Show MANIFEST INJUSTICE THE decision rendered jan 17 in the supreme court of the territory in the hendrickson habeas corpus case carried what we regard in the light of a judicial outrage a step further it continued for the time being the imprisonment of an innocent woman whose character is above the breath of suspicion in flat contravention of the law which speaks for itself the reason for the insertion of the clause in the edmunds tucker law 10 exempting legal wives under certain circumstances from being compelled to testify in specific cases against their husbands husbands is not fax far to seek in the beginning beg fnning of the legal raid instituted against polygamists in 1884 legal wives were exempt from compulsion but as one step after another was taken in departing from sound law in these prosecutions various illegal devices were resorted to among them was the segregation system under which a large number of convicted persons suffered faw false imprisonment when the supreme court of the united states decided that the method was invalid a 0 jog jail delivery of t h he e victims was the result another of the innovations introduced and complained of was the compelling of legal wives to testify tiby against their husbands without the consent of either the basis of this extraordinary and barbarous action of the courts was a territorial statute which was never intended to apply in such cases it was done on the theory that unlawful cohabitation was a crime against the legal wife the latter not being allowed however to have any voice as to whether such was waa the case representations presentations Ke in this connection were made at washington Washing tun and it was admitted in high places that such a proceeding was an outrage being opposed to a vital eitai principle of civilized jurisprudence to prevent the perpetuation of the wrong and to take jakeaway takeaway away one of the reasons upon which the mormon people claimed that they were being legally persecuted the clause in relation to the competency and privilege of legal wives as witnesses was inserted in the edmunds tucker law and made its first section it states as plainly as the english language can tell it that a legal wife cannot be compelled to testily testify against her husband unless there be a specified element of consent without which she he is lot a competent witness the hendrickson case is one of the plainest in this regard imaginable mrs hester hendrickson dr appeared in answer to a subpoena as a witness before a grand jury she stated under oath that she was the legal wife of john hendrickson and on that ground declined to testify further the prosecution being in a case against her husband she stood upon her privilege as defined in the first section of the edmunds tucker law even if her testimony on the point of relationship had been doubted we understand it was not it was the only evidence adduced on that point and stood yet the court when she was brought before afore iti it decided that a question asked by the grand jury that would be to the detriment of the accused was waa proper and that she should answer it it was impossible for that question to be proper without the element of consent required by law the absence of this consent rendered the witness incompetent and so far as legal gal force is 16 concerned there is not shade adshade of difference between an ira improper Proper question put toa to a compe tont tent witness and a question put to an incompetent witness in either case a bar to further proceeding is presented in the one case the question must be transformed into legal shape in the other the element of incompetency must be cleared away otherwise the barrier remains the decision which appeared in our last issue smothers in a mass of verbiage as a baby in a huge bundle of feathers the only vital point in the whole issue the legal privilege of the witness it is made perfectly clear in the law but is enveloped in a waste of words in the decision after this decision was rendered the lady who was the victim of this contempt proceeding concluded to answer the questions propounded by the grand J jury ury and went to ogden january 18 for the purpose she did not recede from the legality of her position she simply yielded under extreme pressure she would not be able to endure the torture to which she would be subjected if she took toofe any other position there is no proper place in which to confine females in the penitentiary and imagination agi nation may but faintly depict the mental and physical agony that would have to be endured by a delicate and respectable woman if she should be confined for any length of time in a small room with two women denof of loose and unsavory character these inmates of the same compartment as that to which mrs hendrickson was assigned slept in the daytime and at night engaged in smoking ng swearing quarreling and reciting their past debaucheries debau cheries with the male sex we axe are informed that the marshal was directed specially to place M hendrickson in the penitentiary and not permit her to be confined elsewhere thus she was treated like a common criminal that she yielded to this pressure is not to be wondered at there appears but a small distinction between it in point of exquisiteness and what was resorted to in inquisition times when judges determined to bring victims to terms one would have imagined that seeing there was an intention to appeal to the supreme court of the united states some humane and decent method of imprisonment might have been devised and permitted pending final adjudication in this case the appeal was practically barred by the intending appellant not having sufficient mental and physical endurance to pass through the intermediate ordeaL which would have been a veritable hell under such circumstances it is only the physically robust and morally obtuse that could reach the ultimate process f justice associated with appeal as provi provided dei by law so go far as we can learn leam the decision in this case is considered by attorneys generally as bad law there are few if any who doubt thatis that if the court of last resort had been reached the discharge of the prisoner would have been the result |