Gentlemen of the Jury—The grand jury, called and sworn on behalf of
the United States, having presented an indictment against Howard Egan,
for the murder of James Monroe—it becomes our duty to proceed with the
case, and if he should be convicted or found guilty of violating the
laws of the United States in this behalf, to pass sentence against
him. For the purpose of determining the facts, you have been
empanelled and sworn to give a true verdict according to the evidence
which should be given you in court. You will readily see that your
duty is important. It is the right of the United States, the right of
the citizens of this territory, and the right of the defendant, to
insist that you shall now discharge that duty without fear, affection,
or partiality. It is the right of us all to insist that, when a crime
has been committed, the offender shall be punished by due course of
law, but not otherwise. We have no right to punish a person for a real
or imaginary wrong, except with the authority of law. The safety of
ourselves individually, and of society, depends on the correct and
faithful administration of good and wholesome laws. No one ought to be
punished unless he be guilty of an act worthy of punishment, nor even
then, unless that act has been declared to be penal by the law of the
land, and the punishment directed, nor until he has had an opportunity
of having a fair and impartial trial, for, peradventure, he may not be
guilty as alleged against him. If the law suffered a person to be
punished upon mere rumor, or upon strong circumstance, accompanied
with the communication of our best—our bosom friends, without
the usual tests of truth which have been established, we might well
pause and wonder whereunto this would grow.
Gentlemen, you are the exclusive judges of the facts, and the court is
to be the judge of the law when the facts are found by you. Murder may
be defined to be, the unlawful killing of a human being in the peace
of the Republic, with malice prepense, or of forethought, by another
human being who is of sound mind and discretion.
In this case, there is no pretence but that the defendant, at the time
of the alleged killing of James Monroe, was of sound mind and
discretion; so you are relieved of that part of the case. When you
retire to your juryroom, you will first proceed to inquire from the
evidence, whether or not James Monroe be dead. If you do not find him
to be dead, that ends the case, and your verdict must be, not guilty.
If you find him to be dead, you will proceed to inquire by what means
he came to his death; if by violence, then inquire whether or not the
defendant gave him the mortal wound. If you find he did not, that ends
your inquiries, and he is entitled to a verdict of not guilty. If you
find the defendant gave him the mortal wound, you will then inquire
whether the killing was lawful or unlawful. In law every killing of
one human being by another of sound mind, is unlawful, except such as
the law excuses or justifies.
If a person when doing a lawful act, by accident kills another, it is
excusable homicide. If a person kills another on a sudden attack in
defense
of himself, wife, child, parent, or servant, it is excusable
homicide. If the
proper officer executes the sentence of the law upon
another, by taking his life pursuant to the judgment of a court
legally rendered, it is justifiable homicide. If an officer of the law
in the exercise of a particular legal duty, is forcibly resisted or
prevented, and, without malice, kills the one who resists, it is
justifiable homicide. If a homicide be committed to prevent the
forcible commission of an atrocious crime, such as murder, robbery,
rape, &c., it is justifiable; but it is not so if done to punish the
offender after the crime has been committed. If you find any of these
in favor of the defendant, then your verdict must be, not guilty; but
if none of these things exist, then the killing, if it has taken
place, is unlawful: in that event, you will proceed to inquire, in
regard to the malice prepense, or malice aforethought. Malice
prepense, or malice aforethought, means premeditated malice, or malice
thought of, before the killing occurred. It may be a meditation for a
few moments only, or it may be of long standing; it may be owing to
injury, real or imaginary, received from the deceased, by the accused.
The law does not permit a person to take the redress of grievances
into his own hands. Though the deceased may have seduced the
defendant's wife, as he now alleges, still he had no right to take the
remedy into his own hands. If, for seduction, the law inflicted the
punishment of death, it would not justify nor excuse the injured party
from guilt, if he inflicted death without a judgment of the law to
that effect, nor even with such a judgment, unless he be the officer
of the law appointed for that purpose. If, as it is contended by the
defendant's attorney, he killed Monroe in the name of the Lord, it
does not change the law of the case. A man may violate a law of the
land, and be guilty, and yet, so far as he is concerned, do it in the
name of the Lord. If, as it has been contended by the district
attorney, the defendant, before he left the city, formed the design of
killing Monroe; or if he so formed the design after he left, and
before he met him; or if he formed it while in conversation with him,
it was malice prepense or aforethought. If the deceased did
seduce the defendant's wife, and begat a child with her; and if for
this the defendant killed him, in law, the killing was unlawful.
Should you be of the opinion in all these things, that the defendant
is guilty, then the place in which the act was committed becomes
material. This would not in most cases affect the general result,
provided the crime be committed within the jurisdiction of the court
trying the accused.
The materiality in this case, arises in consequence of the peculiar
relationship of the United States courts with the courts of the
several States and Territories. The jurisdiction of the United States
courts is separate and distinct from the jurisdiction of the State
courts. But in the Territories, the same judges sit in matters arising
out of the constitution and laws of the United States, as well as the
laws of their respective Territories. This, to me, has been the most
difficult part of the case. The Territorial courts being of a mixed
jurisdiction partly national and partly local in their organization,
it becomes important to keep in view these two jurisdictions. When
sitting as a court of the United States, we must try criminals by the
laws of the United States, and not by the Territorial laws; we must
look to them for our authority to punish violators of the law.
When sitting as Territorial courts we must try criminals by the laws
of the Territory, and look to them for our authority to punish. If the
laws of the United States do not authorize us to punish in a case like
the present as we are now sitting as a United States court, the
defendant, for this reason, is entitled to a verdict of, not guilty.
The United States have no right to pass a law to punish criminals,
except in those cases which are authorized by the constitution. These
may be said to be national in their character, and to extend to all
places under the sole and exclusive jurisdiction of the United States,
but they do not extend to those places within the United States, when
there is an existing State or Territorial jurisdiction, unless they
are to protect its necessary internal authorities, such as protecting
its postal arrangements, its revenue laws, its courts and officers,
and the like cases. There is a large extent of country between this
city and the Missouri River, over which the United States have the
sole and exclusive jurisdiction; and there is a part of this same
country within the jurisdiction of the State of Missouri, and another
part within the jurisdiction of this Territory.
It is the right of every American citizen to have full and ample
protection in the enjoyment of life, liberty, and happiness; and the
duty of the United States, in those places where it has the sole and
exclusive jurisdiction, to extend that protecting hand over them; and
the duty of the States and Territories in their respective
jurisdictions, subject to the constitution and laws of the United
States, to extend a like protecting hand. By this you will see that
the United States, when it established the Territorial governments,
giving them the right of legislation, created a jurisdiction within
its own jurisdiction, but subject to its supervisory control:
therefore it has not the sole and exclusive jurisdiction within the
limits of the existing Territories.
By the 3rd section of the act of Congress, approved April 30, 1790,
chapter 9, it is enacted, "that if any person or persons shall, within
any fort, arsenal, dockyard, magazine, or any other place or district
of country, under the sole and exclusive jurisdiction of the United
States, commit the crime of willful murder, such person or persons on
being thereof convicted, shall suffer death."
You see by this law, the crime must be committed within the
places over which the United States have the sole and exclusive
jurisdiction. You will look to the evidence given you in court for the
facts of the case; if you find the crime, if any has been committed,
was committed within that extent of country between this and the
Missouri River, over which the United States have the sole and
exclusive jurisdiction, your verdict must be guilty. If you do not
find the crime to have been committed there, but in the Territory of
Utah, the defendant, for that reason, is entitled to a verdict of, not
guilty. If, in any of these points, you entertain reasonable doubts,
you may give the defendant the benefit of these doubts. Reasonable
doubts are not merely capricious doubts, but such as reasonable men
may honestly entertain. We often have painful duties to discharge, but
ought not for this reason to shrink from duty. It is better to bear
with many wrong acts, than for the accomplishment of a given object,
to depart from the great and well-approved principles on which mainly
depend our lives, liberty, and happiness. Gentlemen, the case for the
present, is committed to your consideration.
- Z. Snow