“Sir:—Recently there arrived in my hands by mail, with no sender’s address, a pamphlet of ninety pages, entitled ‘Some Facts Regarding Francis J. Heney.’ On page 12 your name appears as a printed signature. I am assuming that you caused the contents to be prepared and mailed.
“The pamphlet contains assertions reflecting on the conduct of Francis J. Heney and the Federal Department of Justice, in taking part in the prosecution of a criminal charge of bribery in the State Court of California against yourself. The pamphlet contains no defense of yourself; it does not even mention your name, except as its signer and in the title of exhibits; much less does it allege or attempt to show your innocence. It merely asks an answer to ‘three important constitutional and moral questions’ affecting Mr. Heney and the Department of Justice.
“Before answering those questions, let me say that this does not appear to be the method of an innocent man. The public press has made notorious the charge against you and its prosecution by Mr. Heney. Thoughtful citizens everywhere have discussed it. Many (not including myself) had assumed that you were guilty. You now appear to have spent a large sum to print and circulate widely a pamphlet concerning the case. Anyone would expect to find the pamphlet devoted to showing your innocence; and thus to removing unfavorable opinions based on casual press dispatches. An honest man, desiring to stand well with honest fellow-citizens, and possessing means to print, would naturally take that course. You do not. Your pamphlet merely attacks the technical authority of one of the attorneys for the prosecution, incidentally abusing two judges. This is not the course of an innocent man. It is the course of a guilty man who desires to divert the attention of the tribunal of public opinion. The tradition is here fulfilled of the attorney’s instructions to the barrister acting for his guilty client, ‘No case; abuse the opposing counsel.’ I am compelled now to assume that you have no case, because all that your expensive pamphlet does is to abuse one of the counsel for the prosecution. Until now I have supposed it proper to suspend judgment. I do so no longer.
“And what are your three ‘constitutional and moral’ questions,—since you have sent me a pamphlet asking an answer to them? I will answer them frankly.
“1. Was Mr. Heney’s payment by the Department of Justice covertly for the California prosecution but nominally for other and Federal services?
“Answer: I do not know. But I and other honest citizens will presume in favor of the honesty, in this act, of a President, an Attorney-General, and an Assistant Attorney-General who proved in all other public acts that they were honest and courageous beyond example, especially as against a man like yourself who publishes a pamphlet based throughout on anonymous assertions.
“2. Can a Federal Assistant Attorney-General, under Federal salary, lawfully act at the same time as State Assistant District Attorney?
“Answer: As to this ‘constitutional’ question, I leave this to the courts, as you should. As to this ‘moral’ question, I say that it is moral for any Federal officer to help any State officer in the pursuit of crime, and that only guilty lawbreakers could be imagined to desire the contrary.
“3. Can a private citizen contribute money to help the State’s prosecuting officers in the investigation and trial of a criminal charge?
“Answer: He can; and it is stupid even to put the question. Under the original English jury-system (of which you received the benefit) and until the last century, the private citizen was usually obliged to pay the prosecuting expenses; for the State did not, and crime went unpunished otherwise. If nowadays, in any community, crime is again likely to go unpunished without the help of private citizens, there is no reason why we should not revert to the old system. As for Mr. Spreckels (the private citizen here named by you), his name should be held in honor, and will ever be, as against anything your pamphlet can say. As for Mr. Heney and his receipt of $47,500 officially and ‘large sums of money additionally’ from Mr. Spreckels, it may be presumed that he spent most of it on trial expenses, and did not keep it as a personal reward. But even if he did so keep it, let me register the view that he is welcome to all this—and to more—if anybody will give it; that no money compensation is too high for such rare courage; that the moral courage displayed by him is as much entitled to high money compensation as the unprincipled commercial skill displayed by yourself—and this solely by the economic test of money value,—viz., demand and supply.