The Nonpartisan Leader Newspaper, July 28, 1919, Page 6

'*z/% 2N o r iw T % - Y % // R %/[/]/ ; "Iéllll// The Verdict atJ ackson T HE verdict of the jury in the Jackson court, hold- state, but when it was shown that the League program and President Wilson’s~14 points squared, the “14 points” 4 were kept out of the records. | And, finally, Mr. Townley was refused the right by Wi/ ing A. C. Townley and Joseph Gilbert guilty of con- spiracy to violate the sedition law of Minnesota, is ‘no surprise to persons who have ‘watched the pro- ceedings since the trial begart The jury was permitted to the court to plead his own case before the jury. Mr. Town- : see only one side of the case. No jury, however fairly ley stressed the importance of the case to himself, to 250,- %! chosen, could have been expected to surmount the obstacles 000 members of the League and to thousands of other per- R that were placed in its path by those in authority. " sons, dependents of Leaguers, but the judge remained | A. C. Townley was tried, not before an impartial court adamant. X : and a “jury of his peers,” such as the constitution guaran- tees. He was tried in a kangaroo court before politics and prejudice. : The opinion of F. A. Teigen, whose testimony, thanks to the intervention of the court, stands unimpeached, may - v T S N s The affair was carefully planned and boldly carried out. There were the mere motions of a trial. Little at- tempt was made to hide the purpose of the case. It was - evident from the first that a movement and not a person was on trial. Mr. Townley was accused of conspiracy. The basis of the charge was a speech made by Joseph Gilbert and a remark alleged to have been made by one Irving - Friday, in the employ of the organization of which Mr. Townley is a part. The man who made the speech has never been tried. Friday has never even been arrested. No court has ever decided that the speech of Gilbert vio- lated the state law and yet this speech of Gilbert’s and the remark of Friday were made the basis of the conspiracy charge for which Mr. Townley was convicted. Mr. Townley was privileged, under the law, to be rep- resented in court by his counsel only. At the time the case was called, Mr. Townley was fighting for the people’s laws in North Dakota. His statutory rights were over- ridden and the judge demanded that Townley appear in " court on pain of forfeiture of his bail, advanced by farm- ers of that section. Obviously the date of trial was so fixed as to embarrass Mr. Townley in the North Dakota election. ' The state was permitted to introduce into the case opinion, comment, reports, convictions and unsupported statements, some of them utterly irrelevant. concerning a speech made at Stillwater, Minn., after the war ended and after the indictment itself had been re- turned, was admitted into the evidence to “show the atti- tude of mind” of the defendants, as the judge expressed it.- Yet the defense was denied the right to show Mr. Townley as a consistent supporter of the war. The traditional ju- dicial attitude that a defendant is presumed to be innocent until he is proven guilty went by the boards. Mr. Town- : ley’s guilt was presumed by the court, and he was defied to ES £ show himself innocent. MAN now under FEDERAL indictment for alleged - [ disloyalty was the chief witness for the state. Fer- dinand A. Teigen was admittedly in the employ of ~ interests violently and actively opposed to the N onpartisan league. Teigen is notoriously untrustworthy. - He" was brought from jail at La Crosse to testify, and his testimony was admitted, while other testimony, produced by the de- fense to show that Teigen had misstated facts, was barred by the court on objection of the state. ' Gl ~ Many farmer witnesses, ready to testify as to speeches that Mr. Townley made and their effect on'them and their : sogs as.to their attitude in the war, was sunimarily barred by the court’s ruling. Testimony to prove Mr. Townley’s alsolute support of the war and his sympathy with its-aims ‘was ruled out of the evidence. : - i The League’s war grogram,- already pronounced loyal by the supreme court of Minnesota, was introduced by the 45 et Evidence. _ask him all | PAGE SIX = be valuable and enlightening in this connection. Mr. Teigen told reporters while arguments were proceeding over the right of the defendant to plead his own case: - ek “If the judge permits Townley to talk to the jury, there certainly will be a disagreement and Townley and Gilbert may be acquitted.” = Does the answer to the refusal lie in Mr. Teigen’s ex- pressed opinion? - S Mr. Townley pleaded the importance of the ease to himself and to the movement to which he has devoted his life. But the court knew its importance. The prosecutor knew its importance. 'Governor Burnquist, who sent as a special prosecutor an assistant attorney general, knew its importance. Charles Patterson, “representative of cer- tain interests,” knew its importance. To speeial privilege in the Northwest there was no doubt of its importance. - It . was vital, climacteric to these vested interests. These men know, too, that the verdict can not stand. There are many reversible rulings. But the verdict was - not made to stand. There was no hope among these men that a verdict that would stand could be arrived at. There- fore they took the next best thing, and now, though the conviction will not hold water, it will be used far and wide as a weapon against the farmer movement. It can not be doubted that the supreme court will reverse the.verdict. The errors are too glaring. ' : JITNESSES for- the defense were granted no pro- Vv tection whatever by -the court from the insulting, - domineering attitude of the prosecution. Under cross-examination, men called by the defense ‘were sub- - jected to humiliation, and objections of Mr. Townley’s at- torneys to the questions were overruled time and again. For a full day Congressman John M. Baer was under the fire of the prosecuting attorney, who was permitted to i manner of questions, inside and outside the facts in the case being tried. All the efforts of the counsel for the defense to save the congressman from humiliation at the hands of the biased, politically higoted, bitter county attorney failed as a result of rulings by the court. No limit or bounds were placed on the latitude of the state’s examination, although the defense was hedged about with sustained objections of the prosecution. All this is contrary to the usual and the proper procedure of law. It is customary to grant the greatest latitude to the defense, so that the accused may have an opportunity to prove his innocence. ¥ * 3 T JACKSON, the prosecution was given every oppor- tunity, every encouragement by the court to mis- . lead the jury, while Mr. Townley was denied the right to introduce constructive evidence that would have proved beyond any doubt his innocence of the absurd - charge of conspiracy. : il et