Democratic Sentinel, Volume 10, Number 37, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 15 October 1886 — DECEMBER 3. [ARTICLE]

DECEMBER 3.

That Is the Day Set Apart for the Execution of the Convicted Anarchists. Judge Gary Asks Them for Reasons Why They Should Not Be Hanged, And They Reply with Argument, Denunciation, Invective, and Tirade Against Capital. The motion to secure a new trial for the convicted Chicago anarchists has failed, and Friday, the 3d of December, been lixetl as the day of execution. JUDGE GARY’S DECISION. Reasons for Refusing to Grant tlio Anarchists a New Trial. The Court began by saying that the case was bo voluminous that it was impossible, within reasonable limits, to give a synopsis. He did not understand that either upon the trial or the argument on the motion had the defense attempted to deny that the defendants, except Neebe, were combined for some purpose. The object of that combination had been debated by the counsel. It was important to know what that fact was, whether it was morely to encourage the workingmen to resist unlawful attacks, or whether it was something else. Thero was no better way than to read what they had spoken and written as to the object of the combination while tiro events wore occurring. He ■would therefore read from the files of the Alarm and Arbeiter-Zeiluny what the defendants themselves have said, beginning as far hack as Jan. 18, 1885. The court then read at length from the flies of the papers in quostion, etioosing such articles as wouid throw the clearest light upon the purposes of tho defendants. He then said: “The papers and speeches furnish an answer to the argument of the counsel, that what they proposed was simply that they should arm themselves, so as to rosist any unlawful attacks which the police or the militia might make upon them. “Now, there can bo no claim that this was a lawful object. There can bo no claim hut that the force which would extend in the carrying out of that object to taking human lifo is murder. It is impossible to argue that any set of men havo a right to dictate to other men whether they shall work or not for a particular individual, and if they choose to work in defianoe of that dictation to drivo them oft by force, and if tho police undertake to prevent tho use of that force, then they have tho right to kill the police. It is impossible to contend for any such principle us that. ” He reviewed at length tho connection of Noebe ■with the conspiracy, and dourly showed that he was associated generally with it in encouraging the movement which hod for its object the doetruetion of tho Government. Upon tho question whother the defendants or any of thorn did anticipate or expect tho throwing of tho bomb, ho said that it was a question not necessary to consider, because the instructions to the jury did not go upon that ground, hut upon the ground that they had generally by speech and print udvisod a large class to commit murder, and had left tho occasion, time, and place to tho individual will, whim, and caprice of the individuals so advised, und that in consequence of that advico and in pursuance of it and influenced bv it somebody not known did throw the bomb. Tho crime was nothing loss than murder, and manslaughter was not to be considered. If verdicts were to be set aside for the cause urged, it was a sure way to bring about anarchy, Bince there would be no way to maintain government and administer law. Tho Court closed by saying : “I think that no case of such magnitude could be tried with less in the way oi irregularity of proceeding in tho trial than in this cuse, and tho motion must be overruled.” “Prisoners at the bar," spoke Judge Gary, “for the first time during these painful and protracted proceedings it is my duty to speak to you, and call upon you individually and separately now to ask whether you havo anything to say why sentence should not ho passed upon you according to the verdict of the jury. I will iirst call upon Mr. Neebe.” SPIES SPEAKS. He Denounces Capitalists, Berates Justice and Says He’ll Die Game. August Spies rose beforo a little table upon which his notes were placed, along with a glass of water, wearing a plain black suit with a but-ton-hole bouquet, strokod his hair back over his somewhat intelligent forohoad, and perspired freely, indicating the great strain upon his physical powers which tho critical situation imposed ujion h ini He spoke for three-quarters of an hour. We present a few choice extracts from his rcmarkablo speech. He began by asserting that there was no evidence connecting him with tho Haymarket massacre, and declared that the execution of tho sentence against him would he “nothing less than a willful, malicious and deliberate murder, as foul a murder as may be found in the annals of religious, political or any other sort of persecution. “The class that clamors for our lives, the good and dovout Christians, have attempted in every way, through their newspapers and otherwise, to conceal tho true and only isauo in this case by designating the defendants anarchists and picturing .them as a newly discovered tribe or species of cannibals, by inventing shocking and horrifying stories of their conspiracies. These Christians sought to keep the naked evidence from the working people—namely, that the evening of May 4 two hundrod armed men under the command of a notorious ruffian attacked a meeting of peaceable citizens —with what intention? With tho intention of murdering them—of murdering as many as they could. I refer to the testimony given by two of our witnesses. The wage-workers of this city began to object to being fleeced too much. They began to say somo truths that were highly disagioeable to our patrician class. Thoy were discontented. They put forth somo very modest demands. They thought that eight hours’ hard toil a day for scarcely two hours’ pay was too much. This low rabble had to be silenced. Tho only way to silence them was to frighten them and murdor those whom thoy looked up to as their loaders. Yes, these foreign dogs had to bo taught a lesson, so that they might never again interfere with the high-handed exploitation of their benevolent and Christian families. Bonfield, the man who would bring a blush of shamo to the murderers of St. Bartholomew night—Bonfleld, the illustrious, with a visage that would have done excellent service to Dore in portraying Dante’s Fiends of Hell—Bonfield was the man to consummate the conspiracy of the Citizens’ Association of our patricians. And if I bad thrown that bomb, or caused it to be thrown, or had known of it, I would not hesitate a moment to state so. It is truo a number of lives were lost and many were wounded; but hundreds of lives were thereby saved. But for that bomb there would have been a hundred widows and hundreds of orphans where now there are a few. These facts have been suppressed, while we were accused and convicted of conspiracy by the real conspirators and their agents. Ttiis, your Honor, is one reason why sentence should not be passed by a court of justioe. “It has always been the opinion of the ruling classeß that the people must be kept in ignorance. They lose their servility, their modesty, and obedience to the arbitrary’powers that be as their intelligence grows. The education of a blacksmith a quarter of a century ago was a criminal offense. Why? Because the intelligent slave would throw off his shackles at whatever cost, my Christian gentlemen. “We have explained to the people the different phenomena of the social laws and circumetances under which they occur. We have further stated that the wage system as a specific form of social development would, by the necessity of logic, have to make room for a higher form of civilization; that the wage system was preparing the way and furnishing tho foundation for a social systom of co-operation. That is socialism. We have said that the tendency of progress seemed to be toward anarch-

ism: that is, a free society, without king and classes—a society of sovereigns in which the liberty and economic quality of all will furnish an unshakable equilibrium as a condition of natural order. It is not likely that the Hon. Boufield and Grinned can conceive of a condition of social order not held intact by the jiolicemeu's club and pistol, nor of a free society without prisous, gallowees. and State’s Attorneys. In such a society they would probably fail to find a place for themselves. And is thi3 the reason why anarchism is such a pernicious and damnable doctrine? Grinned has informed us that anarchism was on trial. If that is the case, your Honor, very wed, you may sentence me, for I am an anarchist. I believe with Buckle, with Faine, Jefferson, with Emerson, wilh Spencer, and many other great thinkers of this century that the state of caste and classes, the state where one class dominates and lives upon the labor of another class, and calls it order, should be abolished. You may pronounce your sentence upon me, honorable Judge, but let the world know that in the year Anno Domini 1888, in the State of Illinois, seven men were sentenced to death because they had not lost their faith in the ultimate victory of liberty and justice. We, who have jeopardized our lives to savo society from the fieud that has grasped her by the throat, that seeks her life blood and devours her substance : we, who would heal her bleeding wounds, who would free her from the fetters you have wrought around her. from the misery you have brought upon her—we are her enemies. We have preached dynamite, it is suid, and we have predicted from the lessons history has taught us that the ruling elasess of to-day would no more listen to the voice of reason than their predecessors, and they would attempt by brute force to stay the march of progress. Are not all tho large industries of this once free country conducted under the surveillance of ths police, the militia, and the Sheriff? “It you think that by hanging us you can stnmp out the labor movement, then call your hangman. But yon will tread upon the spark. Hero and thero, behind you, in front of you, and everywhere, flames will blaze up. The ground is on fire on which you stand. You cannot understand it. You do not believe in witcncraft, but you do believe in ‘conspiracies.’ You want to stamp out the conspirators, the agitators? Ah, stamp out every factory lord who has grown wealthy upon tho unpaid labor of his employes; stamp out every landlord who has amassed a fortune from the rent of overburdened workingmen and farmers. You, gentlemen, are tho revolutionists. Do you, in your blindness, think you cau stop the tidal wave of civilization and human emancipation by facing a few policemen, a few Gatling guns, some regiments of militia, on the shore? Do you think you can frighten tho rising waves back into their unfathomable depths by erecting a few gallowses in the perspective? You who oppose the natural forces of things, you . ro tho real revolutionists. You and you uiono aAt tho conspirators and destructionists. “Said tho Court yesterday: ‘These men (referring to tho Board of Trado demonstration) started out with tho express purpose of sacking tho Bonrd of Trado Building.' Well, I cannot see what sense thoro would have been in such an undertaking. But I will assume that the 3,000 workingmen who marched in that procession really intended to sack the building. In this cuso they would have differed from the respectable Board of Trnde men in that they sought to recover tho stolen property in a lawful way, while tho others sack the entire country lawfully and unlawfully. This being a very highly rc'spoctabio profession, this court of justice and equity proclaims the principle that when two persons do tho same thing it is not the same thing. I thank tho Court for this confession. It contains all that we have taught, and for which we ora to bo hung, in a nutshell. It is a respectable profession when practiced by the privileged class, but it is felony when resorted to in sell-preservation by the other class. This is order. This is the kind of order that we have attempted, and are still trying as long as we live, to abolish. “When anarchism gains its point there will not longer bo any use for policomon and militia to preserve so-called peace and order—the order that tho Russian General telegraphed to the Czar after he had massacred half of Moscow, “Order is retorod in Moscow.” Anarchism does not mean bloodshed, does not mean chaos, arson, and so forth. Thoso monstrosities are the characteristic features of capitalism. Anarchism moans peace and tranquillity to all. “It is true that we havo told the poople time and again that the groat day of a change was coming. It is truo that wo have called upon tho peoplo to arm to prepare for that day. This soems to be the ground upon which the verdict 13 to bo sustained. But ‘when a long train of abuses and usurpations pursuing unvaryingly tho same objocts evinces the design to reduce the people under absolute despotism it is their right and duty to throw off such Government and provide new guards for their future safety.’ This is a quotation from the Declaration of Independence. If you think you can crush out these ideas that are gaining ground uioro and more every day, ii you would oneo more havo people suffer the ponalty of death bocauso they duro to tell the truth, then I say you may call your hangman and turn mo and my friends over to him. We have not told anything hut the truth. I defy you to show us where wo told a He. I shall die proudly and defiantly in the cuuso of truth, as so many martyrs have done whom I could name to you, and among them is Christ." THE LESSER LIGHTS. Noebe Wishes He Was Going to Hang, Too Lingg Becomes Abusive. Michael Schwab followed tho chief anarchist, reading a manuscript speech, which he held in both hands, through a pair of old-fashioned spectacles, in an awkward position, and with a bad voice. He remarked that he would have kept silence if keeping silonco did not look cowardly. Ho went ovor much of tho same ground occupied by Spies, pictured tho sufferings aud hardships of tho working people, and extolling the excellence of socialism and anarchy. Oscar Necbo then took tho lloor, speaking without notes in a linn, strong, grating voice, with a decided Gorman accent. Ho said that he had been marshal of a procession and chairman of a lauor meeting, and for those offenses ho had boon accounted a criminal and convicted. He dovotod some time to denouncing the detectives of Chicago, called Griunell and Furtliman scoundrols to their faces, and said that Mr. Ingham was tho only gentleman among tho attorneys for tho State. Mr. Griunell had ■ caused him to bo indicted in order to crush out tho Arbritur-sinilung, but lie had*found his mistake. To-day that paper had two presses instead of one, and now the workingmen reading its langtiago owned their own paper. He explained his connection with tho labor movement, and disclaimed all counoction with the Haymarket business. 11c enumerated the various “crimes” which, ho said, he had committed, hut according to his own account those were all virtuous doeds on behalf of tho causo of labor. He pictured tho terrible poverty of tho lower classes of laboring men in tho city, and said that when “these rats wore lot out of their holes then look out.” Tho police had searched bis home and found a red flag and a rovolver. Thoy had acted like wild Indians. Ho was sorry that ho could not be bungod with tho rest of the prisoners. Then liis wife and children could visit his grave. Now they would have to live under tho stigiun that ho was a criminul in the penitentiary. Adolph Fischer explained as to the printing of tho “liovengo” circular, and said that when he would bo sentenced to death it would be not because ho was a murderer, hut because he was an anarchist. When he first began to speak Attorney Salomon advanced with the intention of giving tho prisoner somo instructions, but was received with a rebuff: “Don’t bother me ; I know what to say,” was the reply. He made but a brief address, was very sulky, and out of temper with his attorneys und all concerned. He was followed by Louis Lingg, who spoke in German. He said that tho bombs ho made were not tho same ns that exploded at the Haymorkot. He spoke in a very loud voice, and frequently pounded the table with his clenched fist in accontuation of his remarks, walking nervously up aud down the space which had been cleared to accommodate the speakers-. He frequently turned upon Mr. Grinnell and his co-attorneys with outbursts of wrath and German invectives iu a style which lod to somo approhonsions that he was about to pounce upon them. His address was simply a tirade against the police and the authorities generally. He concluded by saying that if he was hanged thousands of others would use dynumite after he was dead. He defied the law and despised its administrators, and would go to the gallows' iu the cause of dynamite against unjust opxnession of the capitalists.

George Engel spoke next, using the German ,ongue : “This is tho-first time,” said he, “I have sver stood before an American couit, and at that I find myself condemned to death. I am brought to this by the same causes that compelled me to leave the fatherland. I have seen with my own eyes that in this freest and richest country in the world there are existing proletarians who are cast out from every order of society. I saw human beings who fished out their food from the slop-barrels cn the streets in order to exist from day to day. I read of examples in the daily papers, which prove to mo that in this glorious country here are people condemned to die from hunger. I became sorry for having left my own land, and asked myself what are the seasons that could bring about such a state of things. “I have lost my respect for American laws. 1 am convinced, and this conviction no one can tear out of my heart, that the proletariat, by means of machinery, will gain power to educate themselves. Not even those can hinder it who to-day arrogate to themselves the government of the workingmen." Engel lifted his voice and flourished his right hand over his head as he cried: “In spite of all, anarchy will exist; if not in public, it will exist in private. If the State’s Attorney thinks by sending seven men to the gallows and another one to the penitentiary he can break up anarchy, he is mistaken. He can only change the tactics, he cannot stop the movement. Nothing can stop the workingmen from making bombs, and they will be used. I am convinced anarchism cannot be rooted out.” Engel wound up with a tirade against tho capitalists and coal barons. He was followed by Sam Fielden, who prefaced what he had to say by reciting a poem from the German of Ferdinand Freiligrdth, entitled, “Revolution." The first stanza was as follows : And tho’ ye caught your noble prey within your hangman’s sordid thrall, And tho’ your captive was led forth beneath your city’s rampart wall. And tho’ the grass lies o’er her green, where, at the morning’s early red, The peasant girl brings funeral wreaths,l tell you still—sho is not dead. After eulogizing the poet, Fielden declared he himself was a revolutionist; that it was only a crime to be a revolutionist when the man entertaining such ideas was a poor man; among intellectual people it was no crime. He declared ho had been arrested and indicted for murder but had been tried for anarchy. Fielden took up the Haymarket meeting and discussed his speech at great length, claiming that it was not incendiary in any sense, and that there was no excuse for the interference of the polico. In closing, he said: “Your Honor, with due respect to your years, I wish to say this, that it is quite possible that you can not understand, having lived in a different atmosphere from what we have lived in. how men con hold such ridiculous ideas. T have no doubt that you have felt that way. Yet it is well known that persons who live to a very ripe old ace very seldom change their opinions. But I impute no wrong motive in that. It is a natural result. But we do claim that our principles will bear discussion, investigation, and criticism. “If I con say anything in the interests of humanity, in the interests of liberty, equality, aud fraternity. I wouid say it now. Take hoed! take heed 1 Tho time, my friends, is not far off. The swift process of reduction of the masses into a condition of depravity and degradation, as is evinced by the ni.mbers of men out of employment, shows us clearly where we are going. We cannot deny it. No thinking man, no reasoning man, no friond of his kind cau ignore the fact thut we are going rapidly onto a precipice. “Your Honor, I have worked at hard labor since I was eight years of age. I went into a cotton factory when I was eight years old, and I have worked continually since, and there has never been a time in my history that I could have been bought or could have been paid to say a single thing by any man or for auy purpose which I did not believe to lie true. To contradict the lie that was published in connection with the bill by the grand jury charging us with murder, I wish to say that I have never received one cent for agitating. “To-day, as the beautiful autumn sun kisses with balmy breeze the cheek of every free man, I stand here never to bathe my he ad’in its rays again. I have loved my fellow-men as I have loved myself. I have hated trickery, dishonesty, and injustice. The nineteenth century commits the crimo of killing its best friend. It will live to repent of it. But, as I have said before, if it will do any good I freely give myself up. I trust the time will cOme when there will be a better understanding, more intelligence, and, above the mountains of iniquity, wrong, and corruption, I hope the sun of righteousness, and truth, and justice will come to bathe in itß balmy light an emancipated world. I thank your Honor for your attention.” Albert R. Parsons followed Fielden. With a flower in his button-hole, water, lemon, red handkerchief, and a bundle of manuscript on the taDle before him, it was seen at once that he is vain and affocted. He rolled his “r’s” and his eyes, said “me” for my, was gentle as a lamb one second and frothed at the mouth the next. He paced up and down, stood on his toes, and crouched to the floor. He aimed to be dramatic, and succeeded only in being sensational and vehement. Almost his first utterance showed the character of his address, as with dramatic gesture and intense tones he thundered forth: “I will tell the truth though my tongue be torn from my mouth, aud my throat cut from ear to ear, so help me God!” Continuing, ho said : “Your Honor, I stand here as one of the people, a common man, a workingman, one of the millions, and I ask you to give ear to what I have to say. You stand as a bulwark ; you Btand as a brake between them and us. You stand here as the representative of justice, holding the poised scales in your hands. You are expected to look neither to the right nor to the left, but to do that by which justice aud justice alone shall be subserved. Now, the conviction of a man, your Honor, does not necessarily prove that he is guilty. Your law books are filled with instances where men have been carried to the scaffold and after their death it has been proven that the murder was judicial; tfiat it was a judicial murder. Now, what end can be subserved in hurrying this matter through in the manner in which it has been done ? Where are the ends of justice subserved, and where is truth found in sending seven human beings at the rate of express speed upon a fast train to the scaffold and an ignominious death? Why, if your Honor please, the very method of our extermination, the deep damnation of our taking off, appeals to your Honor’s sense of justice, of rectitude, and of honor, A judge may also be an unjust man. Such things have been known. “Now, I hold that our execution, as the matter stands just now, would be judicial murder, and judicial murder is far worse than lynch law—far worse. But, your Honor, bear in mind, please, this trial was conducted by a mob, prosecuted by a mob, by the shriek’s and the howls of a mob, au organized powerful mob. That trial is over. Now, your Honor, vou sit here judicially, calmly and quietly, and it is for you now to look at this thing from the standpoint of reason and of common sense. There is one peculiarity about the case, your Honor, that I want to call your attention to. It was the manner and the method of its prosecution. On the one side the attorneys for the prosecution conducted this case from the standpoint of capitalists as against labor. On the other side, the attorneys for the defense conducted this case as a defense for murderers, not for laborers, and not against capitalists. The prosecution in this case throughout has been a capitalistic prosecution, inspired by the instinct of capitalism, and I moan by that by class feelings, by a dictatorial right to rule and a denial to common people the right to say anything or have anything to say to these men. They conducted this trial from that standpoint throughout. “The capitalistic press has taken great pains to say that socialists fight machinery; that we fight property. Why, sir, it is an absurdity, it is ridiculous, it is preposterous. No man ever heard one of us speak who ever heard an utterance from tho mouth of a socialist advising anything of the kind. They know to the contrary. We don’t fignt machinery; we don’t oppose these things. It is only the manner and the methods of it, your Honor, that we object to. That is all. It is the manipulation of these things. When we see little children huddling around the factory gates, the poor little things whose bones are not yet ha*d, when we see them clutched from the hearthstone, taken away from the family altar, and carried to the bastiles of labor, and their little bones ground up into gold dust to bedeck the form of some aristocratic Jezebel, then it stirs the manhood in me, and I speak out. We plead for the little ones ; we plead for the helpless; we plead for the oppressed; we seek redress for those who are wronged; we seek knowledge and intelligence for the ignorant; we seek liberty for the slave; we seek the welfare of every human being.”