I am called upon, and knowing as I do, and as you must know, that it is not lacking in deserving objects for prosecution, about whom I know nothing, but of whom it knows much, my amazement grows. Indeed but for the fact that I am not in receipt of the emoluments of office I might be inclined to suspect myself as "of counsel." This might, by some enthusiasts, be considered distinction, but to me it is stale, flat, and very unprofitable. No, sir, you are in error as to my needing any "vindication.' The "vindication" is needed for the prosecution, not by me, but I thank you for your kind proffer, actuated as I know you are by none but the kindest and most chivalric sentiments, the more marked for the reason that I have observed no evidence of the existence of either in my official intercourse with the head of the Department of Justice, or your associate, Mr. Bliss. In the event of my going before the grand jury, not for my " vindication," however, I may as well say to you that I will not testify if George Bliss, esq., is to represent the United States in the jury room. Y'rs respectfully, J. A. WALSH. (Indorsed:) Letter to R. T. Merrick, Dec. 19, '82, in reply to his of Dec. 16, 82. MR. WALSH TO MR. MERRICK. NEW YORK, December 21, 1882. MY D'R SIR: I appeal to you, as a lawyer and a gentleman, to know whether or not the remarks made by Mr. Chandler yesterday in his opening for the defense are proper? I refer to his strictures on me as reported in the New York Herald of to-day. I beg that you take such action in the premises as you deem proper. Is it possible, Mr. Merrick, that there is to be no limit to this abuse of me? Yours, truly, Hon. R. T. MERRICK, Washington, D. C. J. A. WALSH. P. S.-I am, of course, under the impression that Mr. Bliss, in his opening, made no reference to me, at least it was not reported if he did. Will you be kind enough to let me know whether Mr. Bliss made any statement as to what he expected to prove by me? WALSH. (Indorsed:) Letter to R. T. Merrick of date December 21, 1882, to which I received no response, his ox not being gored. MR. MERRICK TO MR. Walsh. [Merrick & Morris, counsellors, No. 1306 F street.] WASHINGTON, D. C., December 30, 1882. DEAR SIR: Yours without date, except Dec. 1882, was received this morning. I have most carefully kept faith with my assurance to you that I would defend and protect you as a witness for the Government in the case which is now being a second time tried. To obtain evidence in corroboration of your testimony, and thereby repel the accusations brought against your integrity, and at the same time overwhelm your malignant assailants, was, in my judgment, of the utmost importance to you, and a more desirable result than any that could possibly be achieved in executing the obligation I had assumed in your behalf. I had supposed, some days since, that I had accomplished this result, but my efforts in that regard have been seriously embarrassed, if not, indeed, defeated, by the unwise course yon have pursued, especially in the particular of not granting me a personal interview in accordance with my repeated requests to that effect, and also by the prevalence of a report that you are evading the service of the subpoena which has been issued for you, and that it is your purpose not to testify at the present trial of the case if you can avoid it. This report I do not, of course, credit, but it nevertheless largely prevails, and is doing serious mischief to you and subjecting me to some humiliation. I fear that you have not fully appreciated my personal consideration for you. JOHN A. WALSH, Esq. R. T. MERRICK. (Indorsed :) Letter from R. T. Merrick, esq., dated December 30, 1882. me January 2, 1883, in reply to my letter to him of December 29, 1882. Rec'd by MR. WALSH TO MR. MERRICK. NEW YORK, January 3d, 18-3. Hon. R. T. MERRICK, Washington, D. C. : Yours of 30th ult. at hand yesterday p. m. The date of my letter to you, which was omitted by me, was Dec. 29, '82. To say that I am surprised at the tenor of your letter would be to but faintly convey to you my feelings, after many and careful readings thereof. You say, "I have carefully kept faith with my assurance to you that I would defend and protect you as a witness for the Government in the case which is now being a second time tried." That the Government has not protected me has been, and is, part of the burden of my complaint. If you would be kind enough to indicate to me how and in what way and at what time there ever has been manifested any disposi tion by the Government through its officials, judicially or otherwise, to protect me, I would feel obliged to you. That you have felt something ought to be done in that direction is believed by me, but that any steps looking to such action have been frowned down by your associate, Geo. Bliss, esq.. is also believed by me. I have heretofore felt, as relates to your position in this matter, that I would accept the will for the deed; hence did not say much on this subject during the first trial, but have determined as to the future that I shall have some distinct understanding. You say, “To obtain evidence in corroboration of your testimony, and thereby repel the accusations brought against your integrity and at the same time overwhelm your malignant assailants was, in my judgment, of the utmost importance to you, and a more desirable result than any that could possibly be achieved in executing the obligation I had assumed in your behalf." I would suppose that the Government, in obtaining corroborative evidence, was simply doing that which all litigants aim to do; i. e., presenting the very best evidence and as much of it as can be had. I shall not flatter myself that the Government, in its efforts to obtain this corroborative evidence, was influenced therein solely by its desire to "vindicate" me. This very corroborative evidence that you refer to has been made possible solely and entirely by me, and mainly through my efforts. I might also add, even, at my expense, pecuniarily and otherwise. It ought not, and ordinarily does not. require assurances from any individual that witnesses for the United States shall be protected. The protection that I referred to was not such as takes the shape of obtaining corroborative evidence, as it goes without saying that such is the end of all properly-conducted prosecutions on the part of the people against criminals. The protection that I refer and referred to, and of which you assured me, but do not now, was that protection which the law prescribes, a protection that takes the form of criminal proceedings against men who have criminally libeled a witness for the Government for testifying to the truth in its behalf. That protection, in fine, which assumes definite shape by indicting that member and his coconspirators of the late grand jury who violated the law in order to endeavor to discredit and impeach me. You have the evidence in your possession, or under your control; why not protect me by prosecuting these men? You know the names of the persons, together with all the facts, and I ask you to vindicate the majesty of the law. If you are unable, because of your surroundings, because your associate does not believe in such sentimentalism, avow it, say it is due me, but you cannot accord it me. A moral verdict of guilty was found by the nation against these men on the first trial, and, without egotism, I may add entirely on my testimony. If being universally credited by the nation and by ten out of twelve jurors is to constitute "protection" for a witness, there never was a witness much better protected than I. Your case against these defendants was a mere nothing, about to be dismissed from court, when my testimony came to stem the tide. Surely, I am not indebted to the Government for that kind of "protection." Now, if through my efforts and at my expense, you are about to get corroborative evidence, why should you term it protecting me, repelling "accusations" made by my "malignant enemies." These men are not my "enemies" personally; they are the "enemies" of all honesty, the "enemies" of the people, the enemies of the United States Government. They have libeled and conspired, not against me but against justice, and I demand of you, in the name of the outraged law, that they be punished. This will be my "protection;" it is all I ask of you as the representative of the Government. If I am asking too much, or if these men are above and beyond the reach of the law, let me be informed thereof, and I will desist from my mad demands. You say "The prevalence of a report that you are evading the service of a subpona which has been issued for you, and that it is your purpose not to testify at the present trial of the case if you can avoid it." This report, I do not of course, credit, but it nevertheless largely, prevails, and is doing serious mischief to you and subjecting me to some humiliation. You are justified in not believing this report, if for no other reason than the fact that I am not an official, nor have I lately been appointed to office by the administration. Why should I evade a subpoena? Why should I not rather rejoice in receiving one? To be allowed to testify on behalf of the Government at one's own expense is distinction enough, but when that is supplemented with the most robust personal abuse by counsel for the defendants and their organ, "The Robbers' Own," the average mind fails to comprehend the delicacy of the compliment conveyed, in the tender of a subpoena to testify in the case of the United States vs. J. S. Brady, Dorsey, et al. No, sir, you are correct in not believing that I am evading service. I am simply awaiting from you the assurance requested of you in my communication of 29th ult. I am not evading service, nor do I intend to. Why you should feel "humiliated" is beyond my ken. You say, in the conclusion, "I fear that you have not fully appreciated my personal consideration for you." You, if you ever harbored such a thought, do me great injustice. Indeed, sir, the only oasis in this awful waste of official corruption, official deceit, and official neglect of duty has been the reflection that you were an earnest, honest prosecutor, and as such you had alone appreciated the character and extent of the sacrifices that I had made in appearing as a witness for the Government. If during the heat and smoke of battle you have forgotten me I have overlooked it; but if before engaging again in battle I ask that you have a care for my feelings, that you throw around me the protection of that power which you represent, is it asking too much? Do I, by asking of you that these violators of the law be punished, indicate that I have grown weary in the struggle for good government? I trust you do not so reason. I fear there is some misapprehension existing in your mind as to my status in these cases. As I am neither an officer of the Government nor "of counsel" I fail to undertand why I should be called on to sacrifice my time and my money, when I reflect that persons in the employ of the Government and the prosecution have assiduously avoided doing that which they are enormously paid for doing. I marvel that you should expect of me such extraordinary zeal in sending these men to prison. I have not volunteered as a witness in these cases, nor am I an informer. So far as my own personal interests are and were concerned I have given testimony against these men at great loss to myself. You emphasize in your letter to me the fact that you were engaged in obtaining "corroborative evidence," &c., in support of mine, &c. I was not aware that my testimony had ever been contradicted or impeached. Certainly not in open court. The only attempt at impeaching me was when the late grand jury as conspirators assembled, aided by a Cabinet officer and others, undertook to impeach me by not finding indictments on my evidence. How do you know but that the effect of this impeachment by this body was the cause of the disagreement of the petit jury in the first trial? That such was the object of this impeachment by the grand jury does not admit of a doubt. By the conduct of the grand jury the extraordinary spectacle was afforded the nation of the Government conspiring to impeach its own witness, as the grand jury certainly represents the Government. William H. Dickson, late foreman of the petit jury, is being prosecuted by the Government for attempting to corruptly influence the late petit jury, and I might add very properly. Why do yon not likewise cause the prosecution of the men who corruptly influenced the late grand jury? What difference is there in the gravamen of the offense? I have written the Attorney-General of the United States, as well as President Arthur, requesting that these men be prosecuted. Receiving no reply from either of thme I asked you, as Assistant Attorney-General of the United States, and your reply is as set forth in your letter to me of date Dec. 30th, 82, which I respectfully suggest is not an answer to my communication of Dec. 29th, '82. Assuring you of my kindest regards and highest esteem, I am, Yours sincerely, MR. WALSH TO THE ATTORNEY-GENERAL. J. A. WALSH. NEW YORK, November 3, '82. Hon. BENJAMIN HARRIS BREWSTER, Attorney-General of the United States, Washington, D. C.: SIR: In the month of June, 1882, a subpoena was served on me in this city to appear before the grand jury of the District of Columbia to testify in the matter of the U. S. vs. Brady et al. In accordance with this summons I appeared before the grand jury whose term expired June 30th, 18-2. Mr. George Bliss, counsel for the Government, was present during my examination. On my testimony an indictment was found by the jury by ex-Assistant Postmaster-General Brady and mail contractor James B. Price for conspiracy to defraud the Government of the United States. During the following month, July, 1882, one of the special counsel for the Government in the star-route cases, with whom I had then no acquaintance personally, called on me in his official capacity, and during the conversation recited that which he had heard rumored as having been the tenor of my testimony before the grand jury whose term had just then expired, and asked of me confirmation. I then related to him substantially my testimony, whereupon he expressed the greatest indignation and astonishment at the action of the grand jury in not including in the Brady-Price indictment Senator Wm. P. Kellogg. I inquired of him if this was the first official information he had received of the character of my testimony, and, to my surprise, he said it was. A few days after this interview the grand jury (a new body) was called together in extraordinary session ; indeed, the gentleman, after listening to my recital, said he would have the jury called together immediately. In the mean time I had been subpoenaed to appear as a witness before the traverse jury in the suit of U. S. vs. Brady, Dorsey, et al., and while awaiting to be called, I was summoned to appear before the grand jury of the District of Columbia, bringing with me my books and papers. I was before this body the greater part of two days, giving my testimony and exhibiting original papers, etc., etc., with the result as is known to all the world-a result as insulting to all law and justice as it was mortifying to me, reflecting as it did on my veracity. The purposes of this negative action, i. e., not finding an indictment were, in my opinion, two. First, to the end that a distinguished Senator should escape indictment, and, secondly, to vitiate my testimony which I was to give before the traverse jury in the case of Brady et al., then on trial. That influences of a most potential character were brought to bear on the grand jury to accomplish such a result, unhappily, does not admit of a doubt. Manifestly testimony which was considered ample on which to find an indictment against Brady and Price had not been deemed strong enough to reach a Senator. This was the finding of the first grand jury, whose term had expired June 30th, '82. The finding of indictments against comparative pigmies, the hoi polloi, and allowing official giants to escape had become embarrassing, for some jurors revolted against this system on the first jury, and hence this latter grand jury, to avoid similar complications, determined to indict no person. In order to furnish them, if possible, with something like a reason for not finding an indictment in accordance with my testimony, the conspirators on the grand jury had presented them by their associates outside, for the undoubted purpose of influencing the minds of their fellow members, a copy of the testimony in the case of Spofford vs. Kellogg, a contested-election case in which I had testified. My testimony before this jury was direct and positive, and, supported as it was by documentary evidence, simply overwhelming. What could possibly be the reason, then, for the remarkable action of the grand jury? Were they dazed by reason of the high official position of one of the persons against whom my testimony bore most heavily? Or could it be that they concurred with the special prosecuting officers of the Government who, in the grand-jury room, gave expression to the opinion, "that it was a serious matter to indict a Senator of the United States"? Were the jurors influenced by the Spofford-Kellogg testimony? Who directed them to inquire into the case of Spofford vs. Kellogg? Whether they were or were not influenced by the testimony, the criminal object had in view by those who brought it there was to influence them. Precisely the same object which the prosecution say Wm. H. Dickson had in view when he, as foreman of the traverse jury read to its members his statement of the alleged attempt of the Government to bribe him and for which attempt to influence the minds of the jury he is now being prosecuted. I assert that whoever brought into the room of the grand jury the Spofford-Kellogg testimony is far guiltier than Wm. H. Dickson. That this book was there, does not admit of a doubt, as counsel for the Government, Mr. Bliss, will bear me out. In behalf of justice and of law and of order, I call upon you, as the highest law officer of the Government, to discover who it was that brought into the grand juryroom the testimony in the case of Spofford vs. Kellogg; who it was on the grand jury that entered into the conspiracy to protect these men from indictment, and by rendering me descreditable, thereby, tending to break down the case of the Government against Brady, Dorsey, et als. This is a discovery, sir, which the Government owes me and owes to itself. You will please recall the condition of the Government's case at this juncture; I mean that against Brady et als. To say that it was in extremis would be untrue, for it hardly had life enough to die; indeed it was generally understood that a motion to dismiss it would be listened to by the court. A material witness for the Government, indeed an officer thereof, then under subpoena, was moved, as he has said, to go away at this time, for the reason that he was satisfied that the case would be dismissed, and for the further reason that he did not believe the prosecution was in earnest. This gentleman's official, commercial, and social relations with members of the administration gave him exceptional opportunities for informing himself. I take this from the public prints as going to show the condition of sentiment about the time that this grand jury resolved to protect these criminals. Everything was against the prosecution: hence, how necessary it became to braek me down in behalf of the defendants in court, and those who ought to have been defendants, that were not yet at its bar. As John A. Walsh, I was not personally known to a member of that grand jury; to them I was simply an important witness for the Government, and, as such, and in the interests of crime, they showed their bias against me from the moment that I appeared in the jury-room. Such of them as did not listlessly tilt their chairs against the walls, resolved themselves into cross-examiners in the interests of the person against whom I was testifying, with the apparent motion of trying to exhaust the Government's case in the grand-jury room. I again repeat that it behooves the Government to find out the person or persons who first informed a member or members of this grand jury of the existence of the Spofford-Kellogg testimony and the member or members of that body who brought it it into the jury-room. I emphasize this, not because there was anything in that testimony on which to base such an infamous result, but because it will be the first step toward develoving the conspirators in this case. Inasmuch as this book came from some one of the public libraries, surely it ought not to be a difficult task for this great Government, and such action, believe me, would go far toward evidencing that witnesses for the Government would have at least its moral support, a condition it pains me to say that it does not enjoy, in my mind, at least, for I have yet to see the first evidence of any support of any kind from it. Simultaneously with the extraordinary action or rather non-action of this grand jury, now holding session in Washington, a daily paper of that city, conducted in the interests of the star-route conspirators, gave joyous expression to the information that a grand jury had unanimously refused to believe me on oath. Branded thus by a corrupt grand jury, in furtherance of this conspiracy, as one unworthy of belief, I literally stepped from the threshold of their room to the witness, stand in open court, to be there taunted by counsel for the defense as one whom the grand jury did not believe. Such in brief was the character of my introduction to the court, to the traverse jury, and to the people of this country. I do assure yon: sir, that nothing but my own sense of duty and self-respect sustained me in such an ordeal, the most trying of all ordeals for a man of honor. Indeed, while I was on the witness stand, the leading counsel for the defendants asked me contemptuously, "if I was the same Walsh that had appeared before the grand jury?" In the mean time, I was assailed in column after column of the vilest abuse, and that, too, in a paper the control of whose columns it was sworn to in open court was exercised by a man who was then, and is now, the occupant of a lucrative office under the same Government in whose interests I had been summoned to appear as a witness. At this period, when I felt as though this combination of conspirators, composed as it was of the grand jury, the defendants in court, together with such other allies as rumor assigned being in sympathy with these robber barons, were about to crush me I bethought of appealing to that national jury composed of the millions of freemen, who, in their honesty, could not be influenced. Through the medium of a free and enlightened press I addressed myself to this jury, which evidence being weighed has resulted in a moral verdict of guilty against these men. I am convinced that but for the aid extended the cause of justice by the press of this country, these conspirators would have triumphed. I have been informed that you have expressed the opinion that my testimony before the traverse jury saved the prosecution from defeat in a case which special counsel had selected as the strongest, albeit well-informed people never agreed therein with the said counsel. Whether or not I rendered the Government any service in these cases it is not for me to say, but such aid as I have contributed has not been without great sacrifice to me in many ways. Because of my appearance as a witness against these men I have been criminally libelled in the District of Columbia while under subpoena from its judiciary, and I have yet to see the first evidence that the Government intended to protect ine. I have never witnessed such terrorism as was exercised against witnesses in this case. I have been informed by counsel that the persons who have been engaged in libelling me are criminally liable, and vet, sir, I say to you in all candor that I am practically unable to obtain the slightest legal redress in the capital of the Republic. All that I have set forth in this communication, and more, has been printed by the great journals of the country touching the present grand jury of the District of Columbia, and it is in no spirit of sentimentalism for myself alone that I beg of you to take cognizance of the conspiracy which has been entered into by this body. Some member or members of this jury conspired to protect certain people from indictment. This must be obvious to you. If it was really "a serious matter to indict a Senator of the United States," why did they not so resolve and let it go to the world that the Senate of the United States was an asylum for violators of the law? If this jury feared trenching upon the divinity that, in their minds, hedged in a Senator, why not so proclaim, and then the people of this country would know and understand that there was a body of men in the Republic who were not amenable to its laws! Why |