A Lawyer Stood Up in Court and Accused the Jury of Being in the Company's Pocket
In a $25,000 Seattle injury suit, attorney James Hamilton Lewis turned his closing argument into a public warning about corporate influence—and left the courtroom seething.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
Argument in the $25,000 damage suit of Thomas Cleary against the Sound & Alaska Steamship Company, which had been on trial in the United States court for five days, ended last evening. Col. James Hamilton Lewis, counsel for the plaintiff, caused a sensation among spectators by charging that two of the jurors had business relations with the defendant company and that the company had sought to influence them. The jury was to be charged this morning.
The defendant was represented by J. M. Ashton and Cyrus Welling, and the former argued that the plaintiff was partly to blame for the accident that injured him two years ago and from the effects of which he has ever since suffered. In commenting on the case, Lewis made the following remarks, which created a smothered sensation and were the cause of a sharp passage at arms after court adjourned between himself and Gen. Ashton:
“I feel it my duty to be frank with you, gentlemen of the jury. I seek no favor from you as reward for any indifferent flattery, nor shall I from any fear for my client's cause refrain to speak truthfully concerning certain matters which have come under my notice. I realize the position that one of the jurors occupied, with personal relations with the officers of this defendant and the business favors which that association threateningly extends. To another juror I am aware of the relations his business partner bears to the defendant, and what is expected by the defendant from such relation. Under this great burden against me I am relieved only by the thought that you, for reasons or perjury to yourselves, wrong this helpless man while on your oath the shadow of God's retribution would follow you to the grave.”
During this period Gen. Ashton leaned forward and, with a puzzled smile on his face, exchanged whispered remarks with Mr. Welling. Seeing the action, Mr. Lewis fixed on him and cried out: “The gentleman smiles; but the judge does wince.”
Lewis then proceeded with his argument, but the shock was too great for the jury to recover in one breath, and the cleverly concealed charge that some members of the jury had been tampered with seemingly took effect.
“The gentleman smiles; but the judge does wince.”
Jury tampering is now fought through sealed motions and investigations, but in 1895 a lawyer made the charge aloud, turning an ordinary injury suit into a test of whether a corporation could bend a verdict. The episode still rhymes with modern worries about money, power and the credibility of the jury box.
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