“Who will dare to say that in the time of civil war no person shall be deprived of life, liberty and property, without due process of law? This is a provision of your Constitution, than which there is none more just and sacred in it; it is, however, only the law of peace, not of war.
“In time of war the civil tribunals of justice are wholly or partially silent, as the public safety may require; * * * the limitations and provisions of the Constitution in favor of life, liberty and property are therefore wholly or partially suspended.”
He makes allusion to the recent re-election of President Lincoln, as ratifying any doubtful exercise of power by him:
“The voice of the people, thus solemnly proclaimed, by the omnipotence of the ballot * * * ought to be accepted, and will be accepted, I trust, by all just men, as the voice of God.”
He concludes his plea in favor of the jurisdiction of the Commission, by declaring that for what he had uttered in its favor “he will neither ask pardon nor offer apology,” and by quoting Lord Brougham’s speech in defence of a bill before the House of Lords empowering the Viceroy of Ireland to apprehend and detain all Irishmen suspect of conspiracy.
The Special Judge-Advocate then proceeds to sum up the evidence, in doing which he leaves nothing to the free agency of the Court. He, first, by a review of the testimony of the Montgomeries and Conovers, proves to his own and, presumably, to the Court’s satisfaction, that “Davis, Thompson, Cleary, Tucker, Clay, Young, Harper, Booth and John H. Surratt did combine and conspire together in Canada to kill and murder Abraham Lincoln, Andrew Johnson, Wm. H. Seward and Ulysses S. Grant.”
“Surely no word further need be spoken to show that John Wilkes Booth was in this conspiracy; that John H. Surratt was in this conspiracy; and that Jefferson Davis, and his several agents named, in Canada, were in this conspiracy.
“Whatever may be the conviction of others, my own conviction is that Jefferson Davis is as clearly proven guilty of this conspiracy as is John Wilkes Booth, by whose hand Jefferson Davis inflicted the mortal wound upon Abraham Lincoln.”
After such utterances as these, it is hardly necessary to state that this impartial Judge declares every single person on trial, as well as John H. Surratt, guilty beyond the shadow of a doubt.
“That John H. Surratt, George A. Atzerodt, Mary E. Surratt, David E. Herold, and Louis Payne entered into this conspiracy with Booth, is so very clear upon the testimony, that little time need be occupied in bringing again before the Court the evidence which establishes it.