DELMAS IN FINAL BURST OF ELOQUENCE CONCLUDES STORY OF EVELYN THAW’S SAD FATE—DECLARES STANFORD WHITE A MONSTER WHOM THAW WAS JUSTIFIED IN PUTTING OUT OF THE WAY—CRAZED BY WRONGS DONE TO EVELYN—REMARKABLE SERIES OF LETTERS—DEFENDANT PICTURED AS A BENEFACTOR TO SOCIETY—“I NOW, WITH ALL SOLEMNITY, LEAVE IN YOUR HANDS THE FATE OF HARRY K. THAW.”
In a final burst of eloquence seldom equaled before the American bar, Attorney Delmas concluded his pitiful tale of the wrongs of Evelyn Thaw and her husband, and concluded dramatically:
“I now, with all solemnity, gentlemen of the jury, leave in your hands the fate of Harry K. Thaw.”
Mr. Delmas made a direct appeal to the unwritten law. He said:
“Let me call the ‘insanity’ of Thaw ‘Dementia Americana.’ It is the species of insanity that makes every American man believe his home to be sacred; that is the species of insanity which makes him believe the honor of his daughter is sacred; that is the species of insanity which makes him believe the honor of his wife is sacred; that is the species of insanity which is him believe that whosoever invades his home, that whosoever stains the virtue of his threshold, has violated the highest of human laws and must appeal to the mercy of God, if mercy there be for him anywhere in the universe.”
The point of Delmas’ whole argument was that Stanford White deserved his fate; that Harry Thaw in shooting the architect had acted as the champion of purity and goodness, and that he had slain a foul monster that had preyed upon the virtue of women.
The closing part of the summing up by Delmas was as follows:
“I will relieve the long suspense which has been occasioned by your labors by announcing that I will shortly leave the fate of this defendant in your hands. Before entering upon the remarks which I propose making it may be useful to cast a rapid glance over what I have already said, so that you may connect what I shall have to say with what I have already said.
“I have endeavored to lay before the eyes of the jury the picture of the fate of these two young people. I had tried to show the unfortunate occurrence which befell her when she narrated to him in the summer of 1903 her awful story of what had happened. I have shown, or at least have endeavored to convince you, first, that the facts which she swears she then related were true and, secondly, that it was true that she did relate them to the defendant at that time.”
Here Mr. Delmas endeavored to prove these facts.