That is all we ask. We ask the mercy of an honest verdict, and of your honest opinion. We ask the mercy of a verdict born of your courage, a verdict born of your sense of justice, a verdict born of your manhood, remembering that you are the peers of any in the world. And it is for you to say, gentlemen, whether these defendants are worthy to live among their fellow-citizens; whether they shall be taken from the sunshine and from the free air, and whether they are worthy to be men among men.
It is for you to say whether they are to be taken from their homes, from their pursuits, from their wives, from their children. That responsibility rests upon you.
It is for you to say whether they shall be clothed in dishonor, whether they shall be clad in shame, whether their day of life shall set without a star in all the future's sky; that is for you.
It is for you to say whether Stephen W. Dorsey, John W. Dorsey, John R. Miner, Thomas J. Brady, and H. M. Vaile shall be branded as criminals.
It is for you to say, after they have suffered what they have, after they have been pursued by this Government as no defendants were ever pursued before, whether they shall be branded as criminals.
It is for you to say whether their homes shall be blasted and blackened by the lightning of a false verdict.
It is for you to say whether there shall be left to these defendants and to those they love, a future of agony, of grief and tears. Nothing beneath the stars of heaven is so profoundly sad as the wreck of a human being. Nothing is so profoundly mournful as a home that has been covered with shame—a wife that is worse than widowed—children worse than orphaned. Nothing in this world is so infinitely sad as a verdict that will cast a stain upon children yet unborn.
It is for you to say, gentlemen, whether there shall be such a verdict, or whether there shall be a verdict in accordance with the evidence and in accordance with law.
And let me say right here that I believe the attorneys for the prosecution, eager as they are in the chase, excited with the hunt, after the sober second thought, would be a thousand times better pleased with a verdict of not guilty. Of course they want victory. They want to put in their cap the little feather of success, and they want you to give in the scales of your judgment greater weight to that feather than to the homes and wives and children of these defendants. Do not do it. Do not do it.
I want a verdict in accordance with the evidence. I want a verdict in accordance with the law. I want a verdict that will relieve my clients from the agony of two years. I want a verdict that will drive the darkness from the heart of the wife. I want a verdict that will take the cloud of agony from the roof and the home. I want a verdict that will fill the coming days and nights with joy. I want a verdict that, like a splendid flower, will fill the future of their lives with a sense of thankfulness and gratitude to you, gentlemen, one and all.