me a free p.ess. In that awful moment of a nation's travail, of the last gasp of tyranny and the first breath of freedom, how pregnant is the example! The press extinguished, the people enslaved, and the prince undone. As the advocate of society, therefore-of peace-of domestic liberty-and the lasting union of the two countries-I con. jure you to guard the liberty of the press, that great sentinel of the state, that grand detector of public imposture; guard it, because, when it sinks, there sinks with it, in one common grave, the liberty of the subject and the security of the Crown. Recent panic island, and ita consequences Gentlemen, I am glad that this question has not been brought forward earlier; I rejoice for the sake of the court, of the in the sister jury, and of the public repose, that disgraceful this question has not been brought forward till now. In Great Britain, analogous circumstances have taken place. At the commencement of that unfortunate war which has deluged Europe with blood, the spirit of the En of French principles; at that moment of general paroxysm, to accuse was to convict. The danger looked larger to the public eye, from the misty region through which it was surveyed. We measure inaccessible heights by the shadows which they project, where the lowness and the distance of the light form the length of the shade. from, by having public communication left open Benefits to to them? I will tell you, gentlemen, the govern what they are saved from, and what the government is saved from; I will tell you, also, to what both are exposed by shutting up that communication. In one case, sedition speaks aloud and walks abroad; the demagogue goes forth; the public eye is upon him; he frets his busy hour upon the stage; but soon either weariness, or bribe, or punishment, or disappointment, bears him down, or drives him off, and he appears no more. In the other case, how does the work of sedition go forward? Night after night the muffled rebel steals forth in the dark, and casts another and another brand upon the pile, to which, when the hour of fatal maturity shall arrive, he will apply the torch. If you doubt of the horrid consequence of suppressing the effusion even of individual discontent, look to those enslaved countries where the protection of despotism is supposed to be secured by such restraints. Even the person of the despot there is never in safety. Neither the fears of the des-glish people was tremblingly alive to the terror pot nor the machinations of the slave have any slumber-the one anticipating the moment of peril, the other watching the opportunity of aggression. The fatal crisis is equally a surprise upon both the decisive instant is precipitated without warning-by folly on the one side, or by frenzy on the other; and there is no notice of the treason till the traitor acts. In those unfort unate countries-one can not read it without horror-there are officers whose province it is to have the water which is to be drunk by their rulers sealed up in bottles, lest some wretched miscreant should throw poison into the draught. But, gentlemen, if you wish for a nearer and Hiustration from more interesting example, you have English history. it in the history of your own revolution. You have it at that memorable period, when the Monarch [James II.] found a servile acquiescence in the ministers of his folly—when the liberty of the press was trodden under foot—| when venal sheriffs returned packed juries, to carry into effect those fatal conspiracies of the few against the many-when the devoted benches of public justice were filled by some of those foundlings of fortune who, overwhelmed in the torrent of corruption at an early period, lay at the bottom like drowned bodies while soundness or sanity remained in them; but at length, becoming buoyant by putrefaction, they rose as they rotted, and floated to the surface of the polluted stream, where they were drifted along, the objects of terror, and contagion, and abomination.10 10 It may not be ungratifying to hear the manner in which this passage was suggested to the speaker's mind. A day or two before Mr. Rowan's trial, one of Mr. Curran's friends showed him a letter that he had received from Bengal, in which the writer, after mentioning the Hindoo custom of throwing the dead into the Ganges, added, that he was then upon the banks of that river, and that, as he wrote, he could see several bodies floating down its stream. The orator, shortly after, while describing a corrupt Ек There is a sort of aspiring and adventurous credulity which disdains assenting to obvious truths, and delights in catching at the improbability of circumstances, as its best ground of faith. To what other cause, gentlemen, can you ascribe that, in the wise, the reflecting, and the philosophic nation of Great Britain, a printer has been found guilty of a libel, for publishing those resolutions, to which the present minister of that kingdom had actually subscribed his name? To what other cause can you ascribe, what in my mind is still more astonishing, in such a country as Scotland, a nation cast in the happy medium between the spiritless acquiescence of submissive poverty, and the sturdy credulity of pampered wealth; cool and ardent, adventurous and persevering; winging her eagle flight against the blaze of every science, with an eye that never winks, and a wing that never tires; crowned as she is with the spoils of every art, and decked with the wreath of every muse; from the deep and scrutinizing researches of her Hume, to the sweet and simple, but not less sublime and pathetic morality of her Burns-how, from the bosom of a country like that, genius and character, and talents, should be banished to a distant, barbarous soil; condemned to pine under the horrid communion of vulgar vice and base-born profligacy, for twice the period that ordinary calculation gives to the continuance of human life?" But I will not further press any idea ed bench, recollected this fact, and applied it as above.-Life of Curran, by his Sor, vol. i., p. 316. Alluding to the banishment of the Scotch Rə formers, Muir, Palmer, &c. An Irish jury contained in that is painful to me, and I am sure must be painful to you. I will only say, you have now an example of which neither England nor Scotland had the advantage. You have the example of the panic, the infatuation, and the contrition of both. It is now for you to deought to proft cide whether you will profit by their by these errors. experience of idle panic and idle regret, or whether you merely prefer to palliate a servile imitation of their frailty, by a paltry affectation of their repentance. It is now for you to show that you are not carried away by the same hectic delusions, to acts of which no tears can wash away the consequences or the indeli-ple could become so silly as to abandon their ble reproach. that Mr. Rowan did by this publication (suppos. ing it to be his) recommend, under the No leveling name of equality, a general, indiscrim- d inate assumption of public rule by the Address. every the meanest person in the state. Low as we are in point of public information, there is not, I believe, any man, who thinks for a moment, that does not know that all which the great body of the people of any country can have from any government, is a fair encouragement to their industry, and protection for the fruits of their labor. And there is scarcely any man, I believe, who does not know that if a peostations in society, under pretense of governing themselves, they would become the dupes and the victims of their own folly. But does this publication recommend any such infatuated abandonment, or any such desperate assumption? I will read the words which relate to that subject. By liberty we never understood unlimited freedom, nor by equality the leveling of property or destruction of subordination." I ask you with what justice, upon what principle of common sense, you can charge a man with the publice. tion of sentiments the very reverse of what his words avow; and that, when there is no colla!eral evidence, where there is no foundation whatever, save those very words, by which his meaning can be ascertained? or, if you do adopt an arbitrary principle of imputing to him your meaning instead of his own, what publication can be guiltless or safe? It is a sort of accusation that I am ashamed and sorry to see introduced in a court acting on the principles of the British Con. stitution. 66 Gentlemen, I have been warning you by instances of public intellect suspended They ought also to be influenced or obscured; let me rather excite by a more recent change of feeling you by the example of that intellect in England. recovered and restored. In that case which Mr. Attorney General has cited himself, I mean that of the trial of Lambert in England, is there a topic of invective against constituted authorities, is there a topic of abuse against every department of British government that you do not find in the most glowing and unqualified terms in that publication, for which the printer of it was prosecuted, and acquitted by an English jury? See, too, what a difference there is between the case of a man publishing his own opinion of facts, thinking that he is bound by duty to hazard the promulgation of them, and without the remotest hope of any personal advantage, and that of a man who makes publication his trade. And saying this, let me not be misunderstood; it is not my province to enter into any abstract defense of the opinions of any man upon public subjects. I do not affirmatively state to you that these grievances, which this paper supposes, do in fact exist; yet I can not but say that the movers of this prosecution have forced that question upon you. Their motives and their merits, like those of all accusers, are put in issue before you; and I need not tell you how strongly the motive and merits of any informer ought to influence the fate of his accusation. I agree most implicitly with Mr. Attorney General that nothing can be more werable only for criminal than an attempt to work for his errors of a change in the government by armed force, and I entreat that the court will not suffer any expression of mine to be considered as giving encouragement or de- I say, therefore, gentlemen of the jury, as to fense to any design to excite disaffection, to the four parts into which the publica- Recapitulation overawe or to overturn the government. But I tion must be divided, I answer thus: put my client's case upon another ground. If It calls upon the Volunteers. Consider the time, he was led into an opinion of grievances where the danger, the authority of the prosecutors themthere were none; if he thought there ought to selves for believing that danger to exist; the be a reform where none was necessary, he is an- high character, the known moderation, the apswerable only for his intention. He can be an- proved loyalty of that venerable institution; the swerable to you in the same way only that he is similarity of the circumstances between the peanswerable to that God before whom the accuser, riod at which they are summoned to take arms, the accused, and the judge must appear togeth- and that in which they have been called upon to er; that is, not for the clearness of his under- reassume them. Upon this simple ground, genstanding, but for the purity of his heart. tlemen, you will decide whether this part of the Gentlemen, Mr. Attorney General has said publication was libelous and criminal, or not Mr. Rowan an. his intentions, not judgment. In the bitterness of reproach it was said, "out of thine own mouth will I condemn thee." From the severity of justice I demand no more. See if, in the words that have been spoken, you can find matter to acquit or to condemn. "By liberty we never understood unlimited freedom, nor by equality the leveling of property, nor the destruction of subordination. This is a calumny invented by that faction, or that gang, which misrepresents the King to the people, and the people to the King; traduces one half of the nation to cajole the other; and, by keeping up distrust and division, wishes to continue the proud arbitrators of the fortune and fate of Ireland." Here you find that meaning disclaimed as a calumny, which is artfully imputed as a crime. As to reform, I could wish to have said noth-acter. ing upon it. I believe I have said enough. If he thought the state required it, he acted like an honest man. For the rectitude of the opinion he was not answerable. He discharged his duty in telling the country that he thought so. As to the emancipation of the Catholics, I can not but say that Mr. Attorney General did very wisely in keeping clear of that. Yet, gentlemen, 1 need not tell you how important a figure it was intended to make upon the scene, though, from unlucky accidents, it has become necessary to expunge it during the rehearsal. Of the concluding part of this publication, the Convention which it recommends, I have spoken already. I wish not to trouble you with saying more upon it. I feel that I have already trespassed much upon your patience. In truth, upon a subject embracing such a variety of topics, a rigid observance either of conciseness or arrange. inent could, perhaps, scarcely be expected. It is, however, with pleasure I feel I am drawing to a close, and that only one question remains, to which I beg your attention. dence to bring Address to Mr. Whatever, gentlemen, may be your opinion of Want of evi- the meaning of this publication, there home the pub yet remains a great point for you to cation of decide upon; namely, whether, in Rowan. point of fact, this publication be imputable to Mr. Rowan or not; whether he did publish it or not. And two witnesses are called to that fact, one of the name of Lyster, and the other of the name of Morton. You must have observed that Morton gave no evidence upon which that paper could even have been read, he produced no paper; he identified no paper; so that in point of law, there was no evidence to be given to a jury; and, therefore, it turns entirely upon the evidence of the other witness. He has stated that he went to a public meeting, in a place where there was a gallery crowded with spectators; and that he there got a printed paper, the same which has been read to you. I know you are well acquainted with the fact that the credit of every witness must Only one witness, and he be considered by, and rest with the impeached. jury. They are the sovereign judges of that circumstance; and I will not insult your feelings by insisting on the caution with which you should watch the testimony of a witness that seeks to affect the liberty, or property, or character of your fellow-citizens. Under what circumstances does this evidence come before you? The witness says he has got a commission in the army by the interest of a lady, from a person then high in administration. He told you that he made a memorandum upon the back of that paper, it being his general custom, when he got such papers to make an endorsement upon them; that he did this from mere fancy; that he had no intention of giving any evidence on the subject; he took it with no such view. There is something whimsical enough in this Comments on curious story. Put his credit upon the his testimony, positive evidence adduced to his char Who he is I know not. I know not the man; but his credit is impeached. Mr. Blake was called; he said he knew him. I asked him, "Do you think, sir, that Mr. Lyster is or is not a man deserving credit upon his oath ?" If you find a verdict of conviction, it can be only upon the credit of Mr. Lyster. What said Mr. Blake? Did he tell you that he believed he was a man to be believed upon his oath? He did not attempt to say that he was. The best he could say was, that he would hesitate. Do you believe Blake? Have you the same opinion of Lyster's testimony that Mr. Blake has? Do you know Lyster? If you do know him, and know that he is credible, your knowledge should not be shaken by the doubts of any man. But if you do not know him, you must take his credit from an unimpeached witness, swearing that he would hesitate to believe him. A strong cir against him. In my mind there is a circumstance of the strongest nature that came out from Lyster on the table. I am aware that cumstance a very respectable man, if impeached by surprise, may not be ready prepared to repel a wanton calumny by contrary testimony. But was Lyster unapprised of this attack upon him? What said he ? "I knew that, you had Blake to examine against me. You have brought him here for that purpose." He knew the very witness that was to be produced against him; he knew that his credit was impeached, and yet he produced no person to support that credit. What said Mr. Smyth? "From my knowledge of him, I would not believe him upon his oath." Mr. Attorney General. I beg pardon, but 1 must set Mr. Curran right. Mr. Lyster said he heard Blake would be here, but not in time to prepare himself. Mr. Curran. But what said Mrs. Hatchell? Was the production of that witness a surprise upon Mr. Lyster? her cross-examination shows the fact to be the contrary. The learned counsel, you see, was perfectly apprised of a chain of private circumstances, to which he pointed his questions. Did he know these circumstances by inspiration? No; they could come only from Lyster himself. I insist, therefore, the gentleman knew his character was to be impeached; his counsel knew it; and not a single witness has been produced to support it. Then consider, gentlemen, upon what ground you can find a verdict of conviction against my client, when the only witness produced to the fact of publication is impeached, without even an attempt to defend his character. Many hundreds, he said, were at that meeting; why not produce one of them to swear to the fact of such a meeting? One he has ventured to name; but he was certainly very safe in naming a person who, he has told you, is not in the kingdom, and could not, therefore, be called to confront him. Gentlemen, let me suggest another observation or two. If still you have any doubt as to 12 In the Irish courts the witness gives his testi mony seated in a chair, on a raised platform called the table. nved from the character of the has an Irish jury done this deed? The momen he ceases to be regarded as a criminal, he be comes of necessity an accuser. And, let me ask you, what can your most zealous defenders be prepared to answer to such a charge? Wher your sentence shall have sent him forth to that stage [the pillory] which guilt alone can render little statue upon a mighty pedestal, diminishing by elevation. But he will stand a striking and imposing object upon a monument, which, if it does not, and it can not, record the atrocity of his crime, must record the atrocity of his convic tion. And upon this subject credit me when 1 say that I am still more anxious for you than I can possibly be for him. I can not but feel the peculiarity of your situation. Not the jury of his own choice, which the law of England al lows, but which ours refuses," collected in that box by a person certainly no friend to Mr. Rowan, certainly not very deeply interested in giving him a very impartial jury. Feeling this, as I the guilt or innocence of the defendant, give me Argument de leave to suggest to you what circumstances you ought to consider in oraccused. der to found your verdict. You should consider the character of the person accused, and in this your task is easy. I will venture to say there is not a man in this nation more known than the gentleman who is the sub-infamous, let me tell you he will not be like a ject of this prosecution, not only by the part he has taken in public concerns, and which he has taken in common with many, but still more so by that extraordinary sympathy for human affliction which, I am sorry to think, he shares with so small a number. There is not a day that you hear the cries of your starving manufacturers in your streets, that you do not also see the advocate of their sufferings. That you do not see his honest and manly figure, with uncovered head soliciting for their relief, searching the frozen heart of charity for every string that can be touched by compassion, and urging the force of every argument and every motive, save that which his modesty suppresses; the author-am persuaded you do, you can not be surprised, ity of his own generous example. Or, if you see him not there, you may trace his steps to the private abode of disease, and famine, and despair; the messenger of Heaven, bearing with him food, and medicine, and consolation. Are these the materials of which anarchy and public rapine are to be formed? Is this the man on whom to fasten the abominable charge of goading on a frantic populace to mutiny and bloodshed? Is this the man likely to apostatize from every principle that can bind him to the state, his birth, his property, his education, his character, and his children? Let me tell you, gentlemen of the jury, if you agree with his prosecutors in thinking that there ought to be a sacrifice of such a man, on such an occasion, and upon the credit of such evidence, you are to convict him-never did you, never can you give a sentence, consigning anying spirit in the Constitution which will be seen man to public punishment with less danger to his person or to his fame; for where could the hireling be found to fling contumely or ingratitude at his head, whose private distress he had not labored to alleviate, or whose public condition he had not labored to improve. however you may be distressed at the mournful But to walk with the sufferer through the flames, and to preserve him unhurt by the conflagration. At the conclusion of this speech, there was another universal burst of applause, throughout the court and hall, for some minutes, which was again silenced by the interference of Lord Clonmel. "Mr. Curran," says Charles Phillips, "used to relate a ludicrous incident which attended his departure from court after the trial. His path was instantly beset by the populace, who were bent on chairing him. He implored-he entreat ed-all in vain. At length, assuming an air of authority, he addressed those nearest to him: "I desire, gentlemen, that you will desist.” “I laid great emphasis," says Curran, "on the word 'de I can not, however, avoid adverting to a circumstance that distinguishes the case Peroration: Mr. Rowan, if of Mr. Rowan from that of a late condemned, must suffer in sacrifice in a neighboring kingdom.13 Ireland. The severer law of that country, it seems, and happy for them that it should, enables them to remove from their sight the victim of their infatuation. The more merciful spirit of our law deprives you of that consolation. His sufferings must remain forever before your eyes a continual call upon your shame and your re-sist,' and put on my best suit of dignity. How. morse. But those sufferings will do more; they ever, my next neighbor, a gigantic, brawny chair. will not rest satisfied with your unavailing con- man, eyeing me with a somewhat contemptnous trition, they will challenge the great and para-affection, from top to toe, bellowed out to his mount inquest of society. The man will be companion, 'Arrah, blood and turf! Pat, don't weighed against the charge, the witness, and the sentence; and impartial justice will demand, why 14 In making up the jury, Mr. Rowan was not al lowed the same right of challenging which is enjoy 19 Allading to the banishment of Muir, Palmer, &c. ed in England. mind the little crachur; here, pitch him up this | Mr. Rowan was sentenced to pay £500, and to minute upon my shoulder.' Pat did as he was be imprisoned two years. Within a short time, desired; the 'little crachur' was carried, nolens however, he escaped from prison and fled tc volens, to his carriage, and drawn home by an America, where he remained for many years, applauding populace." but finally returned to Ireland and had all further punishment remitted. The jury brought in a verdict of Guilty, and SPEECH OF MR. CURRAN IN BEHALF OF PETER FINNERTY WHEN INDICTED FOR A LIBEL, DELIVERED BE FORE JUSTICE DOWNS IN THE COMMISSION COURT, DECEMBER 22, 1797. INTRODUCTION. MR. FINNERTY was the printer of a newspaper published at Dublin called the Press, and was indicted for publishing a severe letter, signed MARCUS, addressed to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, in reference to the execution of William Orr. Orr was a farmer of the Presbyterian sect—a man of pious, gentle, and gallant character, greatly respected and beloved in the county of Antrim, where he lived. He was prosecuted for administering ar oath to a United Irishman, and for so doing was condemned to death! Some of the jury made an affidavit, immediately after the trial, that they acted under intimidation in convicting him, and that spirits were introduced into the jury room. It was likewise ascertained that the principal witness against Orr was a man of infamous character, whose word could not be relied on. These things were certified to the Lord Lieutenant with a view to Orr's being pardoned. He was accordingly respited to allow time for consid eration; a second, and then a third respite was granted, and the feeling became general that his pardon was secured; when, to the astonishment and horror of the public, he was hanged at the expiration of seven days, surrounded by large bodies of troops collected to overawe the people. He died with great calmness, leaving a written declaration of his entire innocence. The public indignation was now universal. Medals were struck and circulated bearing the inscription, "Remember Orr;" his name became a watch-word even in England; Mr. Fox spoke of him as a martyr; and the toast, "The ministers in Orr's place," was often heard in both countries. The letters of MARCUS expressed the general sentiment of the people respecting his execution; and this was thought by the government a favorable opportunity for crushing Finnerty's paper, in which it was published—the only remaining paper in Ireland which had not been bought out or broken down by the government. "Mr. Curran's address to the jury in this case," says his son, "must be considered, if not the finest, at least the most surprising specimen of his oratorical powers. He had no time for preparation; it was not till a few minutes before the case commenced that his brief was handed him. During the progress of the trial, he had occasion to speak at unusual length to questions of law that arose upon the evidence, so that his speech to the jury could necessarily be no other than a sudden, extemporaneous effusion; and it was, perhaps, a secret, and no: unjustifiable, feeling of pride at having so acquitted himself upon such an emergency that inclined his own mind to prefer it to any of his other efforts." SPEECH, &c. [Mr. Curran, after a few observations on the right of the jury under the Libel Bill of Mr. Fox, proceeded thus:] ter introduced by the counsel for the Crown. And now, gentlemen, let us come to the imRemarks on the mediate subject of the trial, as it is extraneous mat brought before you by the charge in the indictment, to which it ought to have been confined; and also, as it is presented to you by the statement of the learned counsel who has taken a much wider range than the mere limits of the accusation, and has endeavored to force upon your consideration extraneous and irrelevant facts, for reasons which it is my duty to explain. The indictment states simply that Mr. Finnerty has published a false and scandalous libel upon the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, tending to bring his government into disrepute, and to alienate the affections of the people; and one would have expected that, without stating any other matter, the counsel for the Crown would have gone directly eral character of containing the |