not examined the question sufficiently to form an opinion. My feeling about the whole matter is this: That it will not tend to answer the ideas advanced by these men, to hang them. Their execution will excite sympathy among thousands and thousands of people who have never examined and knew nothing of the theories advanced by the Anarchists, or the Socialists, or other agitators. In my judgment, supposing the men to be guilty, it is far better to imprison them. Less harm will be done the cause of free government. We are not on the edge of any revolution. No other government is as firmly fixed as ours. No other government has such a broad and splendid foundation. We have nothing to fear. Courage and safety can afford to be generous—can afford to act without haste and without the feeling of revenge. So, for my part, I hope that the sentence may be commuted, and that these men, if found guilty at last, may be imprisoned. This course is, in my judgment, the safest to pursue. It may be that I am led to this conclusion, because of my belief that every man does as he must. This belief makes me charitable toward all the world. This belief makes me doubt the wisdom of revenge. This belief, so far as I am concerned, blots from our language the word "punishment." Society has a right to protect itself, and it is the duty of society to reform, in so far as it may be possible, any member who has committed what is called a crime. Where the criminal cannot be reformed, and the safety of society can be secured by his imprisonment, there is no possible excuse for destroying his life. After these six or seven men have been, in accordance with the forms of law, strangled to death, there will be a few pieces of clay, and about them will gather a few friends, a few admirers—and these pieces will be buried, and over the grave will be erected a monument, and those who were executed as criminals will be regarded by thousands as saints. It is far better for society to have a little mercy. The effect upon the community will be good. If these men are imprisoned, people will examine their teachings without prejudice. If they are executed, seen through the tears of pity, their virtues, their sufferings, their heroism, will be exaggerated; others may emulate their deeds, and the gulf between the rich and the poor will be widened—a gulf that may not close until it has devoured the noblest and the best.
—The Mail and Express, New York, November 3, 1887.