Anarchy and Anarchists / A History of the Red Terror and the Social Revolution in America and Europe; Communism, Socialism, and Nihilism in Doctrine and in Deed; The Chicago Haymarket Conspiracy and the Detection and Trial of the Conspirators

by Michael J. Schaack

“The court instructs the jury, as a matter of law, that circumstantial evidence is just as legal and just as effective as any other evidence, provided the circumstances are of such a character and force as to satisfy the minds of the jury of the defendants’ guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.

“The court instructs the jury that what is meant by circumstantial evidence in criminal cases is the proof of such facts and circumstances connected with or surrounding the commission of the crime charged as tend to show the guilt or innocence of the party charged. And if those facts and circumstances are sufficient to satisfy the jury of the guilt of the defendants beyond a reasonable doubt, then such evidence is sufficient to authorize the jury in finding the defendants guilty.

“The law exacts the conviction wherever there is sufficient legal evidence to show the defendants’ guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, and circumstantial evidence is legal evidence.

“The court instructs the jury, as a matter of law, that when the defendants August Spies, Michael Schwab, Albert R. Parsons and Samuel Fielden testified as witnesses in this case, each became the same as any other witness, and the credibility of each is to be attested by and subjected to the same tests as are legally applied to any other witness; and in determining the degree of credibility that shall be accorded to the testimony of any one of said above-named defendants, the jury have a right to take into consideration the fact that he is interested in the result of this prosecution, as well as his demeanor and conduct upon the witness-stand during the trial, and the jury are also to take into consideration the fact, if such is the fact, that he has been contradicted by other witnesses. And the court further instructs the jury that if, after considering all the evidence in this case, they find that any one of said defendants August Spies, Michael Schwab, Albert R. Parsons and Samuel Fielden has willfully and corruptly testified falsely to any fact material to the issue in this case, they have the right to entirely disregard his testimony, except in so far as his testimony is corroborated by other credible evidence.

“The rule of law which clothes every person accused of crime with the presumption of innocence, and imposes upon the State the burden of establishing his guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, is not intended to aid any one who is in fact guilty of crime to escape, but is a humane provision of law, intended, so far as human agencies can, to guard against the danger of any innocent person being unjustly punished.

“The court instructs the jury, as a matter of law, that in considering the case the jury are not to go beyond the evidence to hunt up doubts, nor must they entertain such doubts as are merely chimerical or conjectural. A doubt, to justify an acquittal, must be reasonable, and it must arise from a candid and impartial investigation of all the evidence in the case, and unless it is such that, were the same kind of doubt interposed in the graver transactions of life, it would cause a reasonable and prudent man to hesitate and pause, it is insufficient to authorize a verdict of not guilty. If, after considering all the evidence, you can say you have an abiding conviction of the truth of the charge, you are satisfied beyond a reasonable doubt.

“The court further instructs the jury, as a matter of law, that the doubt which the juror is allowed to retain on his own mind, and under the influence of which he should frame a verdict of not guilty, must always be a reasonable one. A doubt produced by undue sensibility in the mind of any juror, in view of the consequences of his verdict, is not a reasonable doubt, and a juror is not allowed to create sources or materials of doubt by resorting to trivial and fanciful suppositions and remote conjectures as to possible states of fact differing from that established by the evidence. You are not at liberty to disbelieve as jurors if from the evidence you believe as men; your oath imposes on you no obligation to doubt where no doubt would exist if no oath had been administered.

“The court instructs the jury that they are the judges of the law as well as the facts in this case, and if they can say, upon their oaths, that they know the law better than the court itself, they have the right to do so; but before assuming so solemn a responsibility, they should be assured that they are not acting from caprice or prejudice, that they are not controlled by their will or their wishes, but from a deep and confident conviction that the court is wrong and that they are right. Before saying this, upon their oaths, it is their duty to reflect whether, from their study and experience, they are better qualified to judge of the law than the court. If, under all the circumstances, they are prepared to say that the court is wrong in its exposition of the law, the statute has given them that right.

“In this case the jury may, as in their judgment the evidence warrants, find any or all of the defendants guilty or not, or all of them not guilty; and if, in their judgment, the evidence warrants, they may, in case they find the defendants, or any of them, guilty, fix the same penalty for all the defendants found guilty, or different penalties for the different defendants found guilty.

“In case they find the defendants, or any of them, guilty of murder, they should fix the penalty either at death or at imprisonment in the penitentiary for life, or at imprisonment in the penitentiary for a term of any number of years, not less than fourteen.”