An American Suffragette

by Isaac Newton Stevens

The reading of the verdict of a coroner's jury has never been known to disqualify any person from serving on a trial jury in a murder case by unduly influencing the opinion, or arousing the passions of such involuntary candidate for the jury box. No jails have been stormed or revolutions started by the verdict of an American coroner's jury, and New York was not destined to have its sensibilities too harshly jarred by a sensational verdict in this case.

After solemnly sitting for hours, the jury found that "Said Emma Bell came to her death from the effects of hydrocyanic acid administered by some person to the said jurors unknown, and whether said hydrocyanic acid was administered with felonious intent the said jurors cannot at this time ascertain."

The facts established by the jury were, that the woman was dead; that hydrocyanic acid had killed her; that the cause of death was so evident that it was only necessary to examine the contents of the stomach; that apparently none of the candied fruit had been disturbed, as the box was even full and the top layer as smooth as when first packed; that a chemical analysis proved that no poison of any kind was in any of the candied fruit in the box; that no vial could be found on or near the woman after death, and that a thorough search of the apartment failed to disclose any of this or any other kind of poison; that the woman was quite alone in the apartment when death took place and was only discovered by the janitress at ten o'clock at night, at which time she entered the apartment, having been invited to sleep there during the absence of the child in the country, whither she had gone a few days previous to this for a week's stay; that Mrs. Bell had been doing her own work for several months and taking in fine sewing.

But ambitious newspaper reporters bent themselves to this new task, as is their custom in all matters of public concern, i. e., to outrival the most noted expert in the line of that particular phase of public endeavor uppermost at the time. Theories were advanced in the daily papers that made Sherlock Holmes seem like a novice in detective work and Lucretia Borgia a mere infant in the skillful administration of poisons. The regular detectives, both public and private, were aroused by the mystery that shrouded the case. It remained, however, for the ubiquitous reporter, to whom society really owes a debt along every line of worthy public endeavor impossible either to estimate or discharge, to discover that the handwriting on the box was that of Dr. John Earl, and that he had been in the habit, for months, of paying almost daily visits to the Bell home; that he was at Magnolia Beach, but a short ride from Boston, at the time the package was mailed there; that ostensibly he had visited the Bell home to attend the little girl who was injured by the automobile, but that the mother was undoubtedly much interested in him; that there were many rumors among surgeons that his operation on the leg of the child had produced tuberculosis; that the district attorney had received anonymous letters to the effect that Earl had deliberately attempted to poison both mother and daughter, to be rid of an unpleasant liaison on the one hand and the evidence of his lack of skill on the other; that the child had gone to the country after he left the city and he still supposed her with her mother, hence the saving of the child's life; that the box of candied fruit was only a blind, and that some other package must have arrived containing the poison in another form, possibly in the same wrapping paper with the fruit; that no possible motive could be discovered for the poisoning by any other person and no clue could be found leading to a suspicion of any one else.

With five hundred thousand visitors constantly within the gates of their city; with a shifting population of nearly a million more; with permanent residents absorbed in the most strenuous existence known on the American Continent; with sensation in high life of such frequent occurrence as to benumb any effort to form a discriminating opinion—the people of New York (visitors, temporary denizens, those of fixed habitation) welcomed these ready-made conclusions of the daily press and blindly adopted them as their own.

Individual character counts for less in the metropolis of the United States than it does anywhere else in the nation. There are several reasons for this, but the principal ones are a lack of time on the part of the permanent residents to inform themselves on such matters and a lack of interest in the subject on the part of the remainder of the population. The result is, that when charges are made, with any degree of sanction from the constituted authorities, against ordinary citizens of hitherto blameless lives, the great majority of the people accept such charges as well founded until they are effectively disproved.

So it was in this case. Just as soon as the incriminating facts seriously involved Dr. John Earl it was taken for granted that he was guilty, and such presumption was certain to grip the public mind until his innocence could be duly established, if such result were at all possible.

This was also the golden opportunity for the Bourbon members of his own profession to assail his theories and, secretly and openly, certain of them charged that the result in Dr. Earl's case was but the natural one where "standard methods" of practice were set aside for the, as yet, "unscientific paths of suggestive therapeutics," as these reactionary medical men denominated Earl's system, for he had cured through suggestive methods a score of patients who had been condemned to the operating table by other surgeons, and as a result he had aroused the resentment of such surgeons in particular and the condemnation in general of all those who believed in the supreme curative power of the knife.

Those in other walks of life, who, from conviction or selfishness, were opposed to disturbing present conditions, and who appreciated and feared the interdependence of the whole progressive movement, were also easily convinced that, properly enough, he was in the toils of the law.

It was not long until his friends and defenders began to realize that a secret sentiment was being created against him which had for its purpose the discrediting of his mental stability, as well as his medical methods, and that they would be compelled to combat not only menacing facts and conditions, but also the still more powerful influences of centuries of prejudice against men of his type, who had dared to get too far ahead of the general parade.