Mr. MERRICK. Your honor has stated the law in reference to challenges. I ask that the jurors be sworn on their voir dire.

The COURT. Swear the jurors to answer severally on their voir dire. Mr. MERRICK. Swear one at a time.

The COURT. Oh, no; they can all be sworn together.

Mr. GEORGE E. KIRK, a juror. [Arising and addressing the court.] I would be very glad to be excused from serving on this jury. I presume I will be challenged anyhow. I regret it very much.

The COURT. You had better take that chance.
The jurors were sworn on their voir dire, and

WILLIAM DICKSON was examined, as follows:

By the COURT:

Question. Have you formed or expressed any opinion with reference to the guilt or innocence of the several defendants in this case, or any of them?-Answer. These cases have been before the public for some time, and I have commented upon the newspaper statements, and in that way have expressed an opinion.

Q. Have you formed such an opinion as will interfere with an impartial consideration of the evidence in the case?-A. I have not, sir. The COURT. I think he is competent. Reading newspapers cannot disqualify a whole community because such papers try the case in ad

vance.

Mr. MERRICK. [To the juror.] Do you know the defendants? The COURT. That will not do. I cannot go into that inquiry. the juror.] You are competent, sir.

WILLIAM T. WOOD was called and arose.

[To

Mr. MERRICK. Does your honor allow the Government to interro

gate?

The COURT. No, sir.

Mr. MERRICK. The court interrogates?

The COURT. The court puts the questions.

By the COURT:

Question. Have you formed or expressed any opinion in regard to the guilt or innocence of the defendants or any of them?-Answer. I have formed no decided opinion. I may have expressed an impression at the time I read the papers. I don't know whether I have or not. I have

not expressed any decided opinion or formed one. The COURT. He is qualified.

Mr. MERRICK. If your honor please, I do not understand precisely the ruling here as to whether or not the Government and the other side can ask any questions.

The COURT. No, except by delegation from the court.

Mr. MERRICK. Except by delegation from the court. I had understood the rule to be different in a case lately tried in this court; but I do not wish to controvert the matter in any way.

The COURT. The jurors are severally sworn to answer such questions as shall be put to them by the court touching their qualification. Mr. MERRICK. And not by the counsel.

The COURT. And not by the counsel. Because if it was thrown open to counsel probably there would be some trouble in the selection of the jury, and the court might have to interfere at last to stop the inquiries. Mr. MERRICK. Will your honor ask questions on behalf of either side that may be suggested to you if you deem them proper questions?

The COURT. You may suggest them to the court, and the court will put them if it sees proper.

Mr. MERRICK. I would like your honor to ask Mr. Wood whether he has not discussed this question independent of the newspapers, and whether he has not formed and expressed an opinion from information derived otherwise than through the newspapers?

The JUROR. I have not.

The COURT. He is qualified. I allow you to put that question, but I do not think I can repeat it.

Mr. MERRICK. Your honor, my reason for asking the question is this: Mr. Wood is the son, as I am informed, of an exceedingly clever gentleman who is in the service of the other side as one of their detectivesif I am not very much misinformed. I presume that this has been a subject of family discussion, possibly.

The JUROR. I was not aware of the fact that my father had anything to do with this matter.

Mr. MERRICK. I understand that to be the case.

Mr. WILLIAMS. Nobody else understands it so.

The COURT. We will not go into that.

Mr. MERRICK. Very well, then, Mr. Wood is challenged.

Mr. TOTTEN. If the court please, I want to make an inquiry here. Are we expected to make our peremptory challenges as your honor proceeds in calling the names after you get through with the voir dire? The COURT. I think the proper course is for the court to put its inquiries to the jurors on their voir dire first.

Mr. TOTTEN. I think so, too.

The COURT. [To the juror.] Mr. Wood, resume your seat.

Mr. MERRICK. I supposed your honor intended that we should take action immediately, which is the ordinary method.

The COURT. We will go through and ascertain how many will answer as jurors.

JOHN B. DAWSON was examined, as follows:

By the COURT:

Question. Have you formed or expressed any opinion with reference to the guilt or innocence of any of these defendants?—Answer. None, except what I have derived from reading the newspapers.

Q. Is that such an opinion as would interfere with your giving an impartial consideration to the evidence in the case?-A. No, sir.

The COURT. Mr. Dawson is not disqualified. Call the next.

JOHN W. HAYES was examined, as follows:

By the COURT:

Question. Have you formed or expressed an opinion with reference to the guilt or innocence of the defendants or any of them?-Answer. I have not, your honor. I never read the papers; only the headings of them; that is all. I haven't bothered myself anything about it. The COURT. You are eminently qualified.

Mr. WILSON. The head-lines are the worst part of the newspapers, your honor.

Mr. INGERSOLL. The text hardly ever supports the head-line.

MATHEW MCNELLY was examined, as follows:

By the COURT:

Question. Have you formed or expressed an opinion with regard to

the guilt or innocence of the defendants or any of them?-Answer. I have not.

The COURT. You are qualified.

GEORGE E. KIRK was examined, as follows:

By the COURT:

Question. Have you formed or expressed an opinion with regard to the guilt or innocence of any of the defendants or all of them?-Answer. None particularly, sir. I asked to be excused in the first in

stance.

The COURT. That is not what I am asking you about now.
The JUROR. I was going to give my reasons for asking.

The COURT. The time has not come.

Mr. MERRICK. Probably his reason is applicable to your question, your honor, as to his competency as a juror. It does not go to his convenience, I apprehend.

The JUROR. I will say I have had some little taste of this matter myself, and it is a very delicate position to be placed in to sit upon a jury. I was interested in some of those star routes, and I will say here that I was wiped out.

The COURT. You stand as you were then?

The JUROR. Not exactly financially. I wish I did. I, of course, am here under oath.

The COURT. I want to know whether you have formed an opinion? The JUROR. I have read the papers a great deal about it. I have heard something of it here and I knew something about it before. suppose, perhaps, I am about the best informed person upon that subject that is here upon the jury.

Q. Are you conscious of such a bias in your mind as will interfere with an impartial consideration by you of the evidence in the case?A. Not at all, sir, when I am here under oath.

The COURT. We will pass you and consider your other grounds afterwards.

JOHN B. MCCARTHY was examined, as follows:

By the COURT:

Question. Have you formed or expressed an opinion with regard to the innocence or guilt of the defendants or any of them?—Answer. I have not, your honor. I have never understood the case sufficiently to pay formal attention to it. I never read the papers in regard to it at all.

The COURT. Neither have I. You are competent.

JOHN T. FINNY was examined, as follows:

By the COURT:

Question. Have you formed or expressed any opinion in regard to the guilt or innocence of the defendants or any of them?-Answer. I have not, your honor. I am the same as Mr. McCarthy in regard to it. I read the papers occasionally, but I have not formed an opinion about the matter.

Q. You have no settled opinion either way?—A. I have not. I will be governed by the evidence, of course.

EDWIN J. MCLAIN was examined, as follows:

By the COURT:

Question. Have you formed or expressed an opinion with regard to the guilt or innocence of the defendants or any of them ?-Answer. I have not, sir. All I know about it is what I have derived from newspaper reports.

Q. Have you any such bias in your mind as would interfere with an impartial consideration of the evidence?—A. No; I think I can say I am entirely without prejudice.

The COURT. He is competent.

WILLIAM K. BROWN (colored) was examined, as follows:

By the COURT:

Question. Have you formed or expressed an opinion with reference. to the guilt or innocence of the defendants or any of them ?—Answer. I have not, sir.

The COURT. He is competent.

FREDERICK C. SHAW was examined, as follows:

By the COURT:

Question. Have you formed or expressed an opinion in regard to the guilt or innocence of the defendants in this case, or any of them?— Answer. I have not. I have read the papers, and have commented upon what I have read in the papers, concerning the proceedings in court here.

The COURT. The papers did not leave much impression on your mind?

Mr. SHAW. No.

EDWIN D. DONIPHAN was examined, as follows:

By the COURT:

Question. Have you formed or expressed an opinion in regard to the guilt or innocence of the defendants or any of them?-Answer. I have not, sir.

The CLERK. That completes that panel.

The COURT. Have you any peremptory challenges, gentlemen?

Mr. TOTTEN. Well, we think we have, your honor.

The COURT. Now is the time.

Mr. TOTTEN. We have a right to how many?

The COURT. To four.

Mr. TOTTEN. And not more than that? Are we entitled to four for all the defendants, or four for each?

Mr. MERRICK. Four for all of them. That is the language of the

statute.

Mr. TOTTEN. Well, it is not the language of the statute at all.

Mr. MERRICK. I am flatly contradicted. Probably you had better produce the statute.

The COURT. You have four peremptory challenges. You are entitled to them by law.

Mr. MERRICK. Mr. Totten says it is not so.

The COURT. Section 838 of the revised statutes is as follows:

On the trial of any person charged with a crime, the punishment whereof may be

confinement in the penitentiary or District jail, the defendant shall be entitled to four peremptory challenges of jurors.

Mr. MERRICK. The question now is, whether "any person" means all persons.

The COURT. Sir?

Mr. MERRICK. Here are a number of persons jointly indicted, or to be tried jointly. The question is whether each of them is entitled to four challenges. Is the Government entitled to challenge?

The COURT. If you can show me the authority for it.

Mr. MERRICK. Yes, sir. I have sent for the law, sir. I supposed that that was not questioned. Will your honor let me see that law that you have there. [The book was submitted to Mr. Merrick.]

Mr. INGERSOLL. If the court please, so that we will act with a view to what we consider our rights, the practice, so far as I know, in all courts in which I have ever happened to practice, has been for the Government first to tender a jury to the defendants. The Government is first to pass on the panel, say twelve men. After having challenged all they desire to challenge, or have the right to challenge, and all have been excluded for cause that should be excluded for cause, then they tender us those accepted by the Government. After having been so tendered the defendants had the right to challenge to see whether they accepted them or not. Then others would be called, and the new ones called would have to be passed on by the defendant first and tendered to the Government. Now, I suppose that that is the practice in this court. I am speaking about the selection of the jury. They tender them to us first, and if they reject any then they must tender us other jurors in the place of those we accept, and of course we claim that each defendant has four challenges, if there is any meaning in the law at all.

Mr. MERRICK. The law to which I refer, your honor, is section 819 of the revised statutes, passed in 1872, and since the passage of the statute in the statutes of the District of Columbia.

The COURT. No; the statutes of the District of Columbia were repassed.

Mr. MERRICK. I know. The revised statutes were all passed together. But when there is any confusion or difficulty the Supreme Court say you go back to the original act:

When the offense charged is treason or a capital offense, the defendants shall be entitled to twenty and the United States to five peremptory challenges. On the trial of any other felony, the defendant shall be entitled to ten and the United States to three peremptory challenges; and in all other cases, civil and criminal, each party shall be entitled to three peremptory challenges; and in all cases where there are several defendants or several plaintiffs, the parties on each side shall be deemed a single party for the purposes of all challenges under this section. All challenges, whether to the array or panel, or to individual jurors for cause or favor, shall be tried by the court without the aid of triers.

I understand that that is the statute under which challenges are made in this court, and there certainly is no reason why that statute in its entirety is not applicable to the District of Columbia.

There is no feature in it which adapts it more peculiarly to the United States courts outside of the District, than to the courts inside of the District; and it is evidently a general rule laid down for the Government in the initiatory proceeding in these cases, and I presume if we were trying here a case for treason that this would be the rule of law by which it would be tried, or the rule by which the initiatory proceedings would be conducted. It covers the entire ground, and it covers all offenses, and provides for the very emergency now existing, viz, the