THE HOKITIKA STATE TEIALS

Hawke's Bay Herald, Volume 12, Issue 953, 20 June 1868, Page 3

THE HOKITIKA STATE TEIALS

Prom the 'Westlaud Observer.')

On Wednesday, May 20, His Honor Mr, Justice Richmond having taken his seat on the Bench, — The defendants Larkin and Manning, ttho had been arraigned the previous evening, and pleaded " Not Guilty " to the indictment of publishing certain seditious libels, were seated on the same bench they had occupied the previous day, when undergoing trial, together with the other five defendants, for unlawful assembty. Shortly after his Honor had taken his seat, Mr. Ireland rose and said that, after the conclusion which had been come to by the jury on the previous evening in the trial which had been terminated, and the expression of qpinion on the legal aspect of the case which had fallen from his Honor, the defendants did not deem it proper to offer any defence to the present indictment. They would each address the court, and he (Mr, Ireland) would not anticipate their observations. . His Honor said, before calling on the defendants, he desired to express his own opinion that they had been exceedingly well advised in the step they had just taken. Defendant Larkin said. — Your Honor, I have hailed with great pleasure your advent amongst us, and the high views you have expressed of the laws, and of their administration in a Court of Justice. On that account, I have resolved to bow to your decision, as it has fallen from you during the recent trial, and not occupy the court with any defence to the present charge. With regard. to the decision, of the jury last night, and the proceedings at the trial, I have little to complain about, if I may except certain personalities which have been levelled against me, tending to bias and prejudice men's minds against me, respecting matters of which, as I live, I have not been guilty. (His Honor here remarked that if the matters to which the defendant referred did not relate to the case before the court, he should strongly recommend him to abstain from alluding to them). With regard to my character, I may say that I can refer to Sir G-eorge Bowen, now Governor of New Zealand, to whom I was known when he was Governor of Queensland, in which I was for two years labouring with God's help in my mission to civilize the aboriginals in those parts, and to bring them to a knowledge of the means of salvation. I came here at a time when the institution of the Sisters of Charity was in pecuniary difficulties, with the intention of rasing funds for its relief; and it was the wish of the Bishops of both Queensland and New Zealand, that I should remain as a minister of the Church. I was subjected here to remarks in the local press of a most galling nature, and which were calculated to lower me in the estimation of my parishioners, and such, but for their fidelity, would have been the result. I went to Stafford Town, and in proof that I had not been discourteous, disloyal, or offensive to any class or creed, I may state that in the exertions which I made to build two churches in that district, I was assisted by all denominations — Catholics, Protestants, Presbyterians, and even. Jews. All sects helped me in my work, and by their help my exertions became successful. I believe — and have reason to believe — that I was esteemed by all sects ; and up to the time of the Duke of Edinburgh demonstration I believed myself without one enemy. Perhaps, however, that expression is too strong a one.' There was a newspaper that had vilified me, and endeavoured continually to cast odium upon me. There can be no position more degraded in the Catholic body than that of a suspended priest. But I have never yet been made aware that I was a suspended priest. My Bishop has not suspended me, and as a fact it is not true. I have been called not alone a suspended priest, but a renegade priest, and a Fenian priest. But I have not been suspended ; I am not a renegade and not a Fenian — I cannot be. It would not be consistent either with my duty or my functions as a priest, that I, who ever at the celebration of high mass have the Domine scdvum fac regem sung in the churches in Stafford Town and at the Waimea, imploring the blessing of God upon the Queen and her family, should bo a member of such an organisation. With regard to the procession, I must say that it is new to me that services for the dead of that nature are to be condemned. ■ I have only seen an isolated passage from the pastoral of Bishop Moriarty, and I should wish to see the whole of it before I can bring myself to understand that such obsequies are open to condemnation. To my knowledge, they are common on the continent of Europe, and have been practised in Wellington and at Nelson. (The defendant then explained the doctrine of the Homan Catholic Church respecting the eternal debt, and the temporal debt to be atoned for by acts of penance in life, or by purgatorial punishment after death.) In this sense was the cross carried, in this sense everyone knelt down in prayer for forgiveness for the shortcomings of those who have done with acts of penance in life. With respect to the speech I made in the cemetery, I desire to say that it was not my intention to have spoken at all; another gentleman had been appointed to address the people, but as he was not present, I addressed them myself hastily, and without preparation. So also at the meeting at the Mtmster Hotel. On both occasions I spoke on the spur of the moment, and I have now not the slightest recollection of what I said, or what words I used. I shall not, therefore, attempt to impugn the correctness of the words imputed to me ; but, if I said anything offensive in its nature, I humbly i apologise. With respect to the proprietorship of the Gelt newspaper, if my acts in that respect do constitute me a proprietor, I must abide the penalty. I most I emphatically deny that it was ever mj intention to become its proprietor ; what I did was with the view only of helping Mr. Manning in the establishment of a journal which I deemed would be a recorder of information interesting to a great number of persons. I never entered into any partnership, nor derived any profit. I lent my name both to Mr. Browne and Mr. Dowling to secure payment to them of what might be due, but I never contemplated becoming proprietor of the paper, neither would it have been becoming in me in my position as a priest. But if the law so interprets what I did, I must bow to the decision. I repeat that until the day of the Duke of Edinburgh procession, I was unaware that I had an enemy, I for on that very day at Stafford Town, when I attended the meeting of sympathy for the Prince that was hold there, I was voted to the chair, and put the resolutions to the meeting. I was on my horse, intending to come to Hokitika, to the meeting held here, when, to my astonishment, I was hooted and cried clown. It was not till then that I knew I had any enemies. Mr. Larkin concluded his address by stating that he left himself to the wisdom and justice of his Honor to deal with him as might be deemed necessary. The defendant John Manning then addressed the Court. He said : I would crave permission before addressing your Honor upon .this subject, to say a few words in reference to a : matter which has occurred since my imprisonment. (His Honor said that, while not wishing to con-

fine the defendant too strictly in what he felt desirous of saying, lie considered he ought at the outset to confine himself to the moral of the offence. He would not, however interrupt him, if he should afterwards address hiraself to some other mat- j ter german to the subject.) I shall, your Honor, accept your recommendation, and addess myself at once to the point. First, with respect to the procession, I have certain ideas of freedom of discussion, and the expression of opinion, and I have always considered, that so long as the opinions of an individual were expressed publicly and peaceably, there was no offence in their expression. In my view, there are three modes of expressing opinion, viz., by acts, by speech, and by writings. The procession, I consider as the expression of opinion by an act ; and I believed at the time, that whatever might be the case in the old country, there was no wrong in a public expression of opinion by that mode. Your Honor will bear in mind that it was proved in evidence that the procession was as quiet as possible, and that it maintained throughout that peaceable demeanour which rendered it simply an expression, of opinion by act. With respect to the seditious libels, I followed the same idea, that the articles in the Gelt newspaper were merely the expression of opinion by writings, and could never amount to the taking up arms or the shedding of blood. No original article in the Gelt advocated the shedding of blood or the taking of life. The extract matter which appears in the paper was inserted in order to give the condition of the country, whether it were one of discontent or of prosperity. Ireland being my country, I naturally gave extracts from the Irish newspapers as being most I interesting to the readers of the Gelt, not to excite them to any disloyal act, and. not thinking for one moment that anything I could write or extract could possibly have the effect of rousing them to rebellion. It was impossible that here, at the distance of 16,000 miles, I could incite a people to take up arms against so strong a government, nor was it ever my intention. The Celt has been misrepresented. Never was any man assailed in it in his private capacity. (His Honor .- That is not charged.) I shall now accept the law as it has been laid down by your Honor ; and before concluding, I desire to express my gratitude to my countrymen for the princely defence fund which they so generously contributed, and which enabled me to obtain for my defence the services of the most eminent counsel in the Australian colonies. I owe thanks, also, to those of my> countrymen and women who paid me so much attention during my imprisonment. To the gaoler, and police in general, I express my thanks for the respect and attention I received from them while in the camp. I now submit myself to your Honor's judgment. His Honor then addressed the prison- | ers as follows : — •John Manning, the course you have taken, under the judicious advice of your counsel, happily enables me to deal leniently with you. Had you made a display of contumacy — had you instructed your counsel to take a defiant position on this charge, the case would have been different. You say that no original article in the Gelt newspaper advocates the shedding of blood or the taking of life. I cannot say what may be original matter, but on a cursory view of the articles impugned, it seems to | me that very many, not to say all, are of what I must call a truculent character. I As to what you have said about " extract matter," as editors call it, it is clearly the law that for matters extracted from other papers the re-publisher is answerable. I agree with you that nothing you have published could possibly rouse an intelligent people. But such publications do undoubtedly act upon unintelligent individuals — they are capable of acting especially on moody, half-sane minds, brooding, as one such lately expressed it, on the wrongs, or fancied wrongs, of Ireland. A recent lamentable occurrence in a neighbouring colony has shown this. I take no notice of what you have said respecting the limits of fair discussion. I feel it needless to add anything to what has been already said upon the subject at this Circuit Court ; and if I wished to add anything, this is not the proper time to do so. I understand that you undertake to act hereafter upon the law, as it has been laid down ai this assize. (The defendant bowed assent.) That being so, I shall not call upon you to enter into ' recognisances. I take your pledge, made thus publicly, as a better guarantee than the coarse method of subjecting you to pecuniary liability. Your writings (if I may take the leading articles as from your pen) display considerable literary ability — considerable powers of reasoning and also of imagination. I trust you will for the future employ your talents to better purpose. The object of the penal law is mainly to protect the public ; neither the court, nor, I am sure, the Government, has any desire to inflict unnecessary suffering. Looking to the course you have taken, I am able to inflict a' very lenient sentence, being, that you be imprisoned in the Hokitika lower gaol for one calendar month. William Joseph. Larkin, before delivering the judgment of the court upon you, for the offence charged in the indictment, to which you have to-day pleaded guilty, I have a word to say in reference to the other indictment (for the procession.) The offence there charged was not that you have celebrated masses for the three men as private persons ; nor is the charge that any rite of the Eoman Catholic Church has been celebrated with the same publicity as is used in other towns of this colony. The offence consists in the celebration of the obsequies of these men as public characters entitled to veneration. The court abstains from all moral comment upon the part you have taken in these matters. It leaves you to the ad-^ monitions of your own conscience, and of' thoso to -whom you owe obedience in spiritual things. The judgment of the court upon you is, that you be imprisoned in the Hokitika lower gaol for the term of one ealendai- month. Had your attitude before the court been different — had you not dutifully submitted to the law of the land, I must have required from you heavy recognisances for future good behaviour. With them I can now dispense, trusting, as I do, in your present professions, and that you will go out again amongst your fellow-subjects in a truly Catholic spirit — in that spirit of Christian charity which transcends the narrow bounds of mere national and clannish feelings. The defendant Larkiu being called up on the other indictment — His Honor said: — Upon this indictment, the court will make no difference between you and your co-defendants, who received judgment last night. The necessary difference is already sufficiently marked by the judgment just now pronounced upon you. The judgment of the court is, that you do forfeit and pay forthwith, to Her Majesty, the sum of £20. The defendant Manning was then called on the indictment for the procession, and fined £20. His Honor said that it would, no doubt, be very acceptable to the gentlemen of the bar to adjourn the court, which, indeed, it was necessary to do, as there was no.common jury panel in attendance. The court would sit in its civil jurisdiction tomorrow (this day) at ten o clock.