OCR Text |
Show JUDGE McKEAH'B CHAHGE. Judge- McKean commenced hit W remarkable charge to the grand jury with hia favorite quotation from the Supreme Court of California to the effect that a consideration of the political and social condition of a country are within the province and duty of a judicial tribunal; and thia is evidently a correct and sensible view. It is simply the application of facts and common aenac principles to the interpretation of tho law and the administration of justice. UntWuuch construction the illegal action of the vigilance committees of California w8 undisturbed by the courts and their members applaud sd rather than punished. By such conatructfon are the acta of do facto rebellious governments govern-ments over a rebellious people or territory sustained by the parent government, for the necessity to preserve pre-serve law and order sometimes overrides the sentiment of loyalty; and the doctrine of inherent popular popu-lar sovereignty and of I he Stato-rights Stato-rights principle of our government prevailed eo Btrongly, even after the military conquest of the Southern Confederacy, that Chief Justice Cbase and the leading Republican lawyers wSuld not consent to jeopardize their political and professional reputations by the trial of Jefferson Davis for treason, when there could have been no doubt of hia technical guilt. The Chief Justice in this case took cognizance cogni-zance of the political institutions and condition of the country in Buffering tho case of the President of the so-called so-called Southern rebellian to pass off' without subjecting the country to the ordeal of a searching legal investigation investiga-tion into the causes and circu instances of that revolt. It was forseen that such a trial, under the direction of that legal-master spirit, Charles O'Conor, could not fail to go down to the very foundations of the government, govern-ment, and that whatovor might have baou its result in regard to Mr. Davis, tho Republican party, then in the height of its power aad influence, could not afford to jeopardize itself by such an enquiry. History is tilled with similar examples, exam-ples, but Judge McKean, in laying down a correct principle of law, ueeB it for a purpose foreign to its practical practi-cal meaning and obvious intent. Even were the indictments which he Jinds against the settlers of Utah at an early period, long before the commencement com-mencement of his judicial career, within his present jurisdiction, and if the entire truth of these indictments is admitted, it must be said that the judge in his zeal to prosecute, or rather, persecute the Mormons, utterly ut-terly fails to consider the political, social and religious condition of the country over which ho judicially rules. On the contrary, his charge convicts the people of this territory of wholesale crime and criminal intent on the strength of ancient statutes which were enacted for the proper regulutioa and control of public pro perty lor the. benefit ol the public, nearly all of which have long since been repealed, or have become obse-lete; obse-lete; he arraigns them for tho commission of act!, which if ever constituting offences, have been condoned by executive amnesty, or congressional action, and accuses them of practices assumed to have been committed on the strength of such evidence as the utterances of public speakers, in giving free vent to their individual opinions. Instead of laying down the law to the grand jury he quotes what he heard some individual indivi-dual say in the Tabernacle four years ago about the legality of territorial governments; in the place of instructions instruc-tions as to their present duties, he seems to invite the jury to a review, if not the indictment of, the government govern-ment of the United States in the following fol-lowing language: But, gen tie moo, after a quarter of a CCDtury of almost or quito criminal negiect of, or moral complicity in these wroagi, ttie Rovoramout of ibo Republic Repub-lic his turned Its attention with some earnestness to the aihurs of Utah. Have we not fairly shown that Judge McKean has not only perverted perver-ted his legal text from its obvious meaninr, but uses it to stirrup strife, 'prejudice and hatred; to rake from the ashes of the past fresh discords and' feuds; to kindle the fires of religious relig-ious animosity, and keep society in a blaze of excitement, which cannot serve the interests of good government and the higher moral and material well-bcinc of the community ? |