“Now, apply the law which I have read to the facts of this case. It appears in evidence in this case from the documents which I have read to you that these men—Schwab, Fischer and Parsons—were from time to time in this city publishing articles printed in papers which they owned, for the publishing of which Spies paid, and which they declared to be their own, in which they advised the destruction of the police of this city by force, in which they advised workingmen from time to time to arm themselves with dynamite and be ready whenever a conflict came to destroy the police of this city by force. For the publication of any one of those articles, if the law had been correctly understood, those men could have been convicted and punished for a misdemeanor; and when on that night Fielden, in the presence of the crowd, told the people before him assembled that the war had come, that war had been declared, that they must arm themselves to resist what he knew never had taken place, he was making a seditious address, and for that reason, if for no other, the police force of this city had a right to appear and disperse the meeting.
“Fielden took the stand at the Haymarket, and until he concluded every sentence he uttered was a sentence seditious in its character, and which, under the decisions of the Supreme Court, would alone subject him to punishment for misdemeanor. A trap had been laid—Spies laid it; Schwab laid it; Fischer laid it; Engel laid it. A trap had been laid to bring out the police force of this city, and that trap was baited by the speeches of Parsons and Fielden. When the bait grew strong enough, the police did come. The moment they got there—the moment they stood opposite that alley, the moment their marching motion was stopped and they stood in that position where the bomb could be thrown with unerring certainty, the bomb came.
GEORGE C. INGHAM.
From a Photograph.
“Now, who made that bomb? You, gentlemen, have heard the evidence in this case, which is not disputed. I ask you, gentlemen, to remember that so far I have not alluded to a single fact about which there is or can be any dispute. It is uncontradicted in this case that Louis Lingg for months had been making bombs of a certain construction. It is uncontradicted that on the morning of Tuesday Louis Lingg said to Seliger that he must work hard all day; that the bombs would be needed and could be disposed of before night. It is in evidence in this case that on that morning Louis Lingg left that house and was gone all the morning, and nothing has been shown as to where he was. It is in evidence that he came back at noon, and because Seliger had filled only one bomb and had then laid down on the bed and gone to sleep, that Lingg upbraided him and told him that this matter must be hurried; and it is in evidence in this case that all that afternoon after that time men were coming and going to and from that house and working at that house on those bombs. Men came there whom Seliger knew; men came there whom Seliger did not know; men came there whom Mrs. Seliger knew; men came there whom Mrs. Seliger did not know. She tells you that during the whole of that day—Tuesday—men were coming and going to and from that house. What for? We put one man on the stand who went to that house in the afternoon—the witness Lehman. Lehman tells you that on Tuesday he was working at his trade; that he quit his work at three o’clock in the afternoon, instead of working until the afternoon was over; that he took a fellow-countryman of his, whose name I have forgotten, and with him went to Lingg’s house to buy a revolver; that they went to the house and dickered first about the revolver, and then went back again, and when he went back the second time Louis Lingg gave him dynamite—loaded bombs, fuse and detonating caps; that during the day Louis Lingg was distributing these bombs to different persons in the city.
“I want to call your attention to those bombs of Lingg’s—admitted to be his—bombs which he admitted to the officers that he himself made, and which were found where he had sent them. Every one of those bombs is about three inches in diameter, as nearly as they could be made with the rough material which he had. I want to call your attention to this bomb, called the ‘Czar’ bomb, obtained from Spies. That bomb in its appearance is composed of the same sort of material that Lingg’s bombs were. You can see that the only difference is in the bolts; that the bolt in the ‘Czar’ bomb was smaller than the bolt in the Lingg bomb. This bolt (exhibiting same) would not be large enough to fasten together the three-inch bombs; it would not quite reach through. Now, suppose that Louis Lingg had this bolt in his possession and wanted to make a bomb for it, what would he do? He would file off the edges here so as to make its diameter smaller. If you will look at this bomb called the ‘Czar’ bomb, you will see that that is just what has been done—the edges of it filed off, and it is just in the condition it was, with the exception of this scraping here, when the reporter Wilkinson got it. The result of that is that its diameter through here would be shorter (indicating) than the diameter across there (indicating). What else does that show? Of course, as this was filed off, it would lessen the diameter of the bomb, and when you measure this you will find that that only lacks the eighth of an inch of being the same size as the bombs found in Lingg’s possession. In other words, if that had not been filed off as it has been in order that this shorter bolt could be used, these bombs would be identical in size.
“What else is there in evidence in this case in regard to bolts? Seliger tells you that he was sent after bolts that day, that he bought a lot of bolts. They have been introduced in evidence. You, gentlemen, noticed it as soon as they were introduced in evidence, that the nut found in the body of the Socialist, and which came out of the bomb exploded at the Haymarket Square, is identically the same sort of a nut as those found on the bombs in Lingg’s possession on that day.
“We have placed on the stand the two most eminent chemists in the city of Chicago. Those gentlemen told you that they made examinations of pieces of this ‘Czar’ bomb which they took from it themselves; that they made examinations of pieces of the four bombs which came from Lingg, and that they examined certain articles found in Lingg’s possession. And what is the result? They told you that these bombs were not made of lead alone; that they were not lead and solder alone; that there is not in the city of Chicago or known to commerce any one article of which those bombs could be made, but that they are made of a mixture—not only the Lingg bombs, but the ‘Czar’ bomb. They tell you that three of the Lingg bombs and the ‘Czar’ bomb contained identically the same constituents, without any difference whatever so far as the constituents themselves are concerned, and the only difference is that between those bombs there was a slight difference in the amount of the tin and the amount of the lead. They told you that in the ‘Czar’ bomb one per cent. or one and one-tenth per cent. is tin; that in one of the Lingg bombs one and five-tenths per cent. was tin; that in another of them two per cent. was tin. The point of it is this: that every bomb was composed of a mixture and not of any one metal; that the mixture in the bombs was as nearly identical as it could be made by any man using the materials which Louis Lingg used, in the way in which he used them. You will remember that he told Capt. Schaack that he made these bombs with a mold made of clay; that he could only mold one or two bombs, when he had to make a new mold. If you will look on the inside of these bombs you will find that they were all made by a rough mold, just as you would expect from one made with a mold of clay; the only difference being that in the case of the ‘Czar’ bomb it had been filed off, as you can see, with a file, in order to smooth it.”
Mr. Ingham then read the testimony of Walter S. Haines, one of the chemists, and proceeded: