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Show I COL. ROOSEVELT'S I MOTIOMIED :-M Syracuse, N. Y., April 19 As his 'jS first line of defense in the $50,000 II- '3i bel action brought against him by ' William Barnes. Jr Theodore Roose- M velt today set up the astonishing con- -tention that his scathing statement M about the latter s boss methods made no perBOual charge and carried no I 7n innuendo. This was in the form of jfll; a motion made by his attorney, John M M. Brown, to dismiss the complaint V;B It was promptly overruled by Justice V;S Andrews, and the cas will go to trial nn its merits tomorrow. ,. rl The first day's session filled th . rm jury box with seven Republican5!, SB. three Progressives and two Demo- B crats. mostly young men. and dlspos- ?9 ed of all the preliminaries. Two of . the jurors bearing German names were peremptorily challenged by the ;H colonel after they had been asked if 'jm his recent attack upon Germany for I tm the violation nf Belgium's neutrality would affect their judgment. They I IBB j cot4 "rr Knt Yf D-.,-,c. vr.lt tx-o - Tint tjn. easy in his mind about them and out I - they went. He also managed to get Ml three of his own party on the jury and to get rid of Beveral persons who were too well acquainted with Mr M Barnes's political adherents. M Will Offer Proof. S Beaten in his first move, the colonel glj will begin tomorrow an attempt to prove his cbarpf-s against Barnes, de-spite de-spite his effort to prove that he did 31 not mean to bp personal. The first fM witnesses will establish the fact that the statements were made and pub- H lished Tommy MeGrath, the col- "m onel's secretary, and seeral newspa- tM per men will be used for this purpose. Then the real fighting will begin. 'M Plainly the Barnes camp regarded :9i Mr Bowers's motion as an eleventh- n hour apology, but they made no effort 'jB to accept it as such Barnes was out of the courtroom when it wa3 .V made, toward the end of the session j but Mr Ivins smiled with satisfac- M tion and chuckled complacently when m the justice overruled IL M' Bowers went considerably further w in his statement than the opposition had really expected. -J "The article in question." he said 9 "is certainly capable of an innocent B meaning. Claim of Privilege. ' -9 "All that is said makes no charge W which is not privileged It is cer- f-m talnly nothing more than the ordinary M political attack which has been made II from time immemorial in the history JW of this country. M "The statement so far as Mr. Barnes m is concerned is. therefore, merely that S Mr. Barnes assisted Mr Murphy to 'jH keep his domination c' the Democrat ic party. "There is not sven a charge that ! Mr. Murphr participated or profited M in any way. nor Is there the slightest M suggestion that Mr. Barnes had any M part therein m. "There is no charge in the article Ml at any point that Mr. Barnes profited m in a manner by any matters that are 9 made the subject of criticism Nor is there any suggestion that any of the acts done by men who were appointed were done by the direction of Mr. Barnes "There will he more room for complaint com-plaint by Governors Dix and Glynn but even as to them the article only states a situation, that it is the duty and the right of every citizen to submit sub-mit for the consideration of his fellow fel-low citizens Attack Upon System. "The references to Mr. Barnes and Mr. Murphy were entirely secondary to the attack upon a vicious system and but for the connection therewith they evidently would not be referred to They were, however, so inseparably insepar-ably connected with the svstem, that it could not be attacked without reference ref-erence to them It is to hp noted that no words wore applied to either man with reference to anything not connected with the system of government govern-ment stated to exist There v.is no golnc out of the way to besmudo the character of Mr Bartu-s or even of Mr. Murphy " Mr Bowers -aid that had the attack at-tack been made in 1898. men othr than Barnes and Murphy would have been named. He said the attacks were solely in the nature of an appeal to the voters to end corrupt conditions condi-tions and to elect for governor a man who would end them (Harvey D. Hin- man r "We submit." he said in conclusion, "that the charge is not a personal at tack upon any man. that there is no innuendo and that as then is nothing noth-ing to go to a jury' the complaint fails I move that It bo dismissed." Motion Denied. "I have read the briefs on both sides." said Justice Andrews after the buzz of surprise caused by the motion had subsided, "and I have decided de-cided that the motion must be de uied " Whereupon John J. Adams, of the Barnes counsel, who had a three-hour answer to the motion all ready to spring, gave a start of acute disappointment, disap-pointment, and thrust a bulky manuscript manu-script back into his pocket. oo |