Charles O'Conor. munity, and the whole country as synonymous with eminent ability and spotless purity. Such a reputation could not be marred without injury to the profession he so long adorned and pain to his countrymen. But conscious of his integrity and sensitive to the slightest imputation upon it, he persevered, even against the judgment of wise professional brethren who loved and honored him, in demanding investigation of the charges referred to. And now five of our fellow-citizens, eminent for wisdom and goodness, have fully heard the evidence, and have unanimously pro nounced the charges without foundation.' " — Vol. 13. P- 392THE TWEED CASES. So much for the disagreeable contact into which Mr. O'Conor came with his former worshipers among the laity. Now let us speak of a matter in which he came into equally unpleasant relations with the courts and many of the Bar. This was in the prosecutions growing out of the cele brated Tweed scandals in the city of New York. It is unnecessary to tell any middleaged lawyer who Tweed was, but it may be well to explain to the legal youth of this day that he was a person who, under the pe culiar possibilities of this favored land, arose from the degree of stone-mason to be the "boss" of the city and State of New York, and who plundered the city of untold millions for the benefit of himself and his creatures, but who, after some years of abject fear and helplessness on the part of the public, was prosecuted, convicted, sen tenced to prison for a long term, escaped by connivance, fled the country, was brought back, and died pending a new trial. Mr. O'Conor, being at the head of the bureau of municipal correction, charged with the pros ecution at law of the so-called Ring-thicves in the city of New York, was directed to prosecute Tweed for a great number of misdemeanors of which he had been guilty in his bandit career. They were all joined in one indictment in 226 counts, and there was a verdict of guilty on 204. Thereupon
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Judge Noah Davis, who presided at the trial, sentenced him to imprisonment for twelve years for twelve offenses, and to a fine of $250 in each; and on the other counts to fines aggregating $12,500. The maxi mum allowed for one offense was one year's imprisonment and a fine of $250. Appeal was taken to the Court of Appeals, and in the famous case of People ex. rel. Tweed v. Liscomb, 60 N. Y. 5 59; s. c. 19 Am. Rep. 211, the court unanimously laid down the doc trine, that in such a case sentence may not pass for a longer term than the maximum pre scribed for a single offense. The opinions were written by Judges Allen and Rapallo, both Democrats, and were concurred in by the five other judges, of whom two were Re publicans. Hereupon arose a terrific clamor of the populace and the newspapers. The decision was stigmatized as a stretch of political mercy towards an offender of the Democratic school. In the course of his opinion, Judge Allen rather mischievously cited as authority against the doctrine of cumulative sentences, some expressions of Mr. O'Conor himself, in his brief in a former case in that court, a civil action against a railroad company to recover 526 penalties for as many different offenses in taking excessive fare. Mr. O'Conor there argued, as counsel for the defendant, that only one penalty was recoverable, and cited the law applicable to indictments as analogous. He said: "And accordingly, except under some statute, expressly authorizing such a course, it has not been the practice to allow the two distinct offenses to be tried at the same time either by indictment or penal action." Judge Allen quoted this, with other and even stronger language of the "eminent jurist" with approval, and ob served, " his arguments appear to me un answerable." This commending of the chalice to his own lips, or hoisting the engineer with his own petard, did not tend to soothe Mr. O'Conor's spirit, perturbed by the signal defeat; and so, when Judge
