Part 44

Immediately Henry Selden was on his feet, addressing the judge, requesting that the jury determine whether or not the defendant was guilty of crime.

Judge Hunt, however, refused and firmly announced, "The question, gentlemen of the jury, in the form it finally takes, is wholly a question or questions of law, and I have decided as a question of law, in the first place, that under the Fourteenth Amendment which Miss Anthony claims protects her, she was not protected in a right to vote.

"And I have decided also," he continued, "that her belief and the advice which she took does not protect her in the act which she committed. If I am right in this, the result must be a verdict on your part of guilty, and therefore I direct that you find a verdict of guilty."

Again Henry Selden was on his feet. "That is a direction," he declared, "that no court has power to make in a criminal case."

The courtroom was tense. Susan, watching the jury and wondering if they would meekly submit to his will, heard the judge tersely order, "Take the verdict, Mr. Clerk."

"Gentlemen of the jury," intoned the clerk, "hearken to your verdict as the Court has recorded it. You say you find the defendant guilty of the offense whereof she stands indicted, and so say you all."

Claiming exception to the direction of the Court that the jury find a verdict of guilty in this a criminal case. Henry Selden asked that the jury be polled.

To this, Judge Hunt abruptly replied, "No. Gentlemen of the jury, you are discharged."

* * * * *

That night Susan recorded her estimate of Judge Hunt's verdict in her diary in one terse sentence, "The greatest outrage History ever witnessed."

The New York Sun, the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle, and the Canandaigua Times were indignant over Judge Hunt's failure to poll the jury. "Judge Hunt," commented the Sun, "allowed the jury to be impanelled and sworn, and to hear the evidence; but when the case had reached the point of rendering the verdict, he directed a verdict of guilty. He thus denied a trial by jury to an accused party in his court; and either through malice, which we do not believe, or through ignorance, which in such a flagrant degree is equally culpable in a judge, he violated one of the most important provisions of the Constitution of the United States.... The privilege of polling the jury has been held to be an absolute right in this State and it is a substantial right ..."

Claiming that the defendant had been denied her right of trial by jury. Henry Selden the next day moved for a new trial. Judge Hunt denied the motion, and, ordering the defendant to stand up, asked her, "Has the prisoner anything to say why sentence shall not be pronounced."

"Yes, your honor," Susan replied, "I have many things to say; for in your ordered verdict of guilty, you have trampled underfoot every vital principle of our government. My natural rights, my civil rights, my political rights, my judicial rights, are all alike ignored...."

Impatiently Judge Hunt protested that he could not listen to a rehearsal of arguments which her counsel had already presented.

"May it please your honor," she persisted, "I am not arguing the question but simply stating the reasons why sentence cannot in justice be pronounced against me. Your denial of my citizen's right to vote is the denial of my right of consent as one of the governed, the denial of my right of representation as one of the taxed, the denial of my right to a trial by a jury of my peers ..."

"The Court cannot allow the prisoner to go on," interrupted Judge Hunt; but Susan, ignoring his command to sit down, protested that her prosecutors and the members of the jury were all her political sovereigns.

Again Judge Hunt tried to stop her, but she was not to be put off. She was pleading for all women and her voice rang out to every corner of the courtroom.

"The Court must insist," declared Judge Hunt, "the prisoner has been tried according to established forms of law."

"Yes, your honor," admitted Susan, "but by forms of law all made by men, interpreted by men, administered by men, in favor of men, and against women...."

"The Court orders the prisoner to sit down," shouted Judge Hunt. "It will not allow another word."

Unheeding, Susan continued, "When I was brought before your honor for trial, I hoped for a broad and liberal interpretation of the Constitution and its recent amendments, that should declare all United States citizens under its protecting aegis--that should declare equality of rights the national guarantee to all persons born or naturalized in the United States. But failing to get this justice--failing, even, to get a trial by a jury not of my peers--I ask not leniency at your hands--but rather the full rigors of the law."

Once more Judge Hunt tried to stop her, and acquiescing at last, she sat down, only to be ordered by him to stand up as he pronounced her sentence, a fine of $100 and the costs of prosecution.

"May it please your honor," she protested, "I shall never pay a dollar of your unjust penalty. All the stock in trade I possess is a $10,000 debt, incurred by publishing my paper--The Revolution ... the sole object of which was to educate all women to do precisely as I have done, rebel against your man-made, unjust, unconstitutional forms of law, that tax, fine, imprison, and hang women, while they deny them the right of representation in the government.... I shall earnestly and persistently continue to urge all women to the practical recognition of the old revolutionary maxim that 'Resistance to tyranny is obedience to God.'"

Pouring cold water on this blaze of oratory. Judge Hunt tersely remarked that the Court would not require her imprisonment pending the payment of her fine.

This shrewd move, obviously planned in advance, made it impossible to carry the case to the United States Supreme Court by writ of habeas corpus.

* * * * *

That same afternoon, Susan was on hand for the trial of the three election inspectors. This time Judge Hunt submitted the case to the jury but with explicit instructions that the defendants were guilty. The jury returned a verdict of guilty, and the inspectors, denied a new trial, were each fined $25 and costs. Two of them, Edwin F. Marsh and William B. Hall, refused to pay their fines and were sent to jail. Susan appealed on their behalf to Senator Sargent in Washington, who eventually secured a pardon for them from President Grant. He also presented a petition to the Senate, in January 1874, to remit Susan's fine, as did William Loughridge of Iowa to the House, but the judiciary committees reported adversely.

Because neither of these cases had been decided on the basis of national citizenship and the right of a citizen to vote, Susan was heartsick. To have them relegated to the category of election fraud was as if her high purpose had been trailed in the dust. Wishing to spread reliable information about her trial and the legal questions involved, she had 3,000 copies of the court proceedings printed for distribution.