illiams!_[224]

[Footnote 224: Med Case, p. 25.]

Gentlemen of the Jury, before you can convict me of the crime charged,
you must ask three several sets of questions, and be satisfied of all
these things which I will now set forth.

I. THE QUESTION OF FACT. Did I do the deed charged, and obstruct
Marshal Freeman while in the peace of the United States, and
discharging his official duty? This is a quite complicated question.
Here are the several parts of it:--

1. Was there any illegal obstruction or opposition at all made to the
Marshal? This is not clear. True, an attack was made on the doors and
windows of the Court House, but that is not necessarily an attack on
the Marshal or his premises. He has a right in certain rooms of the
Court House, and this he has in virtue of a lease. He has also a right
to use the passage-ways of the house, in common with other persons and
the People in general. His rights as Tenant are subject to the terms
of his lease and to the law which determines the relation of Tenant
and Landlord. Marshal Freeman as tenant has no more rights than
Freeman Marshal, or John Doe, or Rachel Roe would have under the same
circumstances. Of course he had a legal right to defend himself if
attacked, and to close his own doors, bar and fortify the premises he
rented against the illegal violence of others. But neither his lease
nor the laws of the land authorized him to close the other doors, or
to obstruct the passages, no more than to obstruct the Square or the
Street. No lease, no law gave him that right.

Now there have been three secret examinations of witnesses relative to
this assault, before three Grand-Juries. No evidence has been offered
which shows _that any attack was made on the premises of the Marshal_.
The Supreme Court of Massachusetts was in session at the moment the
attack was made on the Court House; the venerable Chief Justice was on
the Bench; the jury had retired to consider the capital case then
pending, and were expected to return with their verdict. The People
had a right in the court-room, a right in the passage-ways and doors
which lead thither. That court had not ordered the room to be cleared
or the doors to be shut. Marshal Freeman closed the outer doors of the
Court House, and thus debarred men of their right to enter a
Massachusetts Court of Justice solemnly deciding a capital case. You
are to consider whether an attack on the outer doors of the Court
House, is an illegal