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HENRY SWEET, JURY, CLARENCE DARROW -
MICHIGAN VS. SWEET 1926
The Law of Love
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Go here for more about
 Clarence Darrow.
Go here for more about
Darrow's Law of Love speech.
It follows the full text transcript of
Clarence Darrow's closing argument in the case
The People of Michigan vs. Henry Sweet, delivered at
Detroit, Michigan - May 11, 1926. |
This is page 1 of 2. Go to
page 2.
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If the Court
please,
Gentlemen of
the Jury, |
You have listened
so long and patiently that I do not know whether
you are able to stand much more. I want to say,
however, that while I have tried a good many
cases in the forty-seven or forty-eight years
that I have lived in court houses, that in one
way this has been one of the pleasantest trials
I have ever been in. The kindness and the
consideration of the Court is such as to make it
easy for everybody, and I have seldom found as
courteous, gentlemanly and kindly opponents as I
have had in this case. I appreciate their
friendship. Lawyers are apt to look at cases
from different standpoints, and I sometimes find
it difficult to understand how a lawyer on the
other side can think as he thinks and say what
he says. I, being an extremely reasonable man
and entirely free from all kinds of prejudices
myself, find this hard to comprehend.
I shall begin about where my friend Mr. Moll
[Assistant Wayne County Prosecutor Lester Moll]
began yesterday. He says lightly, gentlemen,
that this isn't a race question. This is a
murder case. We don't want any prejudice; we
don't want the other side to have any. Race and
color have nothing to do with this case. This is
a case of murder.
Now, let's see. I
am going to try to be as fair as I can with you
gentlemen; still I don't mind being watched at
that. I just want you to give such consideration
to what I say as you think it is worth. I insist
that there is nothing but prejudice in this
case; that if it was reversed and eleven white
men had shot and killed a black while protecting
their home and their lives against a mob of
blacks, nobody would have dreamed of having them
indicted. I know what I am talking about, and so
do you. They would have been given medals
instead.
Eleven colored men
and one woman are in this indictment, tried by
twelve jurors, gentlemen. Every one of you are
white, aren't you? At least you all think so. We
haven't one colored man on this jury. We
couldn't get one. One was called and he was
disqualified. You twelve white men are trying a
colored man on race prejudice. Now, let me ask
you whether you are not prejudiced. I want to
put this square to you, gentlemen. I haven't any
doubt but that everyone of you are prejudiced
against colored people. I want you to guard
against it. I want you to do all you can to be
fair in this case, and I believe you will. A
number of you people have answered the question
that you are acquainted with colored people. One
juror I have in mind, who is sitting here, said
there were two or three families living on the
street in the block where he lives, and he had
lived there for a year or more, but he didn't
know their names and had never met them. Some of
the rest of you said that you had employed
colored people to work for you, are even
employing them now. All right.
You have seen some
of the colored people in this case. They have
been so far above the white people that live at
the corner of Garland and Charlevoix [in eastern
Detroit, where the shooting occurred: ed.] that
they can't be compared, intellectually, morally
and physically, and you know it. How many of you
jurors, gentlemen, have ever had a colored
person visit you in your home? How many of you
have ever visited in their homes? How many of
you have invited them to dinner at your house?
Probably not one of you. Now, why, gentlemen?
There isn't one of
you men but what know just from the witnesses
you have seen in this case that there are
colored people who are intellectually the equal
of all of you. Am I right? Colored people living
right here in the City of Detroit are
intellectually the equals and some of them
superior to most of us. Is that true?
Some of them are
people of more character and learning than most
of us. I have a picture in my mind of the first
witness we put on the stand--Mrs. Spalding.
Modest, intelligent, beautiful; the beauty in
her face doesn't come from powder or paint, or
any artificial means, but has to come from
within; kindly, human feeling. You couldn't
forget her. I couldn't forget her. You seldom
have seen anybody of her beauty and her
appearance. She has some colored blood in her
veins. Compare her with the teacher who for ten
years has taught high school on what she called
the corner of Garland and "Gote" Street. Compare
the two.
Now, why don't you
individually, and why don't I, and why doesn't
every white person whose chances have been
greater and whose wealth is larger, associate
with them? There is only one reason, and that is
prejudice. Can you give any other reason for it?
They would be intellectual companions. They have
good manners. They are clean. They are all of
them clean enough to wait on us, but not clean
enough to associate with. Is there any reason in
the world why we don't associate with them
excepting prejudice? Still none of us want to be
prejudiced. I think not one man of this jury
wants to be prejudiced. It is forced into us
almost from our youth until somehow or other we
feel we are superior to these people who have
black faces.
Now, gentlemen, I say you are prejudiced. I
fancy everyone of you are, otherwise you would
have some companions amongst these colored
people. You will overcome it, I believe, in the
trial of this case. But they tell me there is no
race prejudice, and it is plain nonsense, and
nothing else. Who are we, anyway? A child is
born into this world without any knowledge of
any sort. He has a brain which is a piece of
putty; he inherits nothing in the way of
knowledge or of ideas. If he is white, he knows
nothing about color. He has no antipathy to the
black.
The black and the
white both will live together and play together,
but as soon as the baby is born we begin giving
him ideas. We begin planting seeds in his mind.
We begin telling him he must do this and he must
not do that. We tell him about race and social
equality and the thousands of things that men
talk about until he grows up. It has been
trained into us, and you, gentlemen, bring that
feeling into this jury box, and that feeling
which is a part of your life long training.
You need not tell
me you are not prejudiced. I know better. We are
not very much but a bundle of prejudices anyhow.
We are prejudiced against other peoples' color.
Prejudiced against other men's religion;
prejudiced against other peoples' politics.
Prejudiced against peoples' looks. Prejudiced
about the way they dress. We are full of
prejudices. You can teach a man anything
beginning with the child; you can make anything
out of him, and we are not responsible for it.
Here and there some of us haven't any prejudices
on some questions, but if you look deep enough
you will find them; and we all know it.
All I hope for,
gentlemen of the jury, is this: That you are
strong enough, and honest enough, and decent
enough to lay it aside in this case and decide
it as you ought to. And I say, there is no man
in Detroit that doesn't know that these
defendants, everyone of them, did right. There
isn't a man in Detroit who doesn't know that the
defendant did his duty, and that this case is an
attempt to send him and his companions to prison
because they defended their constitutional
rights. It is a wicked attempt, and you are
asked to be a party to it. You know it. I don't
need to talk to this jury about the facts in
this case. There is no man who can read or can
understand that does not know the facts. Is
there prejudice in it?
Now, let's see. I don't want to lean very much
on your intelligence. I don't need much. I just
need a little. Would this case be in this court
if these defendants were not black? Would we be
standing in front of you if these defendants
were not black? Would anybody be asking you to
send a boy to prison for life for defending his
brother's home and protecting his own life, if
his face wasn't black? What were the people in
the neighborhood of Charlevoix and Garland
Streets doing on that fatal night? There isn't a
child that doesn't know. Have you any doubt as
to why they were there?
Was Mr. Moll right when he said that color has
nothing to do with the case? There is nothing
else in this case but the feeling of prejudice
which has been carefully nourished by the white
man until he doesn't know that he has it
himself. While I admire and like my friend Moll
very much, I can't help criticizing his
argument. I suppose I may say what old men are
apt to say, in a sort of patronizing way, that
his zeal is due to youth and inexperience. That
is about all we have to brag about as we get
older, so we ought to be permitted to do that.
Let us look at this case.
Mr. Moll took particular pains to say to you,
gentlemen, that these eleven people here are
guilty of murder; he calls this a cold-blooded,
deliberate and premeditated murder; that is,
they were there to kill. That was their purpose.
Eleven, he said. I am not going to discuss the
case of all of them just now, but I am starting
where he started. He doesn't want any
misunderstanding.
Amongst that
eleven is Mrs. Sweet. The wife of Dr. Sweet, she
is a murderer, gentlemen? The State's Attorney
said so, and the Assistant State's Attorney said
so. The State's Attorney would have to endorse
it because he, himself, stands by what his
assistant says. Pray, tell me what has Mrs.
Sweet done to make her a murderer? She is the
wife of Dr. Sweet. She is the mother of his
little baby. She left the child at her mother's
home while she moved into this highly cultured
community near Goethe Street. Anyhow, the baby
was to be safe; but she took her own chance, and
she didn't have a gun; none was provided for
her. Brother Toms drew from the witnesses that
there were ten guns, and ten men. He didn't
leave any for her. Maybe she had a pen knife,
but there is no evidence on that question. What
did she do, gentlemen? She is put down here as a
murderer. She wasn't even upstairs. She didn't
even look out of a window. She was down in the
back kitchen cooking a ham to feed her family
and friends, and a white mob came to drive them
out of their home before the ham was served for
dinner. She is a murderer, and all of these
defendants who were driven out of their home
must go to the penitentiary for life if you can
find twelve jurors somewhere who have enough
prejudice in their hearts, and hatred in their
minds.
Now, that is this case, gentlemen, and that is
all there is to this case. Take the hatred away,
and you have nothing left. Mr. Moll says that
this is a case between Breiner and Henry Sweet.
Mr. Moll: No, I
did not say any such thing.
Mr. Darrow: Well,
let me correct it. He says that he holds a brief
for Breiner. That is right; isn't it.
Mr. Moll: That is
right.
Mr. Darrow: Well,
I will put it just as it is, he holds a brief
for Breiner, this Prosecuting Attorney. He is
wrong. If he holds a brief for Breiner, he
should throw it in the stove. It has no place in
a court of justice. The question here is whether
these defendants or this defendant is guilty of
murder. It has nothing to do with Breiner.
He says that I
wiggled and squirmed every time they mentioned
Breiner. Well, now, I don't know. Did I? Maybe I
did. I didn't know it. I have been around court
rooms so long that I fancy I could listen to
anything without moving a hair. Maybe I
couldn't. And, I rather think my friend is
pretty wise. He said that I don't like to hear
them talk about Breiner. I don't, gentlemen, and
I might have shown it. This isn't the first case
I was ever in. I don't like to hear the State's
Attorney talk about the blood of a victim. It
has such a mussy sound. I wish they would leave
it out. I will be frank with you about it. I
don't think it has any place in a case. I think
it tends to create prejudice and feeling and it
has no place, and it is always dangerous. And
perhaps, whether I showed it or not, my friend
read my mind. I don't like it.
Now, gentlemen, as
he talked about Breiner, I am going to talk
about him, and it isn't easy, either. It isn't
easy to talk about the dead, unless you
"slobber" over them and I am not going to
"slobber" over Breiner. I am going to tell you
the truth about it. Why did he say that he held
a brief for Breiner, and ask you to judge
between Breiner and Henry Sweet? You know why he
said it. To get a verdict, gentlemen. That is
why he said it. Had it any place in this case?
Henry Sweet never knew that such a man lived as
Breiner. Did he? He didn't shoot at him.
Somebody shot out into that crowd and Breiner
got it. Nobody had any feeling against him.
But who was
Breiner, anyway? I will tell you who he was. I
am going to measure my words when I state it,
and I am going to make good before I am through
in what I say. Who was he? He was a conspirator
in as foul a conspiracy as was ever hatched in a
community; in a conspiracy to drive from their
homes a little family of black people and not
only that, but to destroy these blacks and their
home. Now, let me see whether I am right. What
do we know of Breiner? He lived two blocks from
the Sweet home. On the 14th day of July, seven
hundred people met at the schoolhouse and the
schoolhouse was too small, and they went out
into the yard. This school- house was across the
street from the Sweet house.
Every man, in that community knew all about it.
Every man in that community understood it. And
in that schoolhouse a man rose and told what
they had done in his community; that by main
force they had driven Negro families from their
homes, and that when a Negro moved to Garland
Street, their people would be present to help.
That is why Mr. Breiner came early to the circus
on the 9th. He went past that house, back and
forth, two or three times that night. Any
question about that? Two or, three times that
night he wandered past that house. What was he
doing? "Smoking his pipe." What were the rest of
them doing? They were a part of a mob and they
had no rights, and the Court will tell you so, I
think. And, if he does, gentlemen, it is your
duty to accept it.
Was Breiner
innocent? If he was every other man there was
innocent. He left his home. He had gone two or
three times down to the corner and back. He had
come to Dove's steps where a crowd had collected
and peacefully pulled out his pipe and begun to
smoke until the curtain should be raised. You
know it. Why was he there? He was there just the
same as the Roman populace were wont to gather
at the Colosseum where they brought out the
slaves and the gladiators and waited for the
lions to be unloosed. That is why he was there.
He was there waiting to see these black men
driven from their homes, and you know it;
peacefully smoking his pipe, and as innocent a
man as ever scuttled a ship. No innocent people
were there. What else did Breiner do? He sat
there while boys came and stood in front of him
not five feet away, and stoned these black
people's homes, didn't he? Did he raise his
hand? Did he try to protect any of them? No, no.
He was not there for that. He was there waiting
for the circus to begin.
Gentlemen, it is a
reflection upon anybody's intelligence to say
that everyone did not know why this mob was
there. You know! Everyone of you know why. They
came early to take their seats at the ringside.
Didn't they? And Breiner sat at one point where
the stones were thrown, didn't he? Was he a
member of that mob? Gentlemen, that mob was bent
not only on making an assault upon the rights of
the owners of that house, not only making an
assault upon their persons and their property,
but they were making an assault on the
constitution and the laws of the nation, and the
state under which they live. They were like
Samson in the temple, seeking to tear down the
pillars of the structure. So that blind
prejudices and their bitter hate would rule
supreme in the City of Detroit. Now, that was
the case.
Gentlemen, does anybody need to argue to you as
to why those people were there? Was my friend
Moll even intelligent when he told you that this
was a neighborly crowd? I wonder if he knows you
better than I do. I hope not. A neighborly
crowd? A man who comes to your home and puts a
razor across your windpipe, or who meets you on
the street and puts a dagger through your heart
is as much a neighbor as these conspirators and
rioters were who drove these black people from
their home. Neighbors, eh? Visiting? Bringing
them greetings and good cheer! Our people were
newcomers. They might have needed their larder
stocked. It was a hot night. The crowd probably
brought them ice cream and soda, and possibly
other cold drinks. Neighbors? Gentlemen,
--neighbors? They were neighbors in the same
sense that a nest of rattlesnakes are neighbors
when you accidentally put your foot upon them.
They are neighbors in the sense that a viper is
a neighbor when you warm it in your bosom and it
bites you. And every man who knows anything,
about this case knows it. You know what the
purpose was.
Where did you get
that fool word "neighborly?" I will tell you
where he got it. A witness on our side, a
reporter on the News, said that he parked his
automobile upon the street. People around there
call it "Gothy" Street but intelligent people
call it "Goethe" Street; and then he walked down
Garland. And, as he started down the street, he
observed that the crowd was plainly made up
largely of neighbors and the people who lived
there, a neighborly, visiting crowd. As he got
down toward Charlevoix he found the crowd
changing--the whole aspect has changed. They
were noisy and riotous and turbulent. Now,
gentlemen, am I stating it right? Or am I
stating it wrong? Is it an insult to one's
intelligence to say those were neighbors? They
knew why they were there. They had been getting
ready a long time for this welcome. They were
neighbors in the sense that an undertaker is a
neighbor when he comes to carry out a corpse,
and that is what they came for, but it was the
wrong corpse. That is all.
Now, let us see who were there and how many were
there. Gentlemen, my friend said that he wasn't
going to mince matters. I think I will, because
I know the prejudice is the other way. You can
pick twelve men in these black faces that are
watching your deliberations and have throughout
all these weary days, and with them I would not
need to mince matters; but I must be very
careful not to shock your sensibilities. I must
state just as much or as near the facts as I
dare to state without shocking you and be fair
to my client.
It was bad enough
for a mob, by force and violation of law, to
attempt to drive these people from their house,
but gentlemen, it is worse to send them to
prison for life for defending their home. Think
of it. That is this case. Are we human? Hardly.
Did the witnesses for the State appearing here
tell the truth? You know they did not. I am not
going to analyze the testimony of every one of
them. But they did not tell the truth and they
did not mean to tell the truth.
Let me ask you
this question, gentlemen: Mr. Moll says that
these colored people had a perfect right to live
in that house. Still he did not waste any
sympathy on the attempt to drive them out. He
did not say it was an outrage to molest them.
Oh, no, he said they had a perfect right to live
in that house. But the mob met there to drive
them out. That is exactly what they did, and
they have lied, and lied, and lied to send these
defendants to the penitentiary for life, so that
they will not go back to their home.
Now, you know that
the mob met there for that purpose. They
violated the constitution and the law, they
violated every human feeling, and threw justice
and mercy and humanity to the winds, and they
made a murderous attack upon their neighbor
because his face was black. Which is the worse,
to do that or lie about it? In describing this
mob, I heard the word "few" from the State's
witnesses so many times that I could hear it in
my sleep, and I presume that when I am dying I
will hear that "few", "few", "few" stuff that I
heard in Detroit from people who lied and lied
and lied. What was this "few?" And who were
they, or how did they come there? I can't tell
you about everyone of these witnesses, but I can
tell you about some of them. Too many. I can't
even carry all of their names in my mind and I
don't want to. There are other things more
interesting; bugs, for instance. Anything is
more interesting to carry in your mind, than the
names of that bunch, and yet I am going to say
something for them, too, because I know
something about human nature and life; and I
want to be fair, and if I did not want to, I
think perhaps it would pay me to be.
Are the people who
live around the corner of Charlevoix and Garland
worse than other people? There isn't one of you
who doesn't know that they lied. There isn't one
of you who does not know that they tried to
drive those people out and now are trying to
send them to the penitentiary so that they can't
move back; all in violation of the law, and are
trying to get you to do the job. Are they worse
than other people? I don't know as they are. How
much do you know about prejudice? Race
prejudice. Religious prejudice. These feelings
that have divided men and caused them to do the
most terrible things. Prejudices have burned men
at the stake, broken them on the rack, torn
every joint apart, destroyed people by the
million. Men have done this on account of some
terrible prejudice which even now is reaching
out to undermine this republic of ours and to
destroy the freedom that has been the most
cherished part of our institutions.
These witnesses
honestly believe that they are better than
blacks. I do not. They honestly believe that it
is their duty to keep colored people out. They
honestly believe that the blacks are an inferior
race and yet they look at themselves, I don't
know how they can. If they had one colored
family up there, some of the neighbors might
learn how to pronounce "Goethe." It would be too
bad to spread a little culture in that vicinity.
They might die. They are possessed with that
idea and that fanaticism, and when people are
possessed with that they are terribly cruel.
They don't stand alone. Others have done the
same thing. Others will do the same thing so
long as this weary old world shall last. They
may do it again, but, gentlemen, they ought not
to ask you to do it for them. That is a pretty
dirty job to turn over to a jury, and they ought
not to expect you to do it.
Now, what did this
"neighborly" crowd do, anyway? How many people
were up there around Sweet's home? It was up to
the State to bring all the people who knew about
it. They had the first call and brought in some
of the witnesses that knew about the case. They
didn't find this honest, old German woman. They
didn't find the reporter or newspaper man who
worked for the Detroit Daily News. They didn't
find the man who kept the tire store. Well, now,
why didn't they?
I will say in my
dealings with these prosecuting attorneys, that
they have been perfectly fair about most matters
during this trial. But, still, why did they
leave out these witnesses? They were on the spot
when it all happened. There are three righteous
white people. I am a little rusty on the Bible,
but perhaps you can correct me. Sodom and
Gomorrah would have been saved if ten righteous
men could have been found. If Sodom and Gomorrah
could have been saved by ten, the corner of
Charlevoix and Garland should have been saved by
three.
Was there a crowd
at that corner on that fatal night? Let me see
what their witnesses say, if we can find out.
Not one of them has told the truth, excepting as
we dragged it from them. Mr. Dove lives right
across the street from the Sweet house. He said
he got home from his work and went out on his
porch, and his wife and baby went with him. And
there were two other people upstairs, and they
were all there present at roll call, not only on
the 9th but on the 8th. It was a warm evening
and they got there in time for the shooting.
How hard it was to
pry out of them that they went there on account
of the colored people who had moved in across
the way! You people are not lawyers. You do not
know how hard it was to make them admit the
truth. It is harder to pull the truth out of a
reluctant witness than to listen to them lie.
They were there on the porch for everything on
earth except to see the slaughter. Still, they
finally admitted that curiosity took them there,
just curiosity. Curiosity over what? A black man
had driven up to the house two small trucks
containing a bed and a stove and a few chairs
and a few clothes, and he was going to live in
that community. That is why their witnesses went
to that corner that night and reluctantly they
admitted it.
Dove said that
there were about ten or fifteen people in front
of his house, and that Leon Breiner was sitting
there on the lawn; and a number of other people
standing there, too. Mrs. Dove said there were
two over there and that she did not see Breiner,
or anybody else, and the people upstairs weren't
there, and the two roomers weren't there,
although all of them have testified that they
were present.
Here is another
witness, Abbie Davis. She testified that she
went down around the corner where everybody else
went; we have had about ten or fifteen who went
around that corner and each one said that no one
else was there. She said, as I remember it,
there were probably about twenty people on the
street. And I asked: How, many in front of the
Dove house? She didn't see any, though she was
right across the street.
Let us take the
corner of Charlevoix, where the school house
stands, with the Sweet house on the other side.
How many were there? Schuknecht, the officer
[Norton Schuknecht, a witness for the
prosecution], said that he stood on that corner
all the evening. Schuknecht said that fifteen or
twenty were standing there, and some other
witnesses put it higher.
Miss Stowell,
--Miss Stowell--do you see her? I do.
S-t-o-w-e-l-l. You remember, gentlemen, that she
spelled it for us. I can spell that in my sleep,
too. I can spell it backwards. Well, let me
recall her to you. She teaches school at the
corner of Garland and "Gother" Street; fifteen
years a high school teacher, and, in common with
all the other people in the community, she
called it "Gother" Street.
She came down to
the apartment building, opposite the Sweet house
that night to see about a picnic. She left just
before the picnic began. She said she sat on the
porch with Draper and his wife and made
arrangements for the children to go to the
picnic and she thought their boy was there, too.
Now, you remember
Draper. Draper was a long, lean, hungry-looking
duck. He said he paced up and down in front of
his house. He didn't see much of anything. I
asked him where his boy was. Well, he thought
his boy was part of the time out on that porch.
Were you there? "No." Was your wife there? "No."
Now, part of the time the boy was there. Well,
now, Miss S-t-o-w-e-l-l said that they were all
there. She was there all right. Nobody was on
the street in front of them. She sat right
there.
And they called
this fellow Belcher, the man who is so good to
his wife. His wife had gone away--not for
good---either for her good or his--to visit a
sick friend that belonged to her lodge. And, as
soon as she got out of the house Belcher started
down to the corner across from the Sweet house
and got restless and uneasy. Maybe he is telling
the truth. I have a theory that might account
for his telling the truth, but it is not the
theory of the State. He paced up and down the
block for half an hour looking over the street
cars to see if, perchance, his wandering wife
might return. She was accustomed to going out of
nights, and the cars stopped at their door. It
wasn't dark. The corner of Garland and
Charlevoix is inhabited by very fine people who
have an "improvement club" so as to keep it in
proper condition for their children. I don't see
why he was so restless about his wife; whatever
it was, for more than half an hour, he was
pacing back and forth; probably nearer an hour.
He didn't see anybody else. He didn't see
Draper.
He did see a
policemen, but that is all; but, Miss
S-t-o-w-e-l-l didn't see him. Didn't see
anything, but looked over at the other side to
the schoolhouse yard, and what did she see?
"Well, there were fifty or one hundred people
around there." So, I don't know as I should
complain so much about her. She came nearer to
telling the truth about that than any other
witness called by the State; a good deal nearer.
She looked across the street and saw fifty or
one hundred people, but she saw nobody on the
sidewalk and it was seething with people who
weren't even there, and when she went away she
didn't look around the corners, and didn't know
who were there. Wonderful witness, that woman.
Are there any two
of their witnesses that have agreed on any fact?
She says fifty or one hundred. What did the
policeman say? There were about eight policemen
standing around there to protect a colored
family. Two of them were from Tennessee. That
ought to have helped some. I don't know where
the rest came from. Some them seemed to come
from some institution, judging by the way they
talked. Do you remember the fellow that said he
was parading all the evening along the one
sidewalk next to his house? Right along here.
Didn't see anybody. Didn't know whether anybody
was over there in the schoolhouse-yard, and he
said "there might have been four." Now, he is
one, isn't he?
Here is another
policeman, parading all the evening on this
short beat. He came pretty nearly down to the
corner. Nobody was on this corner. Was there
anybody on the schoolhouse-yard? "There might
have been four." Four, gentlemen. I wouldn't say
this man lied. It takes some mentality to lie.
An idiot can't lie. It takes mentality because
it implies a design, and those two people had no
design or anything else. Now, I won't say the
same about Schuknecht. He has some mentality;
some; just some. He said "there were probably
one hundred and fifty around there." The next
man, what is the name of the next policeman?
Mr. Toms [Wayne
County Prosecutor Robert M. Toms]:
Schellenberger [Paul Schellenberger, also a
witness for the prosecution].
Mr. Darrow:
Schellenberger. He said "there were forty or
fifty," but he finally admitted that he said
"one hundred and fifty" on the former trial. You
can fix it the way you want it. Let me tell you
this: Every witness the State put on told how
the policemen were always keeping the crowd
moving, didn't they? They were always driving
people along and not permitting them to
congregate, didn't they? Who were these people
and where did they come from? No two witnesses
on the part of the State have agreed about
anything.
Let me give you
another illustration of the wonderful
mathematical geniuses who testified in this
case. Let me refer to my friend, Abbie. I asked
her this, did you belong to the improvement
club? Yes. After a long time I brought out of
her why she joined it. I asked: Did you go to
that meeting at the corner of Charlevoix and
Garland in the Howe School? "Yes." What was it
about? "Don't know." Why did you go? "To find
out." Did you find out? "No." Did you ask
anybody? "No." How many were there? "About
forty. I passed through the hall and then went
outside." Why? "Don't know." Did the crowd go
out because there wasn't room for you. "Don't
think so."
And then comes
another busy lady, from just south of the
schoolhouse. A typical club lady. A lady with a
club--for Negroes. Now, what did she say? She is
a wonder. I can see her now. That is the second
time I have seen her, too. It would be terrible
if I didn't have a chance to see her again. She
went up there. Why? "Looking for my girl." Yes?
I will mention about that girl. How many people
did you see? "Oh, not many, a few around the
corner." You belong to the Improvement Club?
"Yes." Were you there to that meeting at the
school house? "Yes." What was it about? "I don't
know." Who spoke? "I don't know." What did they
say? "I don't know." Nobody knows anything
except one man and we pried that out of him. How
many were there? "About forty." Did they adjourn
later on? "Yes." Did you go out? "Yes." Didn't
stay long.
Now they put
another witness on the stand. Everybody in that
vicinity belonged to the improvement club. I am
going to mention this again, but I just want to
speak about one thing in connection with that
club. Mr. Andrews came here, and you remember my
prying-out and surprising myself with my good
luck, because when a lawyer gets something he
wants, he doesn't at all feel that he was
clever. He just worms around until he gets it,
that's all. I asked: Did you belong? He said he
did. How many were at the meeting of the
Improvement Club at the schoolhouse? "Oh, seven
or eight hundred." That is their witness. They
began in the schoolhouse and there wasn't room
enough to hold them, and they went out in the
yard. Now, these two noble ladies, mothers,
looking for their daughters, they said "forty."
What did the
speaker at the meeting say? "Well, one of them
was very radical." He was? "Yes." What did he
say? "He said he advocated violence. They told
what they had done up there on Tireman street,
where they had driven Dr. Carter [actually Dr.
Alexander Turner] out, and they wouldn't have
him, and he said, when-ever you undertake to do
something with this Negro-question down here, we
will support you." Gentlemen, are you deaf or
dumb or blind, or just prejudiced, which means
all three of them? No person with an ounce of
intelligence could have any doubt about the
facts in this case. This man says "seven or
eight hundred" when these women say "forty."
Another witness called by them said "five
hundred." Andrews was the only man who testified
as to who spoke at the meeting, or what he said;
not another one. Did they lie? Yes, they lied,
and you know they lied.
On the eve of the
Sweet family moving into their home, and on the
corner of the street where their home was
located and in a public school house, not in the
South but in Detroit. Six or seven hundred
neighbors in this community listened to a
speaker advocating the violation of the
constitution and the laws, and calling upon the
people to assemble with violence and force and
drive these colored people from their homes.
Seven hundred people there, and only one man
told it.
Let me say something else about it, gentlemen.
There were present at that meeting two
detectives, sent by the Police Department to
make a report. Officer Schuknecht said that he
had heard about the formation of that
"Improvement Club" and the calling of that
meeting, and the purchase of that house by
colored people, and he wanted to watch it. So he
sent two detectives there. They heard this man
make a speech that would send any black man to
jail, that would have sent any political
crusader to jail. They heard the speaker urge
people to make an assault upon life and
property; to violate the constitution and the
law; to take things in their own hands and
promise that an organization would stand back of
them.
Why was he not
arrested? Gentlemen, in a schoolyard paid for by
your taxes; paid for by the common people, of
every color, and every nationality, and every
religion, that man stood there and harangued a
mob and urged them to violence and crime in the
presence of the officers of this city, and
nothing was done about it. Didn't everybody in
the community know it? Everybody! Didn't
Schuknecht know it? He sent the detective there
for that purpose. And what else did Andrews say?
He said the audience applauded this mad and
criminal speech, and he applauded, too.
And yet, you say
that eleven poor blacks penned in a house for
two days, with a surging mob around them, and
knowing the temper of that community; and
knowing all about what had happened in the past;
reading the Mayor's proclamation, and seeing who
was there, and knowing what occurred in the
school house, waiting through the long night of
the 8th and through the day of the 9th, walled
in with the mob into the night of the 9th, until
the stones fell on the roof, and windows were
knocked out; and yet, gentlemen, you are told
that they should have waited until their blood
should be shed, even until they were dead, and
liberty should be slain with them. How long,
pray, must an intelligent American citizen wait
in the City of Detroit, with all this history
before them? And, then, gentlemen, after all
that, these poor blacks are brought back into a
court of justice and twelve jurors are asked to
send them to prison for life.
I want to talk to you a little more about who
was around that house, and why, and what they
were doing, and how many there were. You may
remember a man named Miller. This man Miller
expressed it pretty well. I suppose I prodded
him quite a bit. I asked: What was the
organization for? "Oh, we want to protect the
place." Against what? "Oh, well, generally." You
can't make it more definite? "Yes, against
undesirables." Who do you mean by
"undesirables?" "Oh, people we don't want," and
so on and so forth. Finally, he said, "against
Negroes." I said: Anybody else? He thought
awhile, and he said: "Well, against Eyetalians."
He didn't say Italians. He hadn't got that far
along yet, but he said Eyetalians. Of course,
there was a Syrian merchant running the store on
the corner, so Syrians evidently didn't count.
By the way, we haven't seen that Syrian or heard
from him. He must have done a fine business that
night. He should have seen something. They were
not prejudiced much about Syrians. They want to
keep it American, Miller says. I asked him who
the undesirables were, and the first are
Negroes, and the second, Eyetalians.
Well, now,
gentlemen, just by the way of passing, words are
great things, you know. You hear some fellow who
wants more money than you want, and he calls
himself a one-hundred percent American. Probably
he doesn't know what the word American means.
But he knows what he wants. You hear some fellow
who wants something else talking about
Americanism. I don't know where Miller came
from; about how early or how late an arrival he
is in America. The only real Americans that I
know about are the Indians, and we killed most
of them and pensioned the rest.
I guess that the
ancestors of my clients got here long before
Miller's did. They have been here for more than
three hundred years; before the Pilgrims landed,
the slave ships landed, gentlemen. They are
Americans and have given life and blood on a
thousand different kinds of fields for America
and have given their labor for nothing, for
America. They are Americans. Mr. Miller doesn't
know it. He thinks he is the only kind of
American. The Negroes and Eyetalians don't
count. Of course, he doesn't like them. Mr.
Miller doesn't know that it was an Eyetalian
that discovered this land of ours. Christopher
Columbus was an Eyetalian, but he isn't good
enough to associate with Miller. None of the
people of brains and courage and intelligence,
unless they happen to live around those four
corners, are good enough, and there are no
brains and intelligence, and so forth, to spare
around those corners. If there ever was they
have been spared. These are the kind of
prejudices that make up the warp and woof of
this case.
Gentlemen, lawyers are very intemperate in their
statements. My friend, Moll, said that my client
here was a coward. A coward, gentlemen. Here, he
says, were a gang of gun men, and cowards--shot
Breiner through the back. Nobody saw Breiner, of
course. If he had his face turned toward the
house, while he was smoking there, waiting for
the shooting to begin, it wasn't our fault. It
wouldn't make any difference which way he
turned. I suppose the bullet would have killed
him just the same, if he had been in the way of
it. If he had been at home, it would not have
happened.
Who are the
cowards in this case? Cowards, gentlemen! Eleven
people with black skins, eleven people,
gentlemen, whose ancestors did not come to
America because they wanted to, but were brought
here in slave ships, to toil for nothing, for
the whites--whose lives have been taken in
nearly every state in the Union,--they have been
victims of riots all over this land of the free.
They have had to take what is left after
everybody else has grabbed what he wanted. The
only place where he has been put in front is on
the battle field. When we are fighting we give
him a chance to die, and the best chance. But,
everywhere else, he has been food for the
flames, and the ropes, and the knives, and the
guns and hate of the white, regardless of law
and liberty, and the common sentiments of
justice that should move men. Were they cowards?
No, gentlemen, they may have been gun men. They
may have tried to murder, but they were not
cowards.
Eleven people,
knowing what it meant, with the history of the
race behind them, with the picture of Detroit in
front of them; with the memory of Turner and
Bristol [Alexander Turner and Vollington
Bristol, two Blacks driven out of their homes
earlier in the summer of 1925]; with the Mayor's
proclamation still fresh on paper, with the
knowledge of shootings and killings and insult
and injury without end, eleven of them go into a
house, gentlemen, with no police protection, in
the face of a mob, and the hatred of a
community, and take guns and ammunition and
fight for their rights, and for your rights and
for mine, and for the rights of every being that
lives. They went in and faced a mob seeking to
tear them to bits. Call them something besides
cowards.
The cowardly curs
were in the mob gathered there with the backing
of the law. A lot of children went in front and
threw the stones. They stayed for two days and
two nights in front of this home and by their
threats and assault were trying to drive the
Negroes I out. Those were the cowardly curs, and
you know it. I suppose there isn't any ten of
them that would come out in the open daylight
against those ten. Oh, no, gentlemen, their
blood is too pure for that. They can only act
like a band of coyotes baying some victim who
has no chance.
And then my
clients are called cowards. All right,
gentlemen, call them something else. These
blacks have been called many names along down
through the ages, but there have been those
through the sad years who believed in justice
and mercy and charity and love and kindliness,
and there have been those who believed that a
black man should have some rights, even in a
country where he was brought in chains. There
are those even crazy enough to hope and to dream
that sometime he will come from under this cloud
and take his place amongst the people of the
world. If he does, it will be through his
courage and his culture. It will be by his
intelligence and his scholarship and his effort,
and I say, gentlemen of the jury, no honest,
right feeling man, whether on a jury, or
anywhere else, would place anything in his way
in this great struggle behind him and before
him.
Now, let us return to the house. Why were the
policemen there that night? You know why they
were there. Were they there to protect these
Holy people from the Negroes? Oh, no. Were they
there to protect the people who hate Eyetalians
from the Negroes? No. Were they there to protect
the residents of Goethe Street? No, no, not
that. Was an army to be let loose on Charlevoix
and Garland? No. They were there, gentlemen, to
protect the rights of a colored family who
occupied the premises that they had bought.
Protect them against what? Against people who
would drive them out in violation of law. Is
there any doubt about that?
No, perhaps some
of you gentlemen do not believe in colored men
moving into white neighborhoods. Let me talk
about that a minute, gentlemen. I don't want to
leave any question untouched that might be
important in this case, and I fancy that some of
you do not believe as I believe on this
question.
Let us be honest
about it. There are people who buy themselves a
little home and think the value of it would go
down if colored people come. Perhaps it would. I
don't know. I am not going to testify in this
case. It may go down and it may go up. It will
probably go down for some purposes and go up for
others. I don't know. Suppose it does? What of
it? I am sorry for anybody whose home
depreciates in value. Still, you can not keep up
a government for the purpose of making people's
homes valuable. Noise will depreciate the value
of a house, and sometimes a street car line will
do it. A public school will do it. People do not
like a lot of children around their house. That
is one reason why they send them to school. You
can not get as much for your property. Livery
stables used to do it; garages do it now. Any
kind of noise will do it. No man can buy a house
and be sure that somebody will not depreciate
its value. Something may enhance its value, of
course. We are always willing to take the
profit, but not willing to take the loss. Those
are incidents of civilization. We get that
because we refuse to live with our fellow man,
that is all.
Look at the
Negro's side of it. You remember Dancy. Did you
ever see a brighter man than he? Compare him
with Miller. Compare him with Miss
S-t-o-w-e-l-l. Compare him with Andrews. Compare
him with anybody on their side of this case.
There isn't any comparison. Dancy is colored. He
is the head of the Urban League, branch of the
association of charities. His business is to
look after the poor black, the ones who need it.
He told you how
hard it was for colored people to find homes. Do
I need to say anything about it? You, gentlemen,
are here and you want to do right. Are any of
you going to invite colored people to live next
door to you? No. Would it hurt you? Not at all.
Prejudice is so deep that it might affect the
value of your property for sale purposes. Let me
ask you, would not any of you like to meet
Dancy? Who would you rather meet for
companionship and association and fellowship,
Dancy or some of the gophers up around "Goffee"
Street as some call it? I know who you would
rather meet.
Who would you
rather meet, their white witnesses or Spalding?
Now, I would put Spalding down as a real
gentleman. He has some colored blood in him, but
what of it? He was a student at Ann Arbor
University. He has a good mind, hasn't he?
Wouldn't any of you be willing to invite him
into your home? I think you would. What is he
doing? He is a mail carrier, because he is a
black gentleman, otherwise he would have as
important a position as the white man would
have, with his attainments and his courtesy and
his manner. He is black, partly black.
What are you, gentlemen? And what am I? I don't
know. I can only go a little way toward the
source of my own being. I know my father and I
know my mother. I knew my great-grandmothers and
my grand-fathers on both sides, but I didn't
know my great grandfathers and great grand
others on either side, and I don't know who they
were. All that a man can do in this direction is
but little. He can only slightly raise the veil
that hangs over all the past. He can peer into
the darkness just a little way and that is all.
I know that somewhere around 1600, as the record
goes, some of my ancestors came from England.
Some of them. I don't know where all of them
came from, and I don't think any human being
knows where all his ancestors came from. But
back of that, I can say nothing. What do you
know of yours?
I will tell you
what I know, or what I think I know, gentlemen.
I will try to speak as modestly as I can;
knowing the uncertainty of human knowledge,
because it is uncertain. The best I can do is to
go a little way back. I know that back of us all
and each of us is the blood of all the world. I
know that it courses in your veins and in mine.
It has all come out of the infinite past, and I
can't pick out mine and you can't pick out
yours, and it is only the ignorant who know, and
I believe that back of that--back of that--is
what we call the lower order of life; back of
that there lurks the instinct of the distant
serpent, of the carnivorous tiger. All the
elements have been gathered together to make the
mixture that is you and I and all the race, and
nobody knows anything about his own.
Gentlemen, I
wonder who we are anyhow, to be so proud about
our ancestry? We had better try to do something
to be proud of ourselves; we had better try to
do something kindly, something humane, to some
human being, than to brag about our ancestry, of
which none of us know anything.
Now, let us go back to the street again. I don't
know. Perhaps I weary you. Perhaps these things
that seem important to me are unimportant, but
they are all a part of the great human tragedy
that stands before us. And if I could do
something, which I can't, to make the world
better, I would try to have it more tolerant,
more kindly, more understanding; could I do that
and nothing else, I would be glad.
The Police
Department went up there on the morning of the
8th, in the City of Detroit, in the State of
Michigan, USA, to see that a family were
permitted to move into a home that they owned
without getting their throats cut by the noble
Nordics who inhabit that jungle. Fine, isn't it?
No race question in this? Oh, no, this is a
murder case, and yet, in the forenoon of the
8th, they sent four policemen there, to protect
a man and his wife with two little truck loads
of household furniture who were moving into that
place.
Pretty tough,
isn't it? Aren't you glad you are not black? You
deserve a lot of credit for it, don't you,
because you didn't choose black ancestry? People
ought to be killed who chose black ancestry. The
policemen went there to protect the lives and
the small belongings of these humble folk who
moved into their home. What are these black
people to do?
I seem to wander
from one thing to another without much sequence.
I must get back again to the colored man. You
don't want him. Perhaps you don't want him next
to you. Suppose you were colored. Did any of you
ever dream that you were colored? Did you ever
wake up out of a nightmare when you dreamed that
you were colored? Would you be willing to have
my client's skin. Why? Just because somebody is
prejudiced!
Imagine yourselves
colored, gentlemen. Imagine yourselves back in
the Sweet house on that fatal night. That is the
only right way to treat this case, and the court
will tell you so. Would you move there? Where
would you move? Dancy says there were six or
seven thousand colored people here sixteen years
ago. And seventy-one thousand five years ago.
Gentlemen, why are they here? They came here as
you came here, under the laws of trade and
business, under the instincts to live; both the
white and the colored, just the same; the
instincts of all animals to propagate their
kind, the feelings back of life and on which
life depends. They came here to live. Your
factories were open for them. Mr. Ford hired
them. The automobile companies hired them.
Everybody hired them. They were all willing to
give them work, weren't they? Everyone of them.
You and I are
willing to give them work, too. We are willing
to have them in our houses to take care of the
children and do the rough work that we shun
ourselves. They are not offensive, either. We
invited them; pretty nearly all the colored
population has come to Detroit in the last
fifteen years; most of them, anyhow. They have
always had a corner on the meanest jobs. The
city must grow, or you couldn't brag about it.
The colored people
must live somewhere. Everybody is willing to
have them live somewhere else. The people at the
corner of Garland and Charlevoix would be
willing to have them go to some other section.
They would be willing to have them buy a place
up next to Mrs. Dodge's house; but most of them
haven't got money enough to do that; none that I
know of. Everybody would be willing to have them
go somewhere else.
Somewhere they
must live. Are you going to kill them? Are you
going to say that they can work, but they can't
get a place to sleep? They can toil in the mill,
but can't eat their dinner at home. We want them
to build automobiles for us, don't we? We even
let them become our chauffeurs. Oh, gentlemen,
what is the use! You know it is wrong. Everyone
of you know it is wrong. You know that no man in
conscience could blame a Negro for almost
anything. Can you think of these people without
shouldering your own responsibility? Don't make
it harder for them, I beg you.
They sent four
policemen in the morning to help this little
family move in. They had a bedstead, a stove and
some bedding, ten guns and some ammunition, and
they had food to last them through a siege. I
feel that they should have taken less furniture
and more food and guns.
Gentlemen, nature
works in a queer way. I don't know how this
question of color will ever be solved, or
whether it will be solved. Nature has a way of
doing things. There is one thing about nature,
she has plenty of time. She would make broad
prairies so that we can raise wheat and corn to
feed men. How does she do it? She sends a
glacier plowing across a continent, and takes
fifty-thousand years to harrow it and make it
fit to till and support human life. She makes a
man. She tries endless experiments before the
man is done.
She wants to make
a race and it takes an infinite mixture to make
it. She wants to give us some conception of
human rights, and some kindness and charity and
she makes pain and suffering and sorrow and
death. It all counts. That is a rough way, but
it is the only way. It all counts in the great,
long broad scheme of things. I look on a trial
like this with a feeling of disgust and shame. I
can't help it now. It will be after we have
learned in the terrible and expensive school of
human experience that we will be willing to find
each other and understand each other.
Now, let us get to the bare facts in this case.
The City of Detroit had the police force there
to help these people move into their home. When
they unloaded their goods, men and women on the
street began going from house to house. This
club got busy. They went from house to house to
sound the alarm, "the Negroes are coming," as if
a foreign army was invading their homes; as if a
wild beast had come down out of the mountains in
the olden times.
I am not going
over it fully. Two attractive, clever girls, who
have color in their faces, without using paint,
stayed at the Sweets that night, the 8th,
because they did not dare go home. Can you
imagine those colored people? They didn't dare
move without thinking of their color. Where we
go into a hotel unconsciously, or a church, if
we choose, they do not. Of course, colored
people belong to a church, and they have a YMCA.
That is, a Jim Crow YMCA. The black Christians
cannot mix with the white Christians. They will
probably have a Jim Crow Heaven where the white
angels will not be obliged to meet the black
angels, except as servants.
These girls went
out to the Sweet's house and were marooned, and
did not dare to go home on account of the crowd
on the streets. Was there a crowd? Schuknecht
says there were more on the streets on the 8th
than the 9th. Of course, I don't believe him,
but he says there were more automobiles on the
9th. The papers had advertised that the colored
people had come, and over on Tireman Avenue they
were busy gathering the klans to help out the
Nordic brother of Charlevoix and Garland.
On the 9th, what
happened? I have told you something about the
crowd. Are our witnesses telling the truth, or
are they lying? The tire man, who is white,
won't lie to help them. The newspaper man, Mr.
Cohen, won't lie to help them. He went down that
street just before it happened, in time to hear
the sound of the stones against the Sweet house,
and he told what it was and how he had to elbow
his way through the crowd.
Do you believe it?
Oh, no, you don't believe it. You know it, and I
am wasting my time because you know it. No need
to talk to a jury to correct their ideas. That
is easy. If a man has an opinion you can always
change it. If he has a prejudice you can't get
rid of it. It comes without reason, and is
immune to reason.
I will call your
attention a minute to witnesses we have brought
here. Those two were white. There is another
white witness. That is this motherly,
attractive, Mrs. Hinteys; I don't worry about
her at all. My friends of the prosecution tried
to say some things about her, not so very
unkindly. I don't know as I would say unkindly
at all, but rather arouse suspicion in your
minds as to the truth of her story. She said she
didn't appear on the first trial. No, white
people don't run around volunteering to be
witnesses for us. She appeared in this trial,
and it seems that she had done work for the
mother of my associate, Thomas Chawke. When she
heard that he was in the case, she went to see
him and she came on this witness stand and told
her story.
Now, gentlemen,
you saw her. Did she tell the truth, or didn't
she? Lawyers have a habit, you know, of talking
about the intelligence and perfection of their
own witness, and I imagine I am not breaking
that habit. I have seen few people that
impressed me more than Mr. and Mrs. Spalding. I
have seen few young girls, no matter what their
color, that impressed me more than those two
girls who spent the night in that house. I was
impressed with Smith's story. It was obviously
true. He had such difficulty getting through
Garland Street that night. His car was stoned
because his face was black. Everybody knows that
the automobile man would have no reason for
lying, and that if he could choose to do
anything, he would testify on the other side. I
don't need to suggest to anybody that the
newspaper man was telling the truth. And if he
tells the truth, it settles this case.
Is the old lady
telling the truth? She is the kind we don't see
as much of now as we once did see. She is the
working woman. Of course, you don't see them
very much except when you come in the house and
visit the kitchen. But I am older than most of
you, I guess,--than any of you. Anyway, I have
seen them. A woman with a fine face. She
probably would have called that "Goethy" Street,
like the rest, because she hasn't much
education. She isn't like the rest of the mob. A
fine, honest face. She knew exactly what she was
talking about and she told the truth. As I
looked at her on the witness stand, it seemed to
me that I could see through her face; her face
covered with the scars of life, and fight, and
hard work, to the inward beauty that shone
through it. I could almost feel the years
slipping away from me and leaving me a boy again
in the simple country town where I was born; I
could see my mother and her companions who swept
their own houses, did their own washing and
baked their own bread and made clothes for the
children; they were kind, simple, human and
honest.
There isn't a man
on this jury who could be persuaded to believe
that this woman wasn't honest. She said there
were five hundred people on the corner alone. Is
there any doubt about that? She said "more than
five hundred." She said "twice as many as there
are in this room."
Now let's see what
Schuknecht said, and then I shall skip a little.
I know you wish I would skip a lot more. There
were certain things that did happen that night,
weren't there? There was a crowd there. They
began coming as the dusk gathered. They don't
work in the daylight; not those fellows. They
are too good for daylight work. They came as the
dusk gathered. They came in taxis and
automobiles and on foot. They came on every
street that centered at Charlevoix; they came
down the sidewalk and over across the street,
where they gathered in that school yard; the
school yard, gentlemen, of all the places on
earth; the schoolyard where they made their
deadly assault upon justice and honesty and law,
and they were gathered there five hundred
strong. Still this was no doubt the only
occasion that most of them had ever needed a
schoolhouse.
Schuknecht stood
out in front, didn't he? He had this in charge.
I don't need to go beyond the witnesses who
appeared here for the State. He stood there on
that corner, in front of the schoolhouse. His
brother-in-law came up twice or three times to
see him. Do you remember him? He worked for the
telegraph company. Why did he come? "Looking for
my boy." Yes, he was looking for his boy. He
came up, and he asked nobody about the boy, and
he went back to his home, still looking for his
boy, and came back looking for his boy again,
and went back once more and came back again
looking for his boy.
Now, I am just a
little doubtful in my mind whether he is telling
the truth or not. I will give you two theories,
and you can choose. He either said that he was
looking for his boy so he could claim that he
was not there, looking for the riot that he knew
was coming; or he knew what was coming and he
was afraid for the life of his boy and was
hunting him. Take your choice. I have thought of
both ideas. Sometimes I take one view and
sometimes another! But, anyway, he was there
looking for his boy. "Where is my wandering boy
tonight?" was the song he seemed to be singing,
right around that corner. Poor boy. You have
been away from home before. It was only dusk.
"My God, I must find that boy."
Well, gentlemen,
strange, isn't it, and up there above the Sweet
house, coming down, on the other side of the
street was a woman, Abbie, looking for her girl,
nineteen years old. Mr. Toms thinks she was too
old to disturb her mother, but I will tell you
this, if a mother lived to be one hundred and
she had a girl, seventy-five, she would still be
looking for her. She was looking for a girl
wandering up and down the street, in front of
the Sweet house; a strange place to be looking
for a girl. She might have gone in there and got
eaten by the blacks. In front of the Sweet
house, of all the places in the world, and then
she went back, and then she went across to the
Dove house, and didn't see anybody there, but
Breiner got shot, and we left her looking for
her girl.
And on this corner
was that devoted husband, the most devoted
husband I ever heard of, in court, at least. I
have read about them in fairy-stories;
fairy-stories and cheap novels. I have read
about devoted wives, and I have read about
devoted husbands, but this husband pacing back
and forth for almost an hour watching for his
wife to get off the car at the corner in front
of her house certainly takes the cake. Maybe he
really loved his wife; I don't know. Such things
have happened, and maybe he didn't know just
when this show was going to begin, gentlemen.
Maybe he was worried, and on the other side of
the street was a lady looking for her girl.
All the fathers
and all the mothers and all the husbands and all
the wives were gathering the chickens under
their wings for the coming storm. Weren't they?
Just before eight o'clock. They were clearing
the decks for action and getting the children
out of the schoolyard and out of the crowd, so
that the only strong, healthy men, and plenty of
them, could get these "gun" men who were trying
to live in their own home.
What was
Schuknecht doing? Now, gentlemen, let us see
about that again. I never say much about
policemen.
Mr. Toms: What was
that?
Mr. Darrow: I
never say much about policemen. Do I?
Mr. Toms: That is
what you said, but I couldn't believe it.
Mr. Darrow: I am
going to be very easy on Schuknecht. I have
often seen good policemen. I mean, good men who
were policemen. But, now, Schuknecht said that
he had this matter in his charge. Didn't he? He
stood right there on the corner. He did wander a
little bit, but not much; inside of the block
all the time, knowing that the whole
responsibility rested on him. He had eight men
early in that evening besides himself; and
another officer. That made ten; and then as the
night wore on, and the darkness began to gather,
the darkness and the crowd came down together on
those four corners.
They sent for two
more policemen. Then they put policemen on the
four corners a block away and blocked the
street. For what? There wasn't any crowd there.
Nobody says it was a crowd, unless they are
lying; just a "few;" a "few;" and they blocked
the streets. Gentlemen, none of you look like
you were born yesterday. Maybe you were; I can
not tell. And then a little later, what
happened? They sent for two more policemen. At
the station they had twenty or thirty in reserve
waiting for a riot call. Didn't they? They had
ten or twelve policemen, twenty or thirty
waiting for a riot call, and they sent up for
two more, in a hurry, and they hustled down.
And then two
policemen were sent to the top of that flat
across the way, where they could "view the
landscape" o'er the highest point of vantage,
which, of course, would be used to protect the
civilization and culture of Charlevoix Avenue;
and they had just got started to go to the top
of the flat when they sent for six more.
Gentlemen, six
more policemen, making some fifteen or eighteen
policemen around that corner. Was there any need
of it? It was perfectly peaceful. Only four
people on the schoolhouse grounds, according to
some of them. Nothing doing. All quiet on the
Potomac; warm summer evening, and the children
lying on the lawn. Children, gentlemen,
children. There might have been some children
earlier in the evening, but they had all been
gathered under their mothers' wings before that
time, and most of the women had disappeared.
Just before these fatal shots were fired. Why
were the policemen there?
Gentlemen, do we need anything else? If we need
anything else, it is this: If we need anything
else to show the hostility of the crowd that was
there, it is this: A policeman swore that one
window that we claim was broken at the time was
really broken afterwards. Why? Who would take a
"pebble" to break the windows out of these poor
peoples' home after they were safely lodged in
jail? And the policemen were in charge. This
shooting was on the 9th of September; six or
seven months have passed away since then; all
these defendants were in jail two or three
months, and since that they have been out on
bail, but a policeman still stands guard on that
vacant home to protect it from being destroyed
by the people who want to have an American
community where they can raise their families
"in peace and amity."
Gentlemen,
supposing you return a verdict of not guilty in
this case, which you will; I would be ashamed to
think you would not; what would happen if this
man and his wife and his child, moved into that
house? They have the same right to go to that
house that you have to your home, after your
services are done. What will happen? Don't you
know? What did Schuknecht say? Eight or ten
policemen were standing around that house for
two days and two nights. A menacing crowd was
around them, wasn't there? The police were
protecting them. Did one policeman ever go to
one person in that crowd and say: "What are you
here for?"
There was a mob
assembled there. The Court will tell you what a
mob is. I don't need to tell you. He will tell
you that three or more people gathered together
with a hostile intent is a mob; there were five
hundred; they were plotting against the persons
of these people and their lives, perhaps, as
well. Did any policeman try to disperse it? Did
they raise their hands or their voices, or do
one single thing? Did they step up to any man
and say: "Why are you here?" Never. They stood
around there or sat around there like bumps on a
log, while the mob was violating the
Constitution and the laws of the State, and
offending every instinct of justice and mercy
and humanity.
Schuknecht was
standing there; five or six others were standing
there, weren't they, gentlemen? Let us see how
closely they were guarding the house. They did
nothing. They heard no stones thrown against
that house; not one of them; and yet they were
not twenty feet away. The State brought here
some twenty stones gathered next morning from
the house and yard, and nobody knows how many
more there were. Gentlemen, a roof slopes at an
incline of forty-five degrees, or about that.
You can get the exact figures if you want them.
Imagine some one throwing stones against the
roof. How many of them would stay there, or how
many of them would stay in the immediate yard,
and how many of them would be left there after
the mob had finished and sought to protect
itself, and the police and crowd had gathered
them up, the police force which was responsible
for this tragedy? None of them heard a stone,
and yet they were there to protect that home.
None of them heard the broken glass, but they
were there to protect that home. None of them
saw two men come in a taxi, except one who
hesitated and finally admitted that it seemed as
if he did; but none of the rest. Gentlemen, you
could have looted that house and moved it away
and the police would never have known it. That
is the way these people were protected.
[Lunch Break]
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