Page:The Green Bag (1889–1914), Volume 03.pdf/472

 The Green Bag.

Published Monthly, at $3.00 per annum.

Single numbers, 50 cents.

Communications in regard to the contents of the Magazine should be addressed to the Editor, Horace W. Fuller, i$k Beacon Street, Boston, Mass.

The Editor will be glad to receive contributions of articles of moderate length upon subjects of interest to the profession; also anything in the way of legal antiquities or curiosities, facetia, anecdotes, etc.

A CORRESPONDENT in Colorado kindly sends in the following : —

Editor of the "Green Bag".

Dear Sir,—The following death-sentence was delivered by Judge Kirby Benidict, who was for thirteen years an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of New Mexico, and is reported in the minutes of the Bar Association of New Mexico for the year 1890. A Mexican, Jose Maria Martfn, was found guilty of an atrocious murder at the District Court in Taos, and Judge Benidict sentenced him as follows : "Jose Ma. Martin, stand up — Jose Ma. Martin, you have been indicted, tried, and convicted by a jury of your countrymen, of the crime of murder, and the court is now about to pass upon you the dread sentence of the law. As a usual thing, Jose Maria Martin, it is a painful duty for the judge of a court of justice to pronounce upon a human being the sentence of death. There is something horrible about it, and the mind of the court naturally revolts from the performance of such a duty. Happily, however, your case is relieved of all such unpleasant features, and the court takes positive delight in sentencing you to death.

"You are a young man, Jose Maria Martin; apparently of good physical constitution and robust health. Ordinarily you might have looked forward to many years of life, and the court has no doubt you have, and have expected to die at a green old age; but you are about to be cut off in consequence of your own act. Jose Maria Martin, it is now the spring-time; in a little while the grass will be springing up green in these beautiful valleys, and on these broad mesas and mountain sides flowers will be blooming; birds will be singing their sweet carols, and Nature will be putting on her most gorgeous and her most attractive robes, and life will be pleasant and men will want to stay. But none of this for you, Jose Maria Martin: the flowers will not bloom for you, Jose Maria Martin; the birds will not carol for you, Jose Maria Martin; when these things come to gladden the senses of men. you will be occupying a space about six by two beneath the sod, and the green grass and those beautiful flowers will be growing above your lowly head

"The sentence of the court is that you be taken from this place to the county jail; that you be there kept safely and securely confined, in the custody of the sheriff, until the day appointed for your execution.— Be very careful, Mr. Sheriff, that he have no opportunity to escape, and that you have him at the appointed place at the appointed time. — That you be so kept, Jose Maria Martin, until — Mr. Clerk, on what day of the month does Friday about two weeks from this time come? March 22, your honor. Very well — until Friday the 22d day of March, when you will be taken by the sheriff from your place of con finement to some safe and convenient spot within the county — That is in your discretion, Mr. Sheriff : you are only confined to the limits of the county,— and that you there be hanged by the neck until you are dead, and :— the court was about to add, Jose Maria Martin, ' may God have mercy on your soul," but the court will not assume the responsibility of asking an All-Wise Providence to do that which a jury of your peers has refused to do. The Lord could n't have mercy on your soul. However, if you affect any religious belief or are connected with any religious organization, it might be well enough for you to send for your priest or your minister and get from him, well, such consolation as you can; but the court advises you to place no reliance upon anything of that kind. Mr. Sheriff, remove the prisoner."

This sentence was never carried out, as before the day of execution Jose Maria Martin broke jail and was heard of no more.

LEGAL ANTIQUITIES.

Tobacco users had a hard time of it under the Blue Laws of Connecticut, as witness the following stringent regulations:—

"Forasmuch as it is observed, that many abuses are crept in, and comitted by frequent taking of tobacko,

"It is ordered by the authority of this Courte, That no person under the age of twenty one years, nor