exhaustless capital, and refutation but supplies the and my answer are now before the world, and I food on which he lives. He may, however, pur- leave them to the judgment of all honorable men. sue his vocation undisturbed by me. His libels C. PHILLIPS. From the Examiner, 24 Nov. LAWYERS, CLIENTS, WITNESSES, AND THE PUBLIC. It is painful to allude to two cases of recent occurrence, where attempts were made to secure the escape of criminals from conviction, by directing suspicions against the innocent; and in each instance the prisoner had privately confessed his guilt, and the counsel was acquainted with this fact. The subject may be dismissed with the single observation, that the opinion of the bar was in entire accordance with that of the public, in condemning the line of defence adopted.-Hortensius. 1849. (An His torical Essay by Wm. Forsyth, M. A., Barrister, late Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge.) Courvoisier had made a full confession of his guilt the night before this distinguished advocate [Mr. Phillips] addressed the jury for the defence, and the feelings or prejudices of society have received a shock, not at all favorable to the general estimate of the profession, from the fervor which he notwithstanding contrived to infuse into his appeal. We took occasion very recently to vindicate the privileges of the bar, and we deem it quite unnecessary to prove again that a counsel is bound to see the due forms of law and the strict rules of evidence observed, whatever opinion he may chance to entertain as an individual of the moral guilt of the party or the actual merits of the case. At the same time we think Mr. Phillips went too far. There was no occasion for insinuations against the maid-servants; nor was it in good taste, to say the least of it, to attempt to work upon the timid consciences of the jurymen, by holding out the apprehension of a never-dying omnipresent feeling of reinorse.-Law Magazine. August, 1840. It is alike improper and unprofessional for counsel to do that for a prisoner which it would be unjustifiable in the prisoner to do for himself; and we apprehend there can be small doubt that it would be unjustifiable in a prisoner to get an innocent man hanged in order to save his own neck from a halter. We have been several years at the bar without once hearing such a course countenanced; and we believe Lord Brougham, Mr. Phillips, and Mr. Seymour must divide between them the enviable distinction of giving it sanction.-Law Magazine. February, 1848. THE cases referred to by Mr. Forsyth are those of the defence by Mr. Seymour in the Mirfield murders, and the advocacy of Courvoisier by Mr. Charles Phillips. Both have been mentioned, from time to time, in this journal; and Mr. Phillips has been induced to break what he terms "the contemptuous silence with which for nine years" he has treated the charge against himself, by an allusion arising out of the trial of the Mannings. His attempted defence, which will be found in another column in extenso, is a striking proof of what we took occasion also to state in remarking on the recent trial, namely, the much greater difficulty of resisting public opinion in this direction at present, than at the time when the outrage was committed by Mr. Phillips. Whether or not the defence proves anything else, will be seen as we proceed. The trial of Courvoisier occupied three daysThursday, Friday, and Saturday, the 18th, 19th, and 20th June, 1810. On Saturday the 27th the Bubjoined comments appeared in the Examiner. MR. PHILLIPS' DEFENCE OF COURVOISIER. For the honor or for the dishonor of the profession of the law it should be known whether Mr. Phillips' speech in defence of Courvoisier, after the murderer had confessed his guilt to him, does or does not exceed the bounds of an advocate's license. It would be unjust to present it as an example of professional morality; the question is, whether it is or is not accordant with professional morality? To the report of the Times a remark is appended in which it is presumed that the confession Entirely changed the line of defence intended to be taken by his counsel; for it was generally rumored that a severe attack would be made on the fellow-servants of the prisoner, and also on the police who were engaged in the investigation. The intended line of defence (query, lie of defence?) was not changed by the communication in the two points mentioned-the cruelest insinuations were thrown out against the witness Sarah Mancer, and the foulest charges advanced against the police. Mr. Phillips disclaimed the intention to criminate the female servants. No, forsooth! tainted into the world persons perhaps depending God forbid that any breath of his should send for their subsistence upon their character. It was not his duty, nor his interest, nor his policy, to do so. But did he or did he not make the attempt in this passage? peaceful bed, and was alarmed in the morning by The prisoner had seen his master retire to his the housemaid, who was up before him, with a cry of robbery, and some dark, mysterious suggestion of murder. "Let us go," said she, "and see where my lord is." He did confess that that expression struck him as extraordinary. If she had said, "Let us go and tell my lord that the house is plundered," that would have been natubut why should she suspect that anything had happened to his lordship? She saw her fellowservant safe, no taint of blood about the house, and where did she expect to find her master? Why, in his bed-room, to be sure. What was there to lead to a suspicion that he was hurt? Courvoisier was safe, the cook was safe, and why should she suspect that her master was not safe too? ral; Here, too, was a direct attempt to shake the credit of the woman's evidence, and to induce the jury to believe that she had perjured herself The depositions taken before the coroner were now before the learned judges, and perhaps they would consider it their bounden duty to tell the jury whether that woman swore before the coroner as she did before the court. His conscience was clear; he had discharged his duty by throwing out that suggestion. The question he had put to the witness was this " Upon the oath you have taken, did you not tell the coroner that you saw-instead of some blood on the pillow-his lordship murdered on the bed?" That was matter for the jury to consider; he would now pass on. He (Mr. Phillips) hoped the jury knew something of Leicester place. If they did, they knew the character of this hotel, with a billiard-room attached to it, where, unlike at a respectable hotel, any stranger, not being a guest, might enter and gamble. A correspondent of the Times states All these imputations, of different degrees of blackness, were flung out by Mr. Phillips, in the If the coroner's inquest, which the Globe pro-hope of obtaining, by them, the acquittal of a nounced so eminently well conducted, had done man whom he knew to be a murderer of the its duty, the discrepancy between Sarah Mancer's blackest dye. evidence and that of the other persons who saw the napkin over the face of the murdered nobleMr. C. Phillips, who defended the wretched man man would have been cleared up. The discrep-Courvoisier on Saturday, coinplained in court of a ancy was evidently nothing more than an inaccuracy of expression; but the effect of leaving it unexplained was, as we have seen, to expose the principal witness to a charge of falsehood. Then, as to the police, does it appear that Mr. Phillips' line of defence was altered in these attacks, the groundlessness of which he knew as well as his client's guilt? The witness Pearce is thus dealt with : very gross and false statement which appeared in a notorious Sunday paper, and which, he said, might injure him in the estimation of his brethren at the bar, as well as the public at large, if it were left uncontradicted. The effect of the statement was, that he had made a solemn appeal to God of Cour voisier's innocence. So far from having done so, the learned gentleman said he cautiously abstained from adopting such a course, and for the best reason -that the miserable man had previously admitted his guilt to him, and after he had heard the confes"Look here, sir," said he to Courvoisier, "dare sion he was about to throw up his brief, until his you look me in the face?" Merciful God! was friend, Mr. Clarkson, persuaded him not to do so. there any exhibition on earth so likely to strike He acted upon that advice, and did the best he him dumb with horror as the proofs of the murder could for the guilty wretch, although against his lying before him, and that miscreant challenging own feelings and conviction. Mr. Phillips added, him to look him in the face? He did look him in that he had spoken to both the learned judges upon the face, and answered him, "I see them, I know the subject, and they assured him that they had nothing about them; my conscience is clear, I am purposely watched his speech, and felt quite coninnocent." The learned counsel animadverted in vinced that he never attempted to use the language very strong terms upon the testimony of this wit-attributed to him. Many others in court gave simness, charging him with an attempt to intimidate ilar testimony. the prisoner, and thereby to extort from him a confession of the murder. He also condemned the conduct of Mr. Mayne and Mr. Hobler in permitting Pearce to hold that interview with the prisonSuch treatment was worthy only of the Inquisition. Yet the fellow who did all this told the jury he expected to share in the plunder-the 4507. reward-which was to be divided over the coffin of Courvoisier! He had hoped the days for bloodmoney were past. er. Mr. Phillips, when he uttered this tirade, knew that Pearce was right in fact, though not perhaps in form-that he had confronted the murderer, and dared him to deny his guilt; but Pearce is "the miscreant," and Courvoisier the injured innocent. The attack upon Baldwin is still more unjustifiable, and it is accompanied with a general charge of conspiracy against the prisoner, of whose guilt the speaker was cognizant. Next came Baldwin, who had done his best in the work of conspiracy to earn the wages of blood. He swore well and to the purpose-he did all he could to send a fellow-creature "unhouseled, unanointed, unaneled" before his God. That man equivocated and shuffled, and lied on his oath as long as he could, pretending never to have heard of the reward because he was no scholar, although every wall in London was blazoned with it. Next the character of Mrs. Piolaine was to be defamed, in order to procure the acquittal of the murderer. In the Times' report we find this emphatic assertion: "The omniscient God alone knew who did this crime." This was said by the man who himself knew who did the crime, and who profaned the name of the Deity by thrusting it into a solemn assertion, of the untruth of which he was cognizant. We pass to a less grave example of the lengths to which this advocate carried his zeal for a murderer. The slightest expressions had been fastened upon Dear is that shed to which his soul conforms, There never dropped from human lips a more inno And this maudlin stuff was uttered by the man significance to facts; and it is therefore contended in whose ears the murderer's confession of his guilt was yet ringing: Mr. Phillips, while harping on those words, being conscious that his blood-stained client had coveted the money, and cut his master's throat to obtain it. that it is the counsel's duty to act for the prisoner as the prisoner would act for himself if he had his not thence follow that it is the duty of the advoadvocate's skill. Admitting this position, it does cate to have recourse to falsehood in defence of his client; for the principle stated would only clothe Whether all this accords or not with profes-the advocate with the rights and duties of the prissional morality it is not for us to decide; but, if it does, the public will probably be disposed to think that the profession should change its name from the profession of the Law to the profession of the Lie. We should like to know the breadth of the distinction between an accomplice after the fact, and an advocate who makes the most unscrupulous endeavors to procure the acquittal of a man whom he knows to be an assassin. The subject attracted very considerable attention, and the general feeling manifested against Mr. Phillips elicited attempts to defend him on the part of his friends. Referring to these a fortnight after the foregoing article appeared, and to a statement which had been circulated as to the defence originally proposed, the Examiner of the 11th July had the following remarks: We observe the following startling statement in the Globe: oner, and it cannot be the duty of the prisoner to "COURVOISIER'S INTENDED DEFENCE.-While the preliminaries for the approaching execution were in progress, and a large number of gentlemen were assembled in a room adjoining the prison, waiting for admission, it was stated by one of the city authorities, as an admitted fact, that the line of defence which Mr. Phillips, the criminal's counsel on his trial, intended to have taken was, that the female servants had been engaged in criminal intrigue with some of the police, and had admitted them into the house for the purpose; that the robbery and mur-guilt gave the right reading of circumstances. der had been perpetrated by them. The secretion of Our objections to Mr. Phillips' defence have apthe jewelry and other articles in the butler's pantry plied to the points in which he became the assailant was to have been thus accounted for; and the sub- or accuser of witnesses whose truth he had no reason sequent discovery of blood-stained gloves, &c., so to suspect after Courvoisier's confession, and also to strangely rolled up in Courvoisier's linen, after the his solemn pretences of the murderer's innocence. real perpetrator of the deed was in custody, and Had he procured the acquittal of the guilty by this had left the house, was to have been adduced as course, and transferred suspicion to the innocent, further presumptive proof of the police being the and placed them on their trial, the morality of his guilty parties, for the purpose of criminating the conduct would have been brought to the practical prisoner. According to this story, then, Mr. Phillips' intended line of defence would have been directed not only against the characters but against the lives of the innocent female servants. They were to have been murdered-for sentence of death upon false accusation is nothing less than murder on the part of those raising the false charge-to procure the acquittal of the miscreant. It is to be observed that Mr. Phillips could have had no grounds for believing that the maid-servants and the police had committed the murder; but the statement that such a defence was meditated is too horrible to be credited, and the circulation of it is an affront to public morality. test. To judge of the attempt, imagine the success of it. Had he confined himself to weighing the sufficiency of evidence, and examining flaws in its links, he would at least have avoided wrong and danger to others in the defence of an assassin. The policy of Mr. Phillips' course we question as much as its morality, for jurors, having seen, in this example, the extremities to which his zeal for a client of whose guilt he is cognizant will carry him, will in all other instances be apt to suppose that he is pleading against his knowledge of tho truths of the case. These two articles comprise our charge against Mr. Phillips. It has been re-stated by us from time to time, never with any other feeling than these articles evince. It would have been difficult When the fact Quite bad enough was Mr. Phillips' defence as it was, yet, though condemned by the right sense of the public, it has had its advocates. In the most ingenious argument we have seen in vindica-to overstate anything so grave. tion of it, the counsel is said to represent the pris- became known that Sarah Mancer had been lodged oner with the advantage of the knowledge of the in a lunatic asylum, driven mad by the sufferings law and skill in sifting evidence, and giving due and terrors arising out of the Courvoisier trial, it was an illustration, not an aggravation, of Mr. | said, we did not accuse him of solemnly protesting Phillips' defence of his client. If we tolerate the one, we cannot make a crime of the other. We desire attention to a summary of the charge, thus advanced by us, before we proceed to the attempted exculpation. that belief, but of solemnly acting it. Our assertion was, not that he invented a falsehood to profess faith in his client's innocence, but that he invented a falsehood to profess ignorance of his client's guilt; and that he profaned the name of the Deity by using it to give solemnity to this falsehood. The third and last accusation to which Mr. Phillips replies, is that of having endeavored vants: and the sum of his answer on this head is to requote that very "God forbid he should," &c., which we carefully quoted in our original comment on his speech; and to declare the charge to have been solely derived from his cross-examination of Sarah Mancer on the day when he still supposed his client innocent, to which cross-examination we never even remotely adverted. Now here we might close the subject, as far as this journal is concerned. Mr. Phillips has only done his best to evade every charge specifically brought against him by us. He does not mention his attack upon the police, whose efficiency and character, so vital to the interests of justice, he labored to damage irretrievably. He does not mention his gross imputations on Mrs. Piolaine, of whom he knew nothing but that she was the decisive witness against his client, and that her Having received a private confession that his client was the murderer, Mr. Phillips, disclaiming an intention to criminate the female servants, proceeded to cast upon Sarah Mancer the most to cast imputations of guilt upon the female serfoul suspicions. Knowing that the police had fixed the imputation of guilt in the proper quarter, he branded individual members of that body as liars, bloodhounds, and miscreants; and accused them generally of a conspiracy to obtain the government reward by convicting an innocent man. Thoroughly conscious that the evidence of Mrs. Piolaine, if she was believed, would complete the case against the murderer, he threw out the most unfounded aspersions upon her character and that of her husband. Finally, being in possession of the knowledge of who did the crime, he solemnly protested that the OMNISCIENT GOD ALONE KNEW who did it. This was our charge, from which, at the same time, we not only omitted nothing put forward in so-called extenuation, but interfered to throw discredit on a charge yet more incredibly revolting. We carefully quoted Mr. Phillips' God forbid that he should do what he afterwards did. We identification of him on the evening of the first day gave him what benefit might be derivable from his denial of having made a solemn appeal to Heaven of Courvoisier's innocence; from his assertion that he had acted on the advice of others in retaining his brief after the confession; and from the favorable testimony of the judges who tried the case, in regard to his appeal to the Deity. We even admitted his right, in the peculiar circumstances, to retain his brief; and contended only that he should have refrained from any line of defence, the effect of which, if successful, would have procured the acquittal of his guilty client by criminating or destroying the character of persons who had borne true evidence against him. In short, our charge was restricted to Mr. | Phillips' solemnly acted belief in the murderer's innocence; and to those points in which, in the course of that performance, he became the assailant and accuser of witnesses whose truth he had no reason to suspect after receiving the murderer's confession. Let us now mark how this indictment is met after nine years' rest and reflection. of the trial had led to his confession on the following morning. He would evade the profanity of having introduced the name of the Deity into a false assertion, by setting up a difference of assertion hardly material. He would escape the consequence of having imputed guilt to Sarah Mancer, by suggesting a confusion between her cross-examination on Thursday and his speech on Saturday. But this shall not serve. We have been challenged to reopen this affair, and we will not shrink from doing so. The reply which was meant to dispose of our accusations, will now enable us finally to establish them, on authority above suspicion. The report of the trial which appeared in the Times has been lately restudied by Mr. Phillips; he has in particular "read with care the whole report in the Times" of his three hours' speech; and of these reports he guarantees the strict fidelity. Now we have compared with the Times every passage quoted in the Examiner of the 27th June, and find them to have been taken, verbatim et literatim, from that journal. We now write Mr. Phillips, in his exculpation, alleges our with the file of the Times before us, and with the attack to have been threefold, and proceeds to dis-assurance of Mr. Phillips himself, therefore, that pose of it under three distinct heads. The first is such additional expressions as we may at present that of having retained his brief, which we express-quote are not colored by exaggeration or unfairness. ly excepted from our charge. It now appears that Nor is it less important that we have also the ashe retained it with the sanction of the judge, Mr.surance of Mr. Phillips that he knew of his client's Baron Parke, who assisted Chief Justice Tindal guilt before the commencement of the second day's in trying the case, and to whom the fact of the proceedings, a day earlier than has commonly been confession was communicated. The second is that supposed. Before the court opened on Friday, he of having appealed to Heaven as to his belief in Courvoisier's innocence, which we gave him at the time the credit of having denied. As we have heard the confession; he cross-examined all the police constables, except Baldwin, in the course of that day; he cross-examined Mrs. Piolaine in the afternoon of that day; and on the following|mised thus much, we solicit the reader's attention morning he spoke for the defence. Having pre- to the subjoined parallel passages. WHAT MR. PHILLIPS ASSERTS HE DID NOT SAY. I am accused, secondly, of having "appealed to Heaven as to my belief in Courvoisier's innocence," after he had inade me acquainted with his guilt! A grievous accusation. But it is false as it is foul, and carries its own refutation on its face. **** What! appeal to Heaven for its testimony to a lie, and not expect to be answered by its lightning? What! make such an appeal, conscions that an honorable colleague sat beside me whose valued friendship I must have forever forfeited? But, above all, and beyond all, and too monstrous for belief, would I have dared to have uttered that falsehood in the very presence of the judge to whom, but the day before, I had confided the reality? There, upon the bench above me, sat that time-honored man, that upright magistrate, pure as his ermine, "narrowly watching" every word 1 said. Had I dared to make an appeal so horrible and so impious-had I dared so to outrage his nature and my own conscience, he would have started from his seat, and withered me with a glance. No, Warren, I never made such an appeal; it is a malignant untruth, and, sure I am, had the person who coined it but known what had previously occurred, he never would have uttered from his libel mint so very clumsy and self-proclaiming a counterfeit.-Times, Nov. 20, 1849. WHAT MR. PHILLIPS DREAMT THE NIGHT BEFORE HE DEFENDED THE MURDERER. At the close of the to me most wretched day on which the confession was made, the prisoner sent me this astounding message by his solicitor: "Tell Mr. Phillips, my counsel, that I consider he has my life in his hands." My answer was, that, as he must be present himself, he would have an opportunity of seeing whether I deserted him or not. I was to speak on the next morning. But what a night preceded it! Fevered and horror-stricken, I could find no repose. If I slumbered for a moment, the murderer's form arose before me, scaring sleep away, now mullering his awful crime, and now shrieking to me to save his life! I did try to save it. I did everything to save it except that which is imputed to me; but that I did not, and I will prove it.-Times, Nov. 20, 1849. MR. PHILLIPS' DEFINITION OF THE DUTIES OF AN ADVOCATE. The counsel for a prisoner has no option. The moment he accepts his brief, every faculty he possesses becomes his client's property. It is an implied contract between him and the man who trusts him. Out of the profession this may be a moot point; but it was asserted and acted on by two illustrious advocates of our own day, even to the confronting of a king, and, to the regal honor be it spoken, these dauntless men were afterwards promoted to the highest dignities. You will ask me here whether I contend on this principle for the right of doing that of which I am accused, namely, casting the guilt upon the innocent? I do no such thing; and I deny the inputation altogether.-Times, Nov. 20, 1849. WHAT MR. PHILLIPS NOW SAYS OF COURVOISIER'S FELLOW-SERVANTS. Thirdly and lastly, I am accused of having endeavored to cast upon the female servants the guilt which I knew was attributable to Courvoisier. You will observe, of course, that the gravamen of this consists in my having done so after the confession. The answer to this is obvious. Courvoisier did not confess till Friday; the cross-examination took place the day before, and so far, therefore, the accusation is disposed of. But it may be * * * I said I did so in my address to the jury. * find these words reported in the Times-" Mr. Phillips said the prosecutors were bound to prove the guilt of the prisoner, not by inference, by reasoning, by such subtle and refined ingenuity as had been used, but by downright, clear, open, palpable demonstration. How did they seek to do this? What said Mr. Adolphus and his witness, Sarah Mancer? And here he would beg the jury not to suppose for a moment, in the course of the narrative with which he must trouble them, that he meant to cast the crime upon either of the female servants. It was not at all necessary to his case to do so. It was neither his interest, his duty, nor his policy to do so. God forbid WHAT MR. PHILLIPS ADMITS HE DID SAY. It was not his business to prove who did the crime: that was the task they (his opponents) had undertaken. Unless that was proved, he would beseech the jury to be cautious how they imbrud their hands in this man's blood. THE OMNISCIENT GOD ALONE KNEW WHO DID THIS CRIME: he was not called on to rend asunder the dark mantle of the night, and throw light upon this deed of darkness. * * *If they acquitted the prisoner of the murder, he was still answerable for the robbery, if guilty of that. And even supposing him guilty of the murder, wHICH INDEED WAS KNOWN TO ALMIGHTY GOD ALONE, and of which, for the sake of his eternal soul, he hoped he was innocent, it was better far that in the dreadful solitude of exile, &c., &c. anxious task was now done; that of the jury was about to begin. Might God direct their judgment.-Times, June 22, 1840. * * * * His WHAT DREAMS HE THREATENED THE JURY WITH IF THEY FOUND THE MURDERER GUILTY. He spoke to them in no spirit of hostile admonition. HEAVEN KNEW HE DID NOT. He spoke to them in the spirit of a friend and fellow-Christian, and in that spirit he told them that if they pronounced the word guilty] lightly, its memory would never die within them. It would accompany them in their walks, it would follow them in their solitary retirements like a shadow, it would haunt them in ineir sleep, and hover round their bed; it would take the shape of an accusing spirit, and CONFRONT AND CONDEMN THEM BEFORE THE JUDGMENT SEAT OF THEIR GOD. SO LET THEM BEWARE HOW THEY ACTED. -Times, June 22, 1840. MR. PHILLIPS' ILLUSTRATION OF THE DUTIES OF AN * ADVOCATE. * His learned friend demanded, who murdered Lord William Russell? He (Mr. P.) was not bound to show that; but he had a right to know who placed the bloody gloves in the prisoner's trunk between the 6th and 14th of May, when the prisoner had been already three days in gaol? Had there not been practices here? Thus bad begins, but worse remains behind." This man, it was evidently determined, should be made the victim of some foul contrivance. * * * * Some villains must have been at work here to provide proofs of guilt against the prisoner, and endeavor to make the jury instrumental in rendering him the victim, not of his own guilt, but of their machinations.- Times, June 22, 1840. WHAT MR. PHILLIPS SAID OF COURVOISIER'S FELLOW-SERVANTS NINE YEARS AGO. * * * They were bound to show the prisoner's guilt, not by inference, by reasoning, by that subtle and refined ingenuity which he was shocked to hear exercised in the opening address of his friend, [why does Mr. Phillips now omit this? but by downright, clear, open, palpable demonstration. How did they, &c. And here he would beg, &c. * He wished not to asperse the female servants. God forbid, &c., &c. It was not at all necessary to his case to do so. * * * * The prisoner had seen his master retire to his peaceful hed, and was alarmed in the morning by the housemaid, who was up before him, with a cry of robbery, and some dark, mysterious suggestions of murder. "Let us go," said she, "and see where my lord is." He did confess that that expression struck him as extraordinary. If she had said, "Let us go and tell my lord that the house is plundered," that would have been natural; but why should she suspect that anything had happened to his lordship? She saw her fellow-servant safe, no taint of blood about the house, and where did she expect to find her master? Why, in his bed-room, to be sure. What |