The American: A Middle Western Legend (12 page)

—I don't have to go over the trial with you. Better, my friend, that some day you will go over the trial, step by step, word by word, line by line, and see whether ever before such a mockery was made of justice, or what goes for justice. No, we'll argue afterward. Now I don't have to go into the incredible selection of jurors, the false testimony, the way Lingg was murdered in his cell, the way these men were convicted, and the way their conviction was upheld from the lowest to the highest court. Now, only, I want to finish my story of Parsons. Only a few minutes more.

—He went to the Holmes' house, where Mr. Holmes gave him shelter. There he remained for a few days, and then, because it was so close to Chicago, because Mrs. Holmes had been arrested, he moved on. He shaved off his mustache, became an itinerant worker, and moved on to Wisconsin. He stayed with the Hoans, at Waukesha, doing odd jobs, turning back to his old trade of carpenter. You see, he was sheltered; in eight states, there were men who would die for Parsons, and gladly. Am I sentimental? How many had told me that when he came into a room, it was like Christ entering! Then, because those who had trusted him were on trial for their lives, because for him there was no life underground, no life apart from the working people, no life apart from his wife and children, he came back to Chicago and gave himself up.

—The rest you know, how he appeared in court, how he went on trial, and how he was condemned, with the others, to be hanged by the neck today until he is dead. Then why am I bothering to speak about Parsons at all, and why should I bore you with this Haymarket affair, you who listen so patiently, when for a year and a half now, you have heard so much of it? Only this: when they die, something inside of me will die, and I do not want that something inside of me to be destroyed. Because you are Judge Pete Altgeld, and because I believe you are a different kind from the men I see in power.

—So I put in my pocket a statement from Captain Black, their lawyer. Last Tuesday, just before Lingg was found dead in his cell, Black went to see Parsons and begged him to plead for executive clemency. Because now people are being troubled that something like a saint should die. They are remembering that Christ was also accursed to those who ruled. So they say, if only Parsons pleaded for mercy, the governor would have pardoned him. Black went to Parsons and begged him to plead for mercy. Because if Parsons dies, comething will die inside of Black too. But Parsons refused. It's a terrible thing to die, so how can I say it so simply? Parsons refused; he would not plead for his life. He explained why, and afterwards Black wrote down what he said. I just want to read that to you, and then I am through.

XIII

On the Judge's mantel, the clock, cradled between the expressionless busts of Minerva and Augustus, began to strike ten. The two men listened to the strokes. Schilling was drawing the paper from his pocket, and the Judge, as if loath to confront him, kept staring at the fireplace, where already only embers remained from the fine log.

“Shall I read it?” Schilling asked.

“I've missed court already.”

“Maybe I've talked too much.”

“Go ahead and read it,” the Judge said coldly.

“All right,” Schilling nodded. “Here is Parsons' statement. He said to Black: ‘Captain, I know that you are right. I know that if I should sign this application for pardon, my sentence would be commuted. No longer ago than last Sunday night Melville E. Stone, the editor of the
Daily News
, spent nearly two hours in my cell, urging me to sign a petition, and urging me that if I would do so I should have his influence and the influence of his paper in favor of the commutation of my sentence; and I know that means that my sentence would be commuted. But I will not do it. My mind is firmly and irrevocably made up, and I beg you to urge me no further upon the subject. I am an innocent man—innocent of this offense of which I have been found guilty by the jury, and the world knows my innocence. If I am to be executed at all, it is because I am an anarchist, not because I am a murderer; it is because of what I have taught and spoken and written in the past, and not because of the throwing of the Haymarket bomb. I can afford to be hung for the sake of the ideas I hold and the cause I have espoused if the people of the State of Illinois can afford to hang an innocent man who voluntarily placed himself in their power.

“‘And I will tell you, Captain, what is the real secret of my position, but in confidence. I do not want anything said about it until after the 11th. I have a hope—mark you, it is a very faint hope—but yet I do hope my attitude may result in the saving of those other boys—Lingg, Engel and Fischer. Spies, Fielden and Schwab have already signed a petition for clemency. And if I should now separate myself from Lingg, Engel and Fischer, and sign a petition upon which the Governor could commute my sentence, I know that it would mean absolute doom to the others—that Lingg, Engel and Fisher would inevitably be hung. So I have determined to make their cause and their fate my own. I know the chances are 999 in 1,000 that I will swing with them; that there isn't one chance in a thousand of my saving them; but if they can be saved at all it is by my standing with them, so that whatever action is taken in my case may with equal propriety be taken in theirs. I will not, therefore, do anything that will separate me from them. I expect that the result will be that I shall hang with them, but I am ready.'”

Schilling finished, folded the paper, and said, “That is all.” But the Judge was staring intently at the fire, and the ticking of the clock seemed to fill the entire room.

“That is all,” Schilling said. “In a little while, Parsons will be hanged. In another hour, I think.”

“Yes—”

“Five days ago, they murdered Louis Lingg, who was to die with the men today. That was not clever; that was stupid. When such things happen, even a judge in a stone house isn't safe.”

“Now you're out of your head!” Altgeld said angrily, glad at last to have something to strike back with. “Lingg committed suicide, and when he did, he killed whatever chance Parsons and the others had.”

“Suicide! Has a man ever in this world committed suicide by putting a dynamite fuse in his mouth and igniting it, so that with half of his face torn away he suffered the tortures of the damned before he died? And for effect, there were little dynamite bombs found all over his cell. My God, Pete, will you listen to me? They saw that maybe it would be a terrible thing if Parsons and the others died; they saw sympathy was changing. So they went into Lingg's cell, beat him unconscious, planted those ridiculous little bombs all around the cell, placed a fuse in his mouth, and killed him. You live in a land where this happens. How will you sleep at night?”

“You're excited,” the Judge said. “Calm down.”

“I'm excited—yes, I'm excited. I look at that clock over there and count the minutes before they kill four men. I'm excited! I came to you because I believe in you, because I said to myself Pete Altgeld can pull down the walls of that jail, even now.”

“I can't.”

“You could go to your phone. You could call the governor. You could fight! They might listen to you. No one in this city is happy today.”

“It would do no good.”

Watching the Judge's face, anxiously, keenly, Schilling accepted a verdict, appeared to grow old and tired at once, and at the same time, rose to go.

“Wait a minute,” the Judge said.

“For what?”

“Let me say one word for myself, George! What kind of a son of a bitch do you think I am?”

“It doesn't matter.”

“You got a fire inside you, and you think anything you touch will burn. My God, man, be sane! What good would it do if I called the governor? Don't you understand there's nothing I can do now? Nothing! It's too late. If you want to blame me for before, then blame me. Ask me why I didn't sign the petition. Ask me why I didn't let my voice be heard.”

Schilling shook his head.

“Now it's too late for me to do anything, George.”

“I got to go,” Schilling said.

“Why don't you stay here? Let me give you a drink.”

“I got to go,” Schilling repeated.

“Sit down.”

“It's all right,” Schilling said, smiling slightly. “I'll see you tomorrow, the next day. I'm not angry at you. But I got to go.”

“I could explain more fully—”

“You don't have to explain.”

“Only the world doesn't end because Parsons dies. Pull yourself together. Even if these men are saints, the thing they represent is our enemy—”

“And that justifies their death?”

“Maybe it does. Justice isn't an abstraction, it's a function of—”

“Go on,” Schilling said.

“George, go home and get some rest.”

Emma came into the room. She stood at the doorway, watching them for a moment, and then she said, “George, will you have something to eat?”

He shook his head. “Thank you, Emma.”

“Peters is on the phone—from court.”

“Tell him to adjourn for the day.”

“A reporter from the
Inter-Ocean
called,” she said quietly. “He wanted to know if you have any statement on the execution.” She hesitated a moment, and then added, “I told him, no.”

“Thank you, Emma,” the Judge said.

Schilling began to go. It was half past ten. The Judge asked, “Where are you going, George?” and the little carpenter answered, “I don't know.” “I'm sorry, George.” “It doesn't matter now,” Schilling said. “I think I'll go out and walk for a while. It's a nice day.” And then he left. Emma went to the door with him. When she came back, the Judge was still sitting as she had left him.

“Has it happened yet?” she asked.

“No—in a little while, I suppose.”

“Schilling wanted you to do something, didn't he?”

“Yes.”

“Can you do anything?”

The Judge shook his head.

“I don't think Schilling is angry with you,” she said. “He has very high regard for you.”

“Yes, I suppose so.”

“Anyway, this horrible thing will be over.”

“It will be over,” the Judge said.

“I called Joe Martin's office, but he had left. I didn't want to say where he was in front of Schilling. He went to witness the hanging. I think that's disgusting. His secretary was very much excited. She said she'd get a message to him, and he'd come here later. Peters was pleased with having a holiday. Will you have lunch at home?”

“If you don't mind,” the Judge said.

XIV

Not long before this day Judge Altgeld and his friend, Judge Lambert Tree, had lunched with Phil Armour, the great pork and beef king. Though both Altgeld and Tree were persons of note in Chicago, Armour maintained an attitude of amused condescension all during the meal. Altgeld, with all his innate dignity, found himself cringing under Armour's patronage, and when he tried to hit back, with wit, with sarcasm, with knowledge, he found Armour's bulk impervious to attack of that sort. In this fashion, Armour spoke of Altgeld's book
, Our Penal Machinery and its Victims:

“I hear you been writing, Altgeld. Got a book out.”

“That's so,” Altgeld said.

“No harm in writing. I suppose you've done some writing too, Tree,”

“Very little,” Judge Tree said.

“I don't mind you boys writing,” Armour said. “As a matter of fact, the ladies are kind of impressed by your book, Altgeld. We like a judge to show some brains—after the kind King Mike McDonald dropped on us. A judge isn't just a cheap ward politician; you boys got to get up there and show your faces each day.”

“I see,” Altgeld said. He was incapable of saying anything more.

“But there's a time-and place,” Armour continued. “We have some very bad elements here in Chicago.”

“Yes, I guess we have.”

“Nothing else to do but to make a decent, law-abiding city out of it. A place where a workingman can do a fair day's work for a fair day's wages, without worrying about having his throat cut.”

Altgeld could only nod.

“And for that, we need a police force,” Armour went on. “Pretty fine fellers on the force. They're not helped by psalm-singing for the poor, abused criminal. Jesus God, Altgeld, there's no point in attacking jails. It won't help your career to become a damned reformer. Charity is one thing; you could live five years on what I give charity in one; but when you attack the very foundation of society, then you sound damn like a communist.”

“And you consider jails to be the foundation of society?” Altgeld asked lamely.

“Law and order. That's what I refer to, law and order. When we make a judge, we expect him to stand for law and order. When we break him, it's because he doesn't stand for those things. There's a lot of talk about you being a radical. We don't like that kind of talk.”

“Whom do you mean by ‘we'?” Altgeld asked.

Armour spread his hands and smiled. “You know what I say—I say, no hard feelings. Have your secretary send me a bill; I'll buy a few hundred copies of the book myself. Maybe your next book will be about honest, hard-working citizens. I don't want to discourage you, young man. Now how about a brandy?”

And Altgeld, raging inside, sat there, impotent; now he recalled that luncheon and mixed thoughts of it with thoughts of the four men who were about to die. Schilling had come and spoken and gone, and now Altgeld wondered how much truth there was in Schilling's contention that he, one man, at this eleventh hour, could reverse the course of the law, or even halt it. Much of what Schilling had said he agreed with. Judge Gary, who tried the case of the Haymarket defendants, had been flagrantly partisan. The question of who threw the bomb had been crudely moved aside, and eight men were condemned to death, not because they were murderers, but because they were militant leaders of labor and therefore enemies of one part of society; so it was put up to him, Pete Altgeld, whether they were his enemies too. Even if he could truthfully tell himself that anything he might have attempted would have been futile—as futile as the attempts of his friend, Judge Tree, to gain mercy for the condemned men—he still faced the question of how he would have acted had he been in another positon, as for example in the position of Governor Oglesby. That was the question which stirred a hundred doubts inside of him, mixing so curiously with his recollection of Phil Armour, and what Armour had said, and the matter-of-fact disposal of democracy, which contends that servants of the people are elected by the people, not made by a handful of men. And while cynicism was easy in the normal course of things, and taken for granted in the normal course of things, so that one never raised one's voice against the pattern in which one lived, the pattern of adultery mixed with respectability, of graft mixed with the time-worn democratic slogans, of vice supporting charity and religion, and religion by inaction condoning vice, of filth and suffering and death turned into profits and men turned into beasts; while these matters and a hundred more like them were accepted easily and naturally day in and day out, today they became symbols of four men close to death: and thereby they stuck in a man's craw rather than sliding easily down his throat. They stuck in Judge Altgeld's craw, and what had been only a few hours ago a lovely fall day now turned sour and uncomfortable.