"'So Samuel turned again after Saul, and Saul worshiped the Lord.
"'Then said Samuel, bring ye hither to me Agag, the king of the Amalekites. And Agag came unto him delicately. And Agag said, surely the bitterness of death is past.
"'And Samuel said, as thy sword has made women childless, so shall thy mother be childless among women. And Samuel hewed Agag in pieces before the Lord in Gilgal.
"'Then Samuel went to Ramah; and Saul went up to his house to Gibeah of Saul.
"'And Samuel came no more to see Saul until the day of his death; nevertheless, Samuel mourned for Saul; and the Lord repented that he had made Saul king over Israel.'"
Mr. Pierrepont then read from the eighteenth chapter of St. Matthew as follows:—
"'Woe unto the world because of offences, for it must needs be that offences come; but woe unto that man by whom the offence cometh.... It were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and that he were drowned in the depth of the sea.'
"Such was the order in the times of this Book. All government is of God. The powers that be are ordained of God. Now, from whom come those words? Not from the Old Testament, but they come from the meek and lowly Jesus, the Saviour of the world, who died for you, for me, for all. It is true as the counsel have said, that God is a God of mercy; but he says: 'Though I am a God of mercy, I will by no means clear the guilty.' Now the counsel who has addressed you, you will remember, said in his speech, with great earnestness: 'We have had blood enough; let us have peace.' The question before you, gentlemen, is not about blood. The question is not about peace. The question before you is whether you have not had murder enough, and assassination enough, and crime enough, to enable us to have at least once before a civil tribunal in this land a trial and a verdict. Not a single one of all those engaged in the conspiracy has been tried before a civil tribunal; and the question now is, have you not had enough of this murder, enough of this assassination, to have at least one jury of the country say so, and to say that we will stop it? You and I have nothing to do with the consequences. All we have to do is to do our duty, and ascertain whether the man is guilty. You do not punish the man; I do not punish the man. I have not a feeling toward him of punishment, and you have no such feeling. The duty does not lie with you, nor with me; we have nothing to do with that. The question for us is to see whether this man is guilty of this violation of the law of the land as charged; and if so, to so declare; and then, if for any cause, the Executive sees fit to show leniency, he will show it. If he does not, he will not. It is not for you or for me to have to say what the leniency should be. It is not for you or for me to have anything to say upon that question. Our business is, I repeat, to ascertain whether he is guilty of this violation of the law, and if he is guilty, so to say, and then afterward to say whatever we thought fit to be said with regard to any leniency. Our duty is, and the duty of the court is, to find out that one fact, and to have you pronounce your verdict, under your oath, according to the facts as you find them.
"There are one or two other things that I must notice before I come to the main question. One of these is in regard to the attacks which were made by counsel yesterday upon the learned District Attorney and myself. Have you seen anything in the conduct of the District Attorney in this case that was improper? Have you seen anything but an earnest desire to discharge his duty? If I understood the counsel aright yesterday, he said that if he should stand in the place and should have done as the District Attorney had, he would expect the women, as they passed him, to gather their skirts and pull them aside, lest they be contaminated by the touch. I did not at that time know why there was so much bitterness of feeling thus expressed, but I have been shown since last night this record called the 'Rebellion Record,' and I find in it that on the 5th of January, 1861, Edward C. Carrington, now District Attorney, issued to the public a stirring letter calling out the militia of this District for the purpose of aiding in the protection of the government of the United States; calling upon them to rally; and they did rally at his call. The fact of this native born citizen of Virginia, one of your own number and living in your midst, having thus early and practically taken the side in favor of the government, when even his own State had deserted him, of course would be likely to call down the greatest bitterness and hatred against this loyal and noble citizen on the part of a certain class. We have been told, gentlemen, by the counsel upon the other side, that the Judge Advocate General had done a great many wrong things in his life. We have been told that the military commission which Mr. Johnson had established, and he alone, had done wrong things in their prosecution; and we have been told, likewise, that the Supreme Court of the United States had decided that this commission was illegal. Now you would hardly expect an eminent lawyer to make such a statement unless he believed it. But he is wholly mistaken. No court in the United States has declared this commission to have been illegal. There is no such decision on record—not any.
"Some of these very persons are now in confinement, and if the Supreme Court of the United States had declared the commission that tried them illegal, why should they now, in a time of profound peace, be kept in prison? If such were the case would not an application have been immediately made by my learned brother for a writ of habeas corpus to release them? But nothing of the kind is done. And why? Because no such decision has ever been pronounced. No court has, and in my judgment no court will, pronounce this commission, thus formed by the President of the United States, to have been illegal."