The Man of Last Resort; Or, The Clients of Randolph Mason

by Melville Davisson Post

Is there not in all this criticism a faint suggestion of the men who “darken counsel by words without knowledge”?

Lycurgus taught the laws to the people, Solon taught the laws to the people. The Roman law provided for a final appeal from the consul to the people, and the very essence of republican institutions lies, as has been said, in a recognition of the people as the source of the law-making power. If the law offers imperfect security and is capable of revision, the people must be taught in order that they may revise it. If it offers insufficient security and is incapable of revision, then the people must be taught in order that they may protect themselves. This conclusion is irresistible. To counsel otherwise is to share in the odium of that short-sighted ambassador who urged upon Pericles the wisdom of reversing the tablet upon which the law was written in order that the people might not read the decree.

Surely, then, he who points out the vices of the law to the people cannot be said to do evil, unless the law of the land is to be made by a narrow patriciate sitting, like the Areopagus of ancient Athens, with closed doors.

That yesterday in which the enemies of society plied their craft by means of the jimmy and the dark lantern is now almost entirely past. The master rogue has discovered, with immense satisfaction, that the labor of others may be enjoyed, and the results of their labor seized and appropriated to his uses, without thrusting himself within the control of criminal tribunals.

Wise magistrates, laboring for the welfare of the race, have been pleased to write down what should be done and what should not be done, and have called it “law.” The citizen, having no time to inquire, has gone about his trade under the impression that these rules were offering ample protection to his person and his property. But the law, being of human device, is imperfect, and in this fag end of the nineteenth century, the evil genius thrusts through and despoils the citizen, and the robbery is all the more easy because the victim sleeps in a consciousness of perfect security.

The writer has undertaken to point out a few of the more evident inadequacies of the law and a few of the simpler methods for evasion that are utilized by the skilful villain. It must be borne in mind, however, that more gigantic and more intricate methods for evading the law and for appropriating the property of the citizen are available. The unwritten records of business ventures and the reports of courts are crowded with the record of huge schemes having for their ultimate purpose the robbery of the citizen. Some of these have been successful and some have failed. Enough have brought great fortunes to their daring perpetrators to appal that one who looks on with the welfare of human society at heart.

The reader must bear in mind that the law herein dealt with is the law as it is administered in the legal forms of his country, in no degree changed and in no degree colored by the imagination of the author. Every legal statement represents an established principle, thoroughly analyzed by the courts of last resort. There can be no question as to the probable truth of these legal conclusions. They are as certainly established as it is possible for the decisions of courts to establish any principle of law.

The reader is reminded that the schemes of skilled plotters, resorted to for the purpose of defeating the spirit of the law, are, for the most part, too elaborate and too intricate to be made the subject of popular discussion. An attempt to explain to the but half-interested layman plots of this character would be as vain as an attempt to demonstrate an abstract problem in analytical mechanics. The knaves who have been pleased to devote their energies and their capacities to problems of this nature are experts learned and capable, and against these the average man of affairs can defend himself but poorly. He may be warned, however, and the author will have accomplished his purpose if he succeeds in identifying the black flag of such pirate crafts.

In the present volume he has deemed it wise to continue to utilize as his central figure the lawyer, Randolph Mason,—a rather mysterious legal misanthrope, having no sense of moral obligation, but learned in the law, who by virtue of the strange tilt of his mind is pleased to strive with the difficulties of his clients as though they were mere problems involving no matter of right or equity or common justice.

This emotionless counsellor has already been introduced to the public. He has been described as a man in the middle forties. “Tall and reasonably broad across the shoulders; muscular, without being either stout or lean.” His hair was thin and of a brown color, with erratic streaks of gray. His forehead was broad and high and of a faint reddish color.