Page:The Collected Works of Theodore Parker volume 6.djvu/102

Rh "2. That they escaped from that service.

"These facts he has proved by the record which the statute (sec. 10) declares ’shall be held, and taken to be full and conclusive evidence of the fact of escape, and that the service or labour of the person escaping is due to the party in such record mentioned.'

"Thus these two facts are removed entirely and absolutely from my jurisdiction, and I am entirely and absolutely precluded from applying evidence to them; if, therefore, there is in the case evidence capable of such application, I cannot make it.

"3. The third fact is the identity of the parties before me with the parties mentioned in the record.

"This identity is the only question I have a right to consider. To this, and to this alone, I am to apply the evidence.

"And then, on the whole testimony, my mind is satisfied beyond a reasonable doubt of the identity of the respondents with the parties named in the record.

"On the law and facts of the case, I consider the claimant entitled to the certificate from me which he claims."

The Mayor and Aldermen go into bondage for ever. The liberty of all this audience might be thus sworn away by a commissioner and another kidnapper. But the "ruling" is not the worst thing in the case. The Commissioner had prejudged it all. He had prejudged it entirely before he had even begun this mock trial; before he heard the defence; before the prisoner had any counsel to make a defence. Here is my proof. On Friday (May 26), Wendell Phillips went to Cambridge to see Mr. Loring. He is a professor of law in Harvard College, teaching law and justice to the young men who go up thither to learn law and justice! Mr. Phillips went there to get permission to visit Mr. Burns, and see if he would make a defence and have counsel, Mr. Loring advised Mr. Phillips to make no defence. He said: "Mr. Phillips, I think the case is so clear that you would not be justified in placing any obstructions in the way of the man's going back, as he probably will."

So, as the matter was decided beforehand, it was to be only a mock trial, and might just as well have been dis-