Papers Relating to the Foreign Relations of the United States, With the Annual Message of the President Transmitted to Congress December 7, 1896, and the Annual Report of the Secretary of State
Mr. Williams to Mr. Uhl.
Habana, December 7, 1895.
Sir: I have the honor to report that in accordance with the Department’s instruction No. 1180 of the 14th ultimo I attended as a spectator the trial of the American citizen Mr. Julio Sanguily, which took place in this city on the 28th and 29th ultimo before the superior court of the province of Habana.
The court opened at 12 o’clock noon of the 28th ultimo, and on the entrance and seating of the accused the prosecuting attorney addressed his charges against him to the five sitting judges, the chief justice presiding, and on conclusion asked the court to declare Sanguily guilty, with sentence of imprisonment for life with chain. The charges summed up by the prosecutor and developed at the trial against Sanguily are in nowise materially different in essence from those transmitted to the Department in my dispatch No. 2627 of the 19th of October last.
The advocate for the prisoner, Mr. Miguel F. Viondi, followed in an earnest and eloquent defense, asking the court to declare the innocence and release of Sanguily on the grounds:
- (1)
- The absence of evidence to criminate.
- (2)
- The present trial being a continuation of the court-martial proceedings commenced on the 24th of February last, the day of the arrest of Sanguily, and against which this consulate-general protested by order of the Department before the Governor-General on the 25th of April last because said military proceedings were in violation of the protocol of the 12th of January, 1877.
- (3)
- Claiming that the case of Sanguily comes under the proclamation of the Governor-General published in the Gazette of February 27th of the present year, granting pardon to the rebels presenting themselves to the nearest municipal authorities, a translation of which proclamation I sent to the Department with my dispatch No. 2428, of that same date.
I understand that Mr. Viondi has determined to carry the case on appeal to the supreme court of Spain at Madrid. Accompanying herewith are two copies of the Diario de la Marina of the 29th and 30th of November and 3d instant, also two copies of the Discusion published in supplement, both newspapers giving full report of the proceedings as they actually occurred during the trials.
The current business of this office requiring my constant attention prevents me from devoting time to the translation of either of these reports.
I am, etc.,
Consul-General.
The Sanguily Case—Public Examination of Witnesses.
According to our previous announcement, the public examination of witnesses in the case of the Government against Don Julio Sanguily y Garit, charged with the crime of rebellion, was commenced yesterday, the said case having previously been before the court of first instance.
At an early hour in the morning an immense crowd occupied the galleries of the court room, and it increased until it was found necessary to keep it back by force. At half-past 10 Mr. Sanguily arrived, under the escort of a picket of custodians of public order. He remained in the room set apart for prisoners until half-past 12, when he was summoned to sit on the bench in the court room which is occupied by accused persons. Don Miguel F. Viondi, his counsel, and Attorney Luis P. Valdés were then likewise summoned.
The gentlemen of the press, who occupied their respective places, were then summoned by the doorkeeper; and here an unfortunate incident occurred. * * * All who thought proper to do so sat down at the table intended for the “fourth power of the State,” which is certainly small enough, and neither the doorkeepers nor the policemen required anyone to present a permit to occupy that place, the result of which was that the shorthand reporter of the Diario de la Marina, our collaborator, Mr. Vera y Gonzalez, was obliged to work in the midst of the public throughout the session. Consequently our report can not be quite as extensive as might be desirable.
In the locality occupied by the civil court, the third section of the criminal court sat, the court consisting of the gentlemen to whom we referred yesterday. Among those present were the United States consul and many magistrates and lawyers. Quite a number of prominent ladies were likwise present.
documentary evidence.
Don Manuel Ramón Hernández, one of the court officers, acted as secretary and read the argument prepared by the Government attorney, and the defense to which we referred in our edition of yesterday evening, and the documentary evidence offered by both parties and accepted by the court.
confession of the prisoner.
Don Julio Sanguily y Garit, the prisoner, whose attitude was one of perfect serenity, said, in reply to the usual preliminary questions, that he was a native of Habana, 46 years of age, married, and the father of a family; by occupation a clerk, and that he had been a citizen of the United States since the year 1889. He was arrested on the 24th of February of the present year, between 7 and a quarter past 7 in the morning.
In reply to a question of the Government attorney, he said that, although it was true that on previous occasions—that is to say, before the rising took place—he had spoken of political matters with various persons, and had received, among other visits, that of Mr. Lopez Coloma, with whom he had spoken somewhat of Cuban affairs, he was in no way concerned in the uprising, and had had nothing whatever to do with it.
Government Attorney. Could you not state anything more? Could you not tell what sort of a reference you made to Cuban affairs, and whether you were requested to head the movement in Habana, Matanzas, and Santa Clara?
[Page 791]Prisoner. I was, indeed, invited to head the movement, if I am not mistaken, hut that was several days before, I do not remember exactly when.
Government Attorney. What sort of a movement was it?
Answer. The revolutionary movement which began on the 24th of February, and which still continues.
Q. Did Mr. Lopez Coloma speak to you in his own name, or in that of other persons?—A. He spoke to me both in his own name and in that of other persons.
Q. And what did you say?—A. That I could not do it.
Q. When did you make your first statement before the military court?—A. On the 23d of February, at 11 p.m.
Q. What statement did you make with regard to the movement?—A. I told what I knew.
Q. But did you not state that, owing to its political significance, you might be compelled to take part in it?—A. I do not remember what I said. I asserted that there was no movement.
Sanguily’s counsel here objected to these questions by the Government attorney, and referred to the statements already made by the prisoner.
As the presiding judge considered that the questions of the Government attorney were pertinent, the prisoner’s counsel declared that he protested, notwithstanding that the presiding judge stated that a protest is proper only when the court refuses to permit a question, and the protest is put on record in order that an appeal for disregard of forms may subsequently be taken, which in the present case is of no practical importance.
The Government attorney continued to question the prisoner as to whether he had addressed letters relative to the movement to various persons and issued appointments as officers, among them an appointment as colonel. The prisoner said that he had not.
Q. (By the Government Attorney). Do you not remember that you attended a number of meetings on a sugar estate at which these matters were discussed?—A. I do not remember. I had nothing to do with the movement; I have kept entirely aloof from it.
Q. Were you in New York in the year 1893?—A. I have not been there since 1878.
Q. Have you no relations there with persons who have been concerned in these matters?—A. I have, it is true, some friends to whom I was in the habit of writing.
Q. Have those letters an thing to do with the movement?—A. Nothing whatever.
The prisoner was then asked whether he recognized some fragments of a letter which was on file as being in his handwriting. After carefully examining them, he said that he did not.
Q. Is the handwriting like yours?—A. I think it is different.
Q. Do you know the writing?—A. (Again examining it carefully.) I do not know it.
Q. Do you recognize that letter on file among the records of this court as having been written by you [referring to a letter addressed by the prisoner to Dr. Betancourt]?—A. (Examining it with care.) The writing looks like mine, but I do not dare to state positively that it is, for various reasons which I can not state now. It looks like my handwriting, but I do not feel certain that it is.
The Presiding Judge. Do you know Don José Inocencio Azcuy?—A. No.
Q. Have you never had any relations with him?—A. No.
Q. Have you never addressed a letter to him?—A. I have not.
The prisoner’s counsel stated that he did not desire to address any questions to Mr. Sanguily, and the latter took his seat on the prisoner’s bench.
the experts.
No one but Mr. Biosca appeared for the prosecution. Mr. Biosca compared the signatures of the three letters of the prisoner which were in the possession of the court; he considered them similar, and thought they had been written by the same hand, although he could not positively state that they had.
Messrs. Antonio Pérez Madueño and Pedro Simon Álvarez, the experts for the defense, claimed that the fragments of the letter in the possession of the court, which the Government attorney thought to have been written by Mr. Sanguily, were of no importance whatever, for the reason that the document was wholly illegible.
The Government attorney questioned them on each particular word in the fragment of a letter which apparently contained the appointment of Mr. Azcuy as an insurgent colonel. The following words were found: Colonel in the army * * * citizen * * * fully author * * * colonel of our * * * you are au * * * appoint * * * cios * * * organize forces * * * which is hoped by yours truly * * * Julio Sanguily (flourish).
The experts insisted that it was quite impossible for them to make any sense of the detached words of the document, and after several questions by the prisoner’s counsel, they withdrew.
[Page 792]don antonio lopez coloma.
In reply to the usual preliminary questions, be stated that he was 25 years of age, married, an ex-railroad employee, and that he was connected with the prisoner neither by blood relationship nor by friendship.
He said that he was arrested in the month of March last for having placed himself at the head of an insurgent band at Ibarra on the 24th of February. He declared that he had not instigated that movement, and said that he took the place at the head of his men under compulsion, designing to act as an autonomist, and not as a secessionist.
Q. (By the Government Attorney.) Had you previously visited Habana for the purpose of proposing to Sanguily to assist you?
Witness. I had not.
Q. Did you bring oral or written instructions from Dr. Betancourt, which you were to communicate to Juan Gualberto Gómez?—A. I came to receive orders from Sanguily, Aguirre, and Gómez, but I only saw Gómez, and he merely gave me a letter.
Q. Did you speak to Gómez concerning the uprising?—A. No, sir.
Q. Or with Sanguily?—A. Nor with Sanguily, either.
At the request of the Government attorney, the clerk of the court read the statement made by the witness at San Severino castle at Matanzas. In that statement Coloma said that Don Pedro Betancourt had commissioned him to call upon Sanguily, Juan Gualberto Gómez, and Aguirre at Habana, with a view to raising the cry of “Hurrah for reform!” The witness was then asked how many interviews he had said at San Severino that he had had with Sanguily and Aguirre. He answered that he had there stated that he had had none, although he was acquainted with those gentlemen.
Q. How was it that you did not speak to Sanguily and Aguirre?—A. Because it was believed at Matanzas that Messrs. Sanguily and Aguirre were opposed to the movement. I consequently saw no one but Juan Gualberto Gómez.
Q. (By Prisoner’s Counsel.) Whom did you recognize as leader?—A. Betancourt.
Q. (By the Government Attorney.) Had you no knowledge that Sanguily was the leader of the movement in Habana?—A. On the contrary, I had heard that Sanguily disapproved the movement, and as Betancourt wished to make me believe that Sanguily was with the movement, he spoke to me in rather vague terms.
Q. Did Betancourt tell you that Sanguily would place himself at the head of the Matanzas forces?—A. He had told me that he expected Sanguily by the 25th.
Q. (By the Prisoner’s Counsel.) Did you believe those statements of Betancourt?—A. I did not think that Sanguily would join the insurrection.
Q. If Sanguily had gone to join the insurrection, on what day was he to do so?— A. On the 21st.
After a document belonging to the records of the court had been shown to the witness, and after he had ratified all the statements which he had made, he retired.
a female witness.
The next witness was a colored woman employed on the estate Portela, in Aguacate, where the prisoner Sanguily used to go on hunting trips.
Presiding Judge. Do you swear, before God, that you will tell the truth?
The witness did not answer, although the question was repeated.
The Judge. Do you not hear?
Witness (terribly frightened). Sir!
She was unable to answer the usual preliminary questions that were addressed to her, and afterwards answered in monosyllables. It was finally elicited that she was an unmarried woman, employed in agricultural labor.
Q. (By the Presiding Judge.) Did you reside on the estate Portella, in Aguacate, at the close of last year?—A. Yes, sir.
Q. (By the Government Attorney.) Did not Mr. Sanguily occupy a room there, the furniture of which was sold?—A. Yes, sir.
Q. Was there a gun there?—A. Yes, sir.
Q. Do you remember whether the civil guard came there because the furniture was to be sold?—A. Yes, sir.
Q. Was there a closet in that room?—A. Yes, sir.
Q. Who kept the things there?—A. I don’t know.
Q. Did you see when the civil guard took some papers?—A. No, sir.
Q. (By the Presiding Judge.) Do you remember what person spoke to Don Julio Sanguily?—A. I do not remember.
Q. (Counsel for the Defense.) When the civil guard came to examine the closet, where were you?—A. At home.
Q. Did you live in the house occupied by the family?—A. No, sir.
Q. And did the civil guard apply to you?—A. Yes, sir.
[Page 793]Q. And did those gentlemen come to see the furniture?—A. Yes, sir.
Q. Did they buy anything?—A. Yes, sir.
Q. Did the commander of the civil guard come there?—A. No, sir.
Q. Did they take leave of you?—A. No, sir.
Q. Did you not see what they took away?—A. I did not notice.
The witness then retired.
inspector trujillo.
After answering the usual preliminary questions, he said that he was acquainted with Sanguily, but that he was neither his friend nor his enemy.
Being questioned with respect to the arrest of Mr. Azcuy, he said that when he arrested him on his landing from a steamer from Key West, he untied his cravat, in which he found a paper, which Azcuy snatched out of his hand, put it in his mouth and chewed it up, so that he was able to secure a part of it with the greatest difficulty, and to take another fragment out of Azcuy’s mouth.
The fragments of the letter having been shown to him, he said that they appeared to be the same, and withdrew.
don josé pagliery.
Mr. Pagliery appeared in court in citizen’s clothes, and answered the usual preliminary questions by saying that he was 45 years of age, and a colonel in the civil guard.
The Presiding Judge. Do you know Mr. Julio Sanguily?—A. I do.
Q. Are you a friend of his?—A. No; but I have had some intercourse with him.
In reply to a question by the Government attorney, he said that Azcuy had never told him who had given him the papers which he carried in his cravat, or who had signed them.
His first statement was read, from which it appeard that he had taken from Azcuy a folded letter which was hidden in his cravat, and that when Azcuy saw that the letter was discovered he tore it in two pieces, which he put into his mouth, but that the witness had succeeded in securing some fragments of chewed paper which, among other things, said: “Habana * * * Mr. José Azcuy * * * by our author * * * to organize forces.” It bore Sanguily’s signature, and when Azcuy was asked who had given him that paper, he said that it had been given him by his nephew, Dionisio Azcuy.
The Judge. Were you chief of police on the 24th of February?—A. Yes, sir.
Q. Were you the person who arrested Don Julio Sanguily?—A. Yes; by order of the Governor-General.
Q. Had you any knowledge that he was conspiring with Betancourt and López Coloma at Matanzas?—A. I know, in a general way, that an effort was being made in behalf of secession; everybody knew that.
Q. Did you know that Sanguily was going to place himself at the head of a band from Matanzas, Ibarra, or any other place?—A. I did not know anything about it; I only knew that there was a conspiracy on foot.
Q. (By the Prisoner’s Counsel.) Do you remember that, on the 28th day of June last, you sent a communication to the court, telling what you knew with regard to Sanguily’s antecedents, and said, “A record of all this must be in the Captain-General’s office, since the Captain-General was informed of the facts; I have no information except common reports which I am unable to prove”?
The witness answered in the affirmative, and withdrew.
don josé inocencio azcuy.
This gentleman was unable to appear in court, being ill in a hospital. It was at first decided to visit him at the hospital, but finally, the counsel for the defense and the Government attorney agreeing, it was concluded to do without his testimony; instead of which his first statement was read, from which it appeared that Mr. Azcuy was 56 years of age, married, and an owner of country real estate.
Being asked as to the appointment of a colonel which was taken from him by Inspector Trujillo (said paper being concealed in his cravat) and whether the injury done to the paper was done by him, he said that on his landing in this port Inspector Trujillo took the paper in question from him; he (witness) was able to keep a part of the paper. As to the purport of the document, he said that as he was the lessee of the estate Rosario at Linares the appointment of an insurgent colonel, signed by Sanguily, was sent to him, but he did not know whether the signature was genuine or not, as it was sent to him by the revolutionary junta of New York on the 31st of December, 1894, and was delivered to him by Dionisio Azcuy, his nephew. He conferred, he said, at Tampa with Mr. Enrique Collazo and entered that whirlpool of secession for the sole purpose of being able to see his son, hut that he never could be an insurgent, and that Enrique Collazo confirmed to him the appointment of a colonel.
[Page 794]This declaration was read after those from which we give extracts below; we have, however, preferred to place it here, because it is in the order in which the witnesses were called.
don ramón sanchez.
Mr. Sanchez answered the usual preliminary questions by stating, among other things, that he was the proprietor of the pawnbroker’s shop known as Luz, on the corner of Compostela street. He said that he was a friend of Sanguily.
The Presiding Judge. Did Mr. Sanguily pawn a revolver and a machete in your establishment?—A. I have a kind of an idea that he did, but I can not be positive about it, nor do I remember the date.
Q. About how long ago was it?—A. About a year, a year and a half, or two years. Sanguily has done business with me at various times.
Q. When the preliminary examination was held, did you remember when Sanguily pawned those articles?—A. Yes, I did remember then, because the date was not so remote.
Q. (The Government Attorney.) Did you say in your statement that the last transaction had taken place eight months previously, and that Sanguily had pawned a machete and a revolver? Do you remember whether such was the fact.—A. Yes; I do remember it now.
Q. So that in December—that is to say, eight months before your declaration—Sanguily pawned a machete and a revolver at your shop?—A. He did.
Q. Do you remember that you said, in the month of October, that Sanguily had pawned those articles?—A. Yes, sir.
The Prisoner’s Counsel. You probably remember the day when the insurrectionary movement began. Do you remember whether Sanguily had redeemed the machete and the revolver at that time?—A. I can not say positively.
Q. But do you not remember that you sold those articles at public auction?—A. Yes.
Counsel. Then it is perfectly evident that he did not redeem them.
The witness then retired.
In reply to a question by the presiding judge, Sanguily stated that he did not remember the precise date when he pawned the machete and the revolver, although he knew that he did not redeem them.
Don Francisco Regueira, one of those concerned in the uprising at Ibarra, was next summoned to appear as a witness. He did not appear, and it was decided to do without his testimony.
don luis loret y mola.
This gentleman is a native of Puerto Principe, 21 years of age, unmarried, and a student. He was tried for having taken part in the present uprising, and was pardoned.
Counsel for the Defense. Do you know whether, at the time of the uprising of February 24, Sanguily was in any way concerned in it at Ibarra?—A. I know nothing about it.
Q. Who was your leader?—A. Nobody, except one who was at our head, and that was Coloma.
Q. How many of you were there?—A. Fourteen.
Q. Do you not know whether Sanguily was to take command of the party?—A. I know nothing at all about it.
Don Paulino Alfonso was then summoned, but did not appear.
don gerardo portela.
This gentleman is a native of Habana, 33 years of age, a lawyer, and was tried, together with Sanguily, in the case of Fernández de Castro.
In reply to a question of the defense, he said that he was tried for kidnaping Fernández de Castro, together with Sanguily.
Counsel for the Defense. Were you tried on the same charges, or on different ones?—A. On the same charges.
Q. For the very same reasons?—A. The very same.
Q. Who tried you?—A. The military authorities. There were many persons tried in that case.
Q. Were you released?—A. Yes, sir.
The witness then withdrew. Mr. Azcuy’s statement was then read, and this ended the evidence. The Government attorney and the prisoner’s counsel were then told that they were at liberty to speak. In our next edition we will give reports of the arguments of both these gentlemen.
The Sanguily Case—Oral Proceedings.
speech of the prosecutor.
Gentlemen of the Chamber: The crime of rebellion charged in this case is certainly one of the gravest of all those defined by our code; so much so that the penalty of imprisonment for life, attached to it by article 238, is inflicted in only very rare instances, among others, on those committing treason by inducing a foreign power to declare war against Spain, if it declares war; on those who surrender a fortress or a vessel of war to the enemy; on a minister who countersigns a decree alienating a portion of the Spanish territory; on anyone committing parricide, and on anyone committing a robbery resulting in murder.
It is natural that this should be the case, for those acts are of the same gravity as that of persuading and inducing a few malcontents, a class that is never wanting in any country, to rise against our mother country in order to tear from her this cherished piece of Spanish earth, to which absolutely no one except Spain has any right, in view of her having discovered, peopled, and civilized it; in view of the treasures which she has spent here to beautify it; in view of the efforts which she has made and is still making to the end that all the rights, liberties, and benefits enjoyed in the peninsula may be enjoyed in this country, and in view of the blood so lavishly shed by her sons to retain it.
Still, those who commit any of the former offenses know the consequences of the crime which they are perpetrating; but those who promote a rebellion like that which is now desolating this land know where their crime begins, but they ignore its scope and its consequences.
Having laid down these views with regard to the gravity of the offense charged, I proceed to discuss, with entire impartiality and without any heat of passion, the evidence existing in documents and that which has been adduced in this case.
I have already stated that the crime charged is that of rebellion, defined and punished by article 238, taken in connection with the first paragraph of article 237, of the Criminal Code.
Now, the public ministry, which I have the undeserved honor to represent on this occasion, charges the prisoner, Don Julio Sanguily y Garit, with being the author of such crime of rebellion, and bases its accusation upon most solid oral, documentary, expert, and even confessional evidence; such evidence as removes all kind of doubt as to his direct participation in the same in the character of instigator, as required by the said article 238.
In this case, that article applies fully to Don Julio Sanguily, because it inflicts the same penalty on any person instigating and inducing rebels to maintain rebellion as on those waging it and on the principal chiefs of the rebellion.
Those articles read as follows (he reads them):
I now proceed to show that Don Julio Sanguily induced the rebels to wage rebellion, and that he was, besides, one of its principal chiefs, and that he acted as such.
Let us examine his declarations in the preliminary proceedings and his confession in this proceeding.
The accused, as is natural, denied all the charges made against him; but nevertheless he confessed that López Coloma came to see him before rising with his party in Ibarra, to induce him to join him in the rising, which he says that he refused to do, and that he endeavored, on the contrary, to dissuade him from it.
Does the court believe that such plans are communicated to persons where there is not absolute certainty that they are initiated into the secret, that they favor the movement, and that they assist it with all their ability?
But this is not all. He confesses besides, in a declaration made by him on the day on which he was arrested, and which he subsequently ratified before the judge of El Cerro, and afterwards in this proceeding, that, “in view of his political standing”—let the court note this, these are his very words—“he is certain that if any important project had been concerted he would have known it, and that it is not true that any movement was agreed upon for February 24.”
He said this on that very 24th February, and the inferences are obvious. His political affiliations were Separatist, and he was in constant relations and intercourse with the principal leaders of that party, because it was only by this means that he could be sure that any important project would have been communicated to him, since that is done only with leaders on whom absolute reliance is placed.
[Page 796]We all know well that such a project existed, that it was serious and very serious, and that its execution began on that very 24th February; this we all know, because we are seeing it, and this poor land and the mother country are seeing it and feeling its effects; and if there is still any doubt of it, ask the army, that martyr to duty, which has already shed so much of its blood.
The prisoner himself, therefore, clearly, though involuntarily, confesses in that declaration his direct participation in the Separatist movement and his character as one of the principal loaders, because only such communicate to each other the preliminary steps which accompany every rebellion, what has been decided with regard to the day of the rising, and the plans agreed upon.
Moreover, all this is corroborated by the declaration of López Coloma, who stated, at the time of his arrest, that he came to Habana a few days before the rising by order of Dr. Betancourt, of Mantanzas, to request instructions and orders of Don Julio Sanguily and Don Juan Gualberto Gómez as to whether the cry of independence should be raised or not, and that it was agreed that the said cry should be raised immediately.
It is true that he immediately amended that declaration by saying that he came to an understanding with Betancourt and the latter with Gualberto Gomez, and that what Betancourt told him was to see Gualberto Gomez afterwards, in order to receive his orders and those of Sanguily; but that he expressed himself vaguely on this subject, and that he consequently had no interview with him (Sanguily).
Let it be noticed that this interview, of which Lopez Coloma tries to clear Don Julio Sanguily, is confessed by the latter, who asserts that the former saw him and invited him to join him in the rising.
The court will now, in its discretion, decide which of Lopez Coloma’s declarations deserves the most credit and the most belief—the first, made at the time of his arrest, and when he had not yet been tutored, or the subsequent ones, including those in this proceeding, in which he did not and could not explain these contradictions satisfactorily.
That witness adds, moreover, that he knew through Betancourt that Don Julio Sanguily was to place himself at the head of the movement.
And I here spare the court all that I might say concerning the weight of the evidence adduced in the preliminary proceedings when it conflicts with that furnished by the testimony in this proceeding; not only because I am perfectly well aware of the wisdom of all its members, but because I am also aware of the brilliant talents which distinguish the prisoner’s counsel, and I am sure that in his argument he will not make use of those commonplaces which the prosecuting attorney employs only in the preliminary proceedings as if the old procedure was still in force; that the amendment of the criminal law and the establishment of oral and public trial in this island has consequently been of no avail to the counsel in this case, etc. No; Don Julio Sanguily’s counsel knows perfectly well that the preliminary proceedings, cited by the parties in this case, have their real weight, provided the evidence adduced in them is not overthrown by that produced in this proceeding, and that such rebuttal must be effected by convincing the court that the former evidence was false and that the testimony adduced in this proceeding is true.
The court, then, with the data furnished it, and with the evidence produced by the parties to this case, will form its opinion, and will embody that opinion, in whatever sense it may be, in its decision.
Let us see now what the authorities in existence here at that date tell us as to the prisoner’s machinations, before he was arrested on the 24th of February, to make proselytes to his views, and to procure the rising against the mother country for the purpose of achieving the independence of this island.
The civil governor, in his report on page 10, dated February 27, 1895, states “that he proceeded to arrest Sanguily by order of the Governor-General, who knew from private information and from police reports, that he was conspiring, and that it was notorious that he was designated to place himself at the head of the movement.”
And that this was true is corroborated by the statement of his excellency the Governor-General, folio 22, second page, dated March 24, 1895, in which he uses these words: “With regard to Don Julio Sanguily, it is known to me through confidential information, both from this capital and from abroad, that he was one of the instigators of the Separatist rebellion, and that it was said that he was to place himself at the head of the insurrectional movement in the provinces of Habana, Matanzas, and Santa Clara; that his whole conduct, which was closely watched by the police, also proves this; and that it was certain that he maintained relations and correspondence with the revolutionary junta at New York, with the workmen (labor-antes) abroad, and with the Separatist committees of the provinces of the Island of Cuba.”
It is evident from this that Don Julio Sanguily could well assert that “he was sure that any important plan agreed upon would be known to him.”
His excellency the Governor-General adds in this report: “That he likewise knew [Page 797] the transactions in which Sanguily had participated for the acquisition of munitions of war; but that, as he obtained all this information in confidence, he refrained for the time being from divulging it, intending to do so if it should be necessary to prove the facts, and awaiting the time when his assistance should be requested by the judicial authorities, in order that these facts might appear in full at the trial.”
The Government had no proofs of these last facts, perhaps because they were communicated in confidence to His Excellency the Governor-General, and the prosecuting attorney would, at the proper time, have requested the court to ask General Calleja for the assistance which he had offered the judicial authorities in facilitating the proof of them, but that the waiting until he forwarded the documents from the Peninsula, where it is well known that he is, would have too greatly prolonged the preliminary stage of this trial; and besides, because the remaining evidence is so strong that he thought that he could dispense with them without endangering the success of the task which his office imposes upon him.
Besides, the witnesses who testified to this effect are of the highest respectability, and their simple assertions must certainly have weight in the opinion of the court, as they had in that of my office, since falsehood or exaggeration is not even to be suspected in such high and respected personages.
Moreover, these assertions are corroborated by other documents, and, among them, by several letters which have been found and of which I proceed to speak.
I shall begin with those which were found by the civil guard at the Portela works among other papers in a cupboard in a room which was frequently occupied by Don Julio Sanguily, and in which the rifle, admitted by the prisoner to be his, was seized.
The prisoner does not recognize that letter, nor does he know who wrote it nor to whom it was addressed. It is evident that it was not written by him on comparing the writing with that which is known to be the prisoner’s; but it does not appear so clear to the prosecuting ministry that it was not addressed to him, as it was found in a room which he frequently occupied and with other articles used by him and belonging to him, and among other papers among which was found no less than a diary of his, as stated by the civil guard in the report on folios 98–101, which the Sala permitted this ministry (the prosecuting attorney) to offer as a part of its documentary evidence.
Let us see now the contents of this letter which appears on folio 94, and which is dated December 8, 1893. (He reads it and we extract the following paragraph from its contents: “No one more than you, in view of your respectable surroundings, the credit which your name imparts to the movement, your old and ‘well-established reputation as a revolutionist’ and a soldier, the position which you have always occupied among the members of both parties, ‘is called’ to lead a regular and important movement from the very start.”)
Another letter figures among the documents on folio 45. This letter was turned over to the military court which first heard this case; it was signed with the anonym “A Resident,” and the prisoner has recognized it as written and signed by him, both in the preliminary proceedings and in this.
This and the signatures written by the prisoner at the foot of his declarations in the preliminary proceedings, have served as a means of comparison in the expert examination of other letters seized, and, although its contents are of no importance in themselves, I shall read it in order that its style may be compared with that of those which still remain to be examined, and that it may be seen that it is exactly the same.
“Thursday—Cerro—February 14, 1895.”
In this letter we find the following sentence: “I have something of interest to communicate to you on this subject.”
Now, compare the heading of this letter with that of the letter which appears at folios 36 and 37, which was, beyond any doubt, written by Don Julio Sanguily, although it is signed “Gener,” and it will be seen that it is the same; it is as follows: “Saturday—Cerro—February, 1895.” [He reads it.]
In this letter, as the court has heard, the person signing it “Gener” says that he has pawned his revolver and his machete, and the court will remember that the prisoner has admitted having been reduced to such straits, which, moreover, has been proved by the statement of Don Ramón Sánchez, the owner of the pawnbroker’s establishment at the corner of Compostela and Luz streets, where the pawning took place.
There is another reason for asserting that this letter was written by the prisoner and not by some other person who imitated his handwriting exactly, and that is, that if any one had done this in order to implicate the prisoner by means of this letter he would, in that case, have signed it “Sanguily,” the name of the person whom he was trying to implicate and whose handwriting he was imitating, and not with a fictitious signature used by the person to whom that handwriting really belongs, only [Page 798] when he is attempting to conceal his identity from those who do not know him, in case the letter should be lost.
Another document, and certainly the most important one, remains to be examined before we proceed to consider what the experts have said about this letter and that document.
This document is an appointment as colonel in the insurgent army, issued by Don Julio Sanguily in this city, who has competent authority, according to the said appointment, in favor of Don José Inocencio Azcuy, to organize forces in Vuelta Abajo, and to issue in his turn such appointments as he may think necessary for the purposes of the rebellion, in favor of such persons as may merit them by their services.
Let us see first of all how this document was found. Azcuy was arrested by the police when he landed here on his arrival from the United States. He was carefully searched, and this appointment was found in the knot of the cravat which he was wearing.
When Azcuy saw it in the possession of the police, he attempted to snatch it from the hands of Inspector Trujillo in order to swallow it, but he only partially succeeded, the fragment which appears at folio 236, and by which an exact knowledge of its “contents is obtained, having been saved.
Azcuy himself explained in all his declarations how and when it came into his possession, stating that his nephew, Don Nemesio Azcuy, had given it to him in the “El Rosario” house at Viñales, in January or February of this year, according to the number of months which in his declarations he states as having elapsed, and added that it was signed by Don Julio Sanguily, though he did not see him sign it, and that his nephew told him that it was sent to him by the Revolutionary Junta at New York.
Don Julio Sanguily does not acknowledge the letter signed “Gener” nor this document, though he admits that the handwriting of both resembles his own.
Let us now see the text of this document. It roads as follows;
“Sr. D. J. Azu—— Coronel del Ejer———, Ciudadano, competentemente autor—— Coronel de nuestro—— sub—— y—— Queda Vd. actor z—— conferir nombran—— todas que por mi merit—— cios los merezca—— Organizará, fuerzas que—— to le irán á u—— instrucciones—— sobre la manera ó—— ganiz—— los y puntos que ha de ocupar—— confiamos en su cello—— tico espera—— zo affrao., su y P. J. S–nguily.”
The little that is wanting does not prevent nor even render difficult the understanding what the document means as clearly as if it was entire, especially in the signature, to which only the “a” in Sanguily is wanting, the rubric (flourish) being seen distinctly.
This document and the letter signed “Gener “having been examined by the experts in handwriting, they could not do less than say at the first preliminary examination that they believed both of them, together with the letter at folio 45 and the signatures affixed to his declarations by Don Julio Sanguily, to have been written by the same hand; and the expert who repeated that examination in this proceeding made the same statement, and it is impossible that it could have been otherwise, as it is sufficient, without being an expert, to have a little practice in this kind of comparisons to perceive this, and the person who now has the honor of speaking has not the slightest doubt on the subject, as he made this comparison, letter by letter, with a good magnifying glass.
I am well aware that my assertion in itself alone is of no importance, and that the opinion of the experts is not conclusive, but the court will doubtless repeat this operation, form its opinion, and then decide.
The experts for the defense were not present at the examination in this proceeding as the defense produced them only that they might ratify the declaration which they made in the preliminary proceeding in which they stated that they could not reproduce the document at folio 236, which statement they repeated when it was exhibited to them at the request of the prosecution.
As the prosecution, therefore, bases its argument upon the certain fact that that letter and that appointment were written and sent by Julio Sanguily, can there be a doubt of his direct participation in the crime of rebellion which is charged in this case?
Both documents are very expressive. The letter says: “He is on the eve of placing himself at the head of a work of redemption,” and the prosecution adds that if he did not succeed in doing so on that day it was doubtless because he could not leave his family without giving them some money, which was out of his power; and, above all, because he was arrested before the rising had begun.
Hence, this letter and the statements of López Coloma prove that he induced and decided the rebels, and that he was one of the principal leaders of the rebellion.
And if, in spite of all this, any doubt still remained, it would certainly be dispelled by the appointment as colonel in the insurgent army, seized on Azcuy’s person, [Page 799] and issued by Sanguily, “who has competent authority,” since it is very clear that only the principal leaders have such powers.
I have little to say about the evidence produced in this case by the distinguished counsel for the prisoner, as he has not succeeded in disproving by it any of the charges upon which this prosecution is based.
I well know that in the discharge of the honorable professional duty incumbent upon him to defend his client he will distort this evidence, and will by his ability succeed in imparting some life to it, but it will be a fictitious life, which can not withstand a cool and dispassionate examination such as that to which it will be subjected by the court, and to which it has been subjected by this ministry, whose representative on this occasion would have experienced sincere gratification in being convinced by it of the prisoner’s innocence in order to desist from the prosecution in this case, as it is always more agreeable and gratifying to find that men are innocent than that they are guilty, especially where great crimes are involved.
This has not been the case, and he has therefore maintained his inferences as conclusive, thereby discharging the very sacred duty imposed by the law of seeing that those who have violated its injunctions shall suffer the penalty of their crimes.
This evidence on the part of the defense was confined to the statements of the persons composing López Coloma’s band, who could only say that they did not know that Sanguily was to place himself at their head, and this means nothing more than that, owing to their obscurity, they were not informed of it, as the court may have seen, or that, if they knew it, they now conceal their knowledge, which is not at all extraordinary, as they were all partisans of the same cause, and did not wish to betray their leader.
The prisoner’s counsel touches upon one point in his statement of preliminary inferences, in which I think that he is mistaken. After staking those which he considered applicable, and asking for his client’s acquittal, he says: “Article 653 of the Law of Prosecutions permits the presentation of alternative inferences, and, if article 678 of the same law allows the parties to reproduce, at the oral trial, the preliminary questions which ‘have been rejected,’ it can not be disputed that they have a right to offer as alternative inferences any of a preliminary character not presented before that trial.”
The defense then states, as an alternative, the inference that, even if the prisoner were guilty, he is relieved from every penalty by General Calloja’s proclamation of February 27, granting pardon to all who submit to the authorities within the eight days following its publication.
Let us see what is said in articles 653 and 678 of the Law of Criminal Procedure, upon which the defense lies. [He reads them.]
The right of the parties, therefore, to state alternative inferences on each of the points which are to be the subjects of the decision, in order that they may be taken into consideration in the sentence, is indisputable; but, in my opinion, the same is not the case with the preliminary questions, because, in order that they may be reproduced, article 678 requires that those questions shall have been “previously” raised, and that they shall have been rejected by the sala.
How, then, can that which has not been “produced,” and which, consequently, could not be rejected, be reproduced?
But, be that as it may, let us grant that such question is applicable and fitting, and let us examine it thoroughly.
The proclamation cited was dated February 27, and Señor Sanguily was arrested and prosecuted on this charge three days before, to wit, on the 24th.
Can a pardon, then, which had not yet been granted when he was arrested, apply to him?
Let us see its contents. [Reads it.]
As the court may see, article 3 grants full pardon to the rebels, it is true, but only to those who shall submit to the authorities within the term of eight days subsequent to the grant; and, as the prisoner did not fulfill the condition, the benefit of it does not and can not apply to him.
The defense will reply to this that a person who was not at liberty could not submit. If he had been at liberty and if he had rebelled, would he have presented himself within that term? I can not answer that question, for in order to do so it would be necessary to penetrate into the sanctuary of the conscience, and Heaven preserve me from even attempting it. But this I will say, that the object of that pardon was precisely to reach that interior sanctuary in order to learn who had repented of the previous acts which they had committed.
I am now going to try to show, in anticipation of certain arguments of the defense, that the preliminary inferences stated are the only ones possible; but as I must not read the whole code for that purpose I shall confine myself to disproving the applicability to this case of article 244, which treats of prevention and attempt.
Article 244 says [reads it]:
Now, it is essential to the existence of a conspiracy or attempt, and to their being [Page 800] so designated, that the offense shall not have been consummated, for if it is consummated, it is evident that the penalty to he applied is that which is attached to the offense committed; consequently this article is not applicable to the case, as the rebellion was not only instigated, but is still raging in this island.
Can it, then, be thought, asked the prosecutor, that, because Don Julio Sanguily was arrested on the 24th February and, therefore, could not in person support the rebellion begun on that day, his acts did not pass from the stage and consequently remain in that of attempt or prevention?
This view is also refuted by the clear language of article 238. It says, [he reads it]:
As we see, it requires that the rebels be induced and decided, using a copulative conjunction, and to instigate rebellion; but it does not require that those instigating it shall afterwards support it, because the conjunction used here is disjunctive, “or;” hence, the one who instigates it, although he may not subsequently support it, as in the case of Don Julio Sanguily, has done all that is required by article 238.
And this, apart from his being one of the principal leaders of the rebellion, in which character its penal provisions also apply to him.
In order to conclude, gentlemen of the sala, let us sum up the charges set forth by this ministry in this ill-arranged statement.
The most prominent are—
The prisoner’s expressive statement that, “in view of his political standing he is sure that if any important plan had been agreed upon, he would have known it;” by which he plainly confesses that he was one of the principal leaders of the insurrection, as they alone know these plans in advance.
Comma’s declaration, in which he says that he came to Habana to receive his instructions as to whether the cry of independence should be raised or not, and his statement that he knew through Betancourt that Sanguily was to place himself at the head of the insurrectionary movement.
The reports of the Governor-General of this island and the civil governor of the province, stating that Sanguily was one of the instigators of the insurrection; that he was to place himself at the head of it in this city and in the cities of Matanzas and Santa Clara; that he maintained relations and correspondence with the revolutionary junta at New York and with the Separatist committees of this island, and that he had participated in the acquisition of munitions of war.
The letter appearing at folio 94, found at the Portella works, among other papers of Don Julio Sanguily, in which nothing but the revolution is spoken of.
The letter at folio 36, signed “Gener,” and directed to Dr. Betancourt, which is undoubtedly entirely in Sanguily’s handwriting and in which, as in the preceding, nothing is spoken of but the then rising, and which was written thirteen days before it began, to wit, on the 9th of February last.
And, lastly, the appointment as colonel in the insurgent army issued by Sanguily in favor of Azcuy, with competent authority, which in itself alone proves super-abundantly that Sanguily was one of the chiefs and organizers of this armed rebellion, because he could not otherwise have issued these appointments.
On these grounds the prosecutor asks the sala, after weighing the evidence produced, with the good judgment and conscientiousness of which it daily gives so many proofs, to be pleased to sentence the prisoner, Don Julio Sanguily y Garit, as guilty of the crime of rebellion, treated of by article 238, taken in connection with No. 1 of article 287 of our code, without the presence of extenuating circumstances, to the penalty of imprisonment for life, which he asked in his preliminary inferences, and which he has maintained as final, together with the “accesorias” recited in that article, and the costs.
I have finished my prosecution, gentlemen of the sala. The prosecuting ministry aims in all cases at displaying impartiality in its arguments. In that which I am now closing I have taken special care to exclude every atom of passion in the examination of the evidence produced, remembering that if we, the ordinary courts, have cognizance of this case instead of the military courts it is owing to the agreement between the United States and our nation, by virtue of which the civil courts are to try American citizens for these offenses, provided that, as in the present case, the rebels were not caught with arms in their hands. If, then, the most absolute truthfulness and impartiality are always obligatory in the discharge of our duties, they are still more obligatory in this case, when we are trying a foreign citizen, the subject of a friendly nation.
I do not know whether I have well discharged that duty and the others imposed upon me by my office in this trial; but, if I have not succeeded, the court and all others may be assured that it has been owing to my deficiency in ability, to my small command of language, or to some other similar cause, but not to want of goodwill; nor because I have neglected the means of attaining that end. I have spoken.
the defense.
Your Excellency: As your excellency has heard from the lips of the prosecutor, the circle in which this case is developed is very limited; the imputation of a crime—according [Page 801] to the legal classification—nothing extraordinary, certainly; common, frequent in every latitude of the globe, against a prisoner who is innocent of it, according to the documents in the case and the result of this trial.
Still, the public sentiment has decided to ascribe to this case an importance which, in reality, it does not possess; and this is owing to the fact that public opinion presumes without reason that the political agitation which prevails in the environs may, by crossing the threshold of this august place, exercise some influence upon the serene minds of judges who are great precisely because they are the servants of the law, which convicts without malice, and which acquits without sympathy.
I would be the first to wish that the just and clear case of my client had been represented here, and especially that the erroneous arguments of the prosecuting ministry had been refuted here, through the honored agency of one of our forensic luminaries.
It could not be. But really, the task presents so few difficulties that a man of ordinary ability can execute it without effort, and without any fear that the counsel himself may be the cause of his client’s conviction, which alone could make it possible for a sentence of condemnation to be rendered in this case, consistently with justice.
I, therefore, setting forth, though it may be awkwardly, the evidence in the case, submitting it none the less to the impartial consideration of the court, to its wisdom and its penetration, excluding what is false, proving ad nauseam its nonexistence, reconstructing the legal truth as it appears from the facts in the case, without adding or diminishing anything, trust that I shall prevent the court from deciding that the facts constituting my client’s guilt have been proved.
These facts do not exist. How could the prosecuting ministry discover them? Its argument resembles a novel, and the denouement with which it winds up, the terrible penalty which it asks, is inexplicable in view of the actual state of the case to such a degree that it can assume form and body only by regarding it as a work of the imagination elaborated on the forbidden ground of the improbable.
I again assert before the court, anticipating the demonstration of the fact, that the punishable act does not exist in this case. Or, at least, there are two standards for the same case—always one of condemnation for my client, always one of acquittal for others who have been in a similar situation to his.
When partially recovering from the astonishment into which I was thrown by the fact that the prosecuting attorney had not in this proceeding modified his exaggerated charge in the sense of acquittal, I rack my brains for the cause; I find no other reason, nor can there be any other, than the moral pressure involuntarily exercised upon the mind by the purest and most elevated ideas, from which it is impossible to withdraw ourselves under certain circumstances, but under the influence of which points of view are admitted as true and real which are in reality optical delusions of the mind, which, deceived by this means, rises from deduction to deduction until it culminates in the most radical of errors.
A most noble sentiment, the summary or synopsis of all the virtues, prevails, it is true, like a generating principle, in the argument of the prosecution, and I do not hesitate to render it that tribute of justice; but the excellencies of patriotism, on occasions like the present, place bandages over the eyes, which conceal the path of legal truth.
Passion, which is a bad counselor, especially in judicial proceedings, is, in its turn, in political trials, necessarily aroused by preconceived ideas; and when these are diametrically opposed to those attributed to the prisoner, the latter, at the time of his defense, has before him, owing to hypotheses based on presumptions admitted a priori as evidence, a double prosecutor—the prosecuting attorney, who, if he is humane, speaks impersonally in the name of the law, and the antagonist, who, in the prosecution, yields unconsciously to the pressure of his private feelings.
Thus, in the present case, where the prisoner took a prominent part in the last war, and where he is denounced by the Governor-General himself in a long communication, going into minute details, both factors uniting in the, of course, patriotic mind of the prosecuting attorney—the prisoner’s antecedents and the Government’s denunciation—the conviction of the prisoner’s present guilt arises spontaneously in his mind, and he demands the enormous penalty which is its logical consequence.
The theory upon which the defense relies is entirely different, and, consequently, the mode of procedure which it has to employ in this trial is entirely different. To the great syntheses of the prosecuting ministry it will oppose the most scrupulous analysis and it will sustain its words by proofs, by documents, not taken into account by the prosecuting attorney, although they are entirely conclusive in the prisoner’s favor.
Your excellency will now see at once that I am entirely in the right; that the prosecuting attorney is entirely in the wrong; that there is no evidence proving the prisoner’s guilt, and your excellency will see how, in logical and legal order, in spite of the frivolous sophistries of the prosecution, the defense stands firm, gaining from the [Page 802] conscience of the court, by its irrefutable arguments, the unanimously favorable decision which it demands in the name of justice, without servility or adulation, in the name of justice alone.
It is not for me to undervalue any argument, favorable or adverse, as all must be submitted to your excellency’s high jurisdiction, and, to be brief—as I must begin with the beginning—I begin by asserting, under the legal rule, that where there is no one accused there can be no oral trial; that this case could not be brought to trial because legally there is no one accused in it, or, what amounts to the same thing, the writ of prosecution is absolutely void, and not even the consent of the prisoner himself can give it force, as its nullity does not affect his personal interests alone, but involves a much higher principle, the public interest or international law.
This is my first proposition, and I proceed to demonstrate it.
Here is the writ of prosecution and arrest.
writ of prosecution.
The present case, transmitted by the judge, dean of the judges in this case, having been received, let the receipt of it be acknowledged, and in view of the reasons given in the opinion of his excellency the auditor of the war, at folio 55, second page, the cognizance of the same is accepted, so far as relates to the American citizens, and to that end let these proceedings be entered in the proper book, and let their institution be communicated to the criminal court and to his excellency His Majesty’s prosecuting attorney.
It appearing that on the morning of February 24 last, in consequence of “antecedents and confidential communications, the government proceeded to the arrest of various persons” gravely involved in a projected separatist movement, a band outside of this province having risen in open rebellion on the morning of the said day, under the cry of independence, which case is now under the cognizance of the jurisdiction of war, which has transmitted the previous testimony, in order that the ordinary courts may take cognizance of the said crime so far as relates to the American citizens.
Considering that these acts are invested with the character of the crime of rebellion defined in article 237 of the Criminal Code, and “that the antecedents and other evidence appearing in the proceedings transmitted by the said jurisdiction of war, appear to furnish reasonable presumptions of guilt against Don Julio Sanguily y Garit and Don José Maria Aguirre y Valdés as guilty of the said crime in the character of principals.”
In view of articles 384 and 503 of the Law of Criminal Procedure, his excellency said that he ought to decree and decrees the prosecution of the said Don Julio Sanguily y Garit and Don José María Aguirre y Valdés, and orders proceedings to be instituted in accordance with the charges. In view of their prosecution and of the penalty attached by the law to the crime in question, the provisional arrest of the said Don Julio Sanguily y Garit and Don José María Aguirre y Valdés is decreed; let them be notified thereof, and let the proper orders be issued to the heads of the penal institutions in which they are; and if this fact does not appear from the judicial proceedings, let a respectful communication be addressed to his excellency the Captain-General requesting him to be pleased to say so and to issue the necessary orders that the said accused persons may remain as prisoners at the disposal of this court and for the purposes of this preliminary proceeding; let the accused be notified of the right granted them by law to demand the return of this writ within the legal term, and to appoint at once lawyers and attorneys to advise and represent them in this case, and let the clerk of the court report on the subject at the proper time. Let them be required to give bail, within one term, in the sum of 50,000 pesetas ($10,000) each, in order to secure the payment of any sums of money which they may be required to pay at the proper time, and if they fail to furnish the said bail proceed to attach their property in legal form. Let the penal and prison antecedents be annexed to the case, and, when done, let report be made, in order that such further decrees as may be necessary may be issued.
The examining judge (juez de instruccion) of the district of El Cerro has ordered the foregoing, and signs it. Witness, Eugenio Luzarreta, Antonio Alvarez Insua.
That is to say, these proceedings transmitted by the jurisdiction of war, in this special case, can have no more weight than that of a mere information, and proceedings are not instituted, nor is arrest ordered, on an information.
The only “considering” of the writ which I am discussing states “that the antecedents and other evidence appearing in the proceedings transmitted by the said jurisdiction of war appear to furnish reasonable presumptions of guilt against Don Julio Sanguily y Garit and Don José María Aguirre y Valdés;” that he, therefore, ought to decree and decreed their prosecution.
And a few lines afterwards: “In view of his prosecution and of the penalty attached by the law to the crime in question, the provisional arrest of the said Don Julio Sanguily is decreed.”
[Page 803]The civil judge, in whose favor the jurisdiction of war withdraws, issues the foregoing writ as soon as he has received the evidence, before making any declaration of his jurisdiction. Sanguily is therefore prosecuted and imprisoned for the reasons contained in the evidence transmitted; or, what is the same thing, the civil judge places his signature at the foot of the work done by the jurisdiction of war, from which it follows that Sanguily is to-day prosecuted and imprisoned by the tribunal of war through the intervention of his legitimate judge, if the latter admits as the only charge against the prisoner that made by the incompetent jurisdiction, something hybrid and confused, which international law does not accept, which it condemns.
In the first place, the protocol of January, 1877, by which Ministers Calderón y Collantes and Caleb Cushing interpret the treaties existing between Spain and the United States, provides in the most positive manner that American citizens shall not under any circumstances be tried by military courts, with the single exception of their being caught with arms in their hands.
And in the second place, the United States consul-general, in a series of communications addressed to his excellency the Governor-General, demanding the enjoining of the military authorities, one of which communications appears as evidence in this case, repeatedly makes the following protest:
“By order of my Government I enter before the Government of this island the most solemn protest against all the proceedings hitherto instituted, or which may be hereafter instituted, by the tribunal of war, on the ground that they are in open violation of the agreement between the two nations.”
International conflicts are excited or created in this way. The case of Waller, between the United States and France, occurs at this very time. The United States, believing, from information received from a relative of the American citizen, that an irregular procedure had been adopted toward him, demanded of France a full copy of the proceedings in the case, which is now in the possession of the American Government.
And this, although it is not a question, as in this case, of writs issued by the civil authorities, based exclusively on evidence transmitted from the jurisdiction of war, but, according to all the documents published, on niceties of procedure which the competent tribunal failed to observe.
Now, the prosecution and imprisonment of my client is based entirely and exclusively upon these proceedings which the consul denounces and protests against, not of his own motion, but by express order of his Government; and our own Government has not repelled it.
Are such prosecution and imprisonment legal? No; the former is void, and the latter is arbitrary.
And is it not proved, by legal arguments, that this case should not have been brought to oral trial, there being no accused, as the writ of prosecution is void under every aspect?
At the proper time I requested, and the court granted, that both the writ of prosecution and imprisonment and the consular protest should be admitted as part of my client’s evidence.
Before leaving this head, I must add two considerations, one of which I have already alluded to, to wit, that it makes no difference that the accused did not enter an appeal against that writ of prosecution, because, where an essential point forming an intrinsic part of an international convention is involved, the will of an individual does not affect the provisions of such convention; and the other consideration has reference to the fact that Sanguily’s prosecution and imprisonment were ratified several days afterwards, not for reasons arising subsequently, but “because the grounds for ordering it not having changed, it is proper to carry out the provisions of article 516 of the law of criminal procedure.”
the punishable act.
In commenting upon it the prosecuting attorney makes four assertions, all of them, without one exception, absolutely untrue.
- 1.
- Sanguily, he says, was, up to the day of his arrest, one of the most active promoters and instigators of the insurrection which broke out in this island on that day.
- 2.
- Being the person designated to place himself at the head of the insurrectionary movement in this province, that of Mantanzas, and that of Santa Clara.
- 3.
- And as principal chief and leader of that insurrection, and as the representative of the revolutionary junta existing in New York, he issued—
- 4.
- The appointments conducive to his purposes, among them that of Don José Inocencio Azcuy as colonel in the insurgent army.
On examining the proceedings, it is proved that three of these assertions, far from being original, were gathered from a vitiated source. Their want of authenticity is evident from the very first.
[Page 804]I shall discuss the fourth separately.
Let us study the first three. They are a literal copy of the declaration made by his excellency General Calleja in the proceedings instituted by the military jurisdiction. In proof of this see General Calleja’s declaration.
Don Emilio Calleja é Isasi, lieutenant-general in the army, governor and Captain-General of the Island of Cuba, etc., certify, in reply to the preceding interrogatory: (1) That my name is as above stated; that I am of full age; and that I have no direct nor indirect interest in this case. (2) That I affirm and ratify the communication referred to in the question relating to my authority. (3) That as to Don Julio Sanguily and Don José María Aguirre, it is known to me, through confidential communications, both from this capital and from abroad, that they were promoters of the separatist rebellion, and that it was said that they were to place themselves at the head of the insurrectionary movement in the provinces of Habana, Matanzas, and Santa Clara. That their whole conduct, which was closely watched by the police, also proved this; and that it was certain that they maintained relations and correspondence with the Revolutionary Junta at New York, with the workingmen abroad, and with the separatist committees of the provinces of the Island of Cuba. Lastly, that by the same confidential channel he has received more evidence concerning their operations, and particularly concerning the participation of those gentlemen in the acquisition of munitions of war, but that, as they are invested with the said character of confidential communications, he abstains, for the present, from repeating them, reserving to himself the right to do so if it should be necessary to furnish proofs, at the time when the administration of justice shall call upon him for such aid in a special case, and in order to have these facts appear in the proceedings. As to Don Ramón Pérez Trujillo and Don Francisco Gómez de la Maza, the same confidential communications have shown that they participated in the separatist conspiracy, that they were present at secret assemblies, and that they maintained relations with the former agitators, to whose operations, as I was informed by the confidential communications, they rendered direct or indirect assistance. That he has nothing more to say. (Habana, March 25, 1895. Emilio Calleja. Rubric.)
This alone would render the testimony inadmissible, as all that I said when analyzing the writ of prosecution and arrest applies to this case. The declaration is based upon the military testimony, and, not being ratified before a competent judge, disappears with the whole weight of that testimony.
But there is more and more important. General Calleja states that he obtained the information which he gives concerning Sanguily through confidential communications from the police.
And the police through its chief, Senor Paglieri, tells the court that, as regards Sanguily, “it has no other evidence than public report, which it can not prove.”
Lastly, General Calleja adds that he knows what he testifies, and he offers to furnish new proofs, and for this purpose the court transmits to the Government a statement of the case, which is answered by the present Captain-General of the island in the following words: “That, as regards the evidence corroborating the statements of General Calleja concerning Don Julio Sanguily as a promoter of the Separatist rebellion in this island, and as being in constant relations with the revolutionary junta at New York, he has the honor to inform the court that there is no evidence at this center corroborative of the said statements, but that as they relate to politics, the said General Calleja may have obtained his information in his character as Governor-General, at which center the documents requested may perhaps be found.”
“The General Government, when called upon, stated that as regards the evidence relating to Don Julio Sanguily, as involved in the present insurrection, it has to inform the secretary, by order of his excellency the Governor-General, that the documents requested are not at this center.”
General Calleja’s famous statement is reduced to this: The captain-general and governor-general, his excellency Senor Martinez Campos himself, condemns his statements.
I make no comparisons, but if General Calleja, Don Julio Sanguily’s personal enemy, is great owing to the office which he filled, Gen. Martinez Campos, who now occupies that same position, has in his favor, in addition to the admiration of his followers, the esteem and respect of his adversaries; and, if he is a national glory, he is, likewise, a European and a universal celebrity, an indisputable man of honor; and he who is all this, he, and not the impassioned and petty defense, is the one who roundly and categorically denies General Calleja’s statements.
On this account, it appeared useless to Sanguily’s defense to object to General Calleja as the prisoner’s personal enemy, a fact very easily proven. It preferred to oppose to his unsupported charges the full and complete denial of Gen. Martinez Campos.
The prosecuting attorney, on the contrary, gives credit to General Calleja’s words, which he copies literally in his inferences in setting forth my client’s punishable act. On the other hand, he pays no attention to the documents which I have had the [Page 805] honor to read to the court, and which strip General Calleja’s declaration of all claim to legal truthfulness.
Fourth assertion of the prosecution:
That Sanguily, in the double capacity of leader and representative, issued appointments in the insurrectionary army; among them, that of colonel, in favor of Azcuy.
As it has been shown that there is not, in this case, any element proving the characters attributed to Sanguily, the appointment in question was a private act of the prisoner. It would not constitute a punishable act. The contrary would be the case if Sanguily had been the leader, the representative, authorized to issue such appointments.
And it is certain that this paper, which has been baptized with the name of “colonel’s title or commission,” is the only one that appears in the case, no allusion being made to any other. It is, therefore, strange that the prosecuting attorney should use the plural in speaking of it.
But this is of little importance. It would be more important to ascertain how the prosecuting attorney knew that this unintelligible paper constitutes a colonel’s appointment, issued by Sanguily.
Azcuy asserts that it was given to him by his nephew, Don Nemesio, who had received it from the revolutionary junta at New York. But he does not say that it was issued by Sanguily; and the fact that he came from New York, and that Sanguily resided in Habana, makes us immediately presume the reverse.
The experts who were summoned to reproduce the greatly injured text of the paper declare “that they can form no opinion as to the date at which the document was written, nor as to the contents of the writing, owing to the dilapidated condition of the fragments and the want of the necessary words to form even an approximate idea of the context of the writing itself.”
How, then, does the prosecuting attorney know that this paper contains a colonel’s commission? Why does he suppose so? A mere private supposition, in opposition to the opinion of experts, is not sufficient evidence to prove a fact, to base upon it the presumption of guilt, and to demand the infliction of the penalty which he asks for my client.
Sanguily denies that the paper in question is his, and Azcuy does not assert it; and, to strengthen the case, the handwriting has not been recognized. It is not known whose the paper denominated by the prosecuting attorney “colonel’s commission” legally is; it has not been recognized, and this is shown by the following considerations: Article 466 of the Code of Criminal Procedure provides that the appointment of experts “shall be communicated to the accused without fail and immediately;” and article 7 of the treaty of October 27, 1795, between Spain and the United States, ratified by that of February 22, 1819, which went into force in 1821, and both explained by the protocol of January 12, 1877, provides that United States citizens shall be allowed free access to the proceedings in the cases, and shall be permitted “to be present at every examination that is held.”
The examining judge was not, could not be, ignorant of the provision of the law of criminal procedure, although he ignored the article of the treaty; and this is proved by the fact that, in ordering the examination of June 9, 1895, relating to another subject, he ended his writ with the following order: “And let the attorneys of the prisoners know it, in case they wish to be present at the proceeding, and for the purposes of the right granted them by the law.”
Now, in the examination of the handwriting of the document which is supposed to be a colonel’s commission signed by Sanguily, this same judge suppressed the summoning of the prisoner and his counsel, and took care to summon the prosecuting attorney alone; and the latter, the judge, the notary, and the experts alone being present, the experts took the oath in the form appearing in the minutes, and which is directed by article 474 of the law, and declared in the most solemn manner that they believed the handwriting to be Sanguily’s.
No one can doubt the nullity of such a proceeding. The law, both that of the nation and that of the treaty, appears to have been knowingly violated by the examining judge, and nothing resulting from such a proceeding can have any judicial force.
Nor has anythting been done to remedy the fault committed as “the same experts,” appointed by the prosecuting attorney for the oral trial—those already bound by the oath which they had taken—must necessarily repeat what they had said, under penalty of committing the crime of perjury. Hence, we hold that, for all legal purposes, the void proceedings in first instance are the same that are reproduced here without alteration; and, if they were instituted in the first instance without summoning the prisoner, and are, consequently, void, they continue to be so now; and it follows that the handwriting of the said document has not been recognized by anyone. The experts being the same in this superior court, and being bound by the oath which they took in the inferior court, the want of liberty under which they now labor to dissent from what they said before, renders the expert proceedings the same now as [Page 806] those which were instituted before; and if they are void in one of their stages they are necessarily void in the other.
To sum up, the experts first selected could not, according to their own voluntary statement, reproduce the text of the injured document; and the other experts have not recognized the handwriting in it; and, consequently, the evidence which the prosecuting attorney might have found in the said paper vanishes.
the letter to betancourt.
This must be considered separately, alone, without connection with any other document of evidence in the case, as all of them, General Calleja’s declarations and the paper found on Azcuy, have no existence in the proceedings, for the reasons given for their rejection. There is therefore no way of connecting this letter with any other document. It must therefore be taken at its own intrinsic value; it must be weighed by its precise words.
To what does it amount in its essence and meaning? Simply to an intention. According to the letter, Sanguily intends to place himself at the head of a “work of redemption,” which other people’s imagination may presume to be the insurrectionary movement. Even in that case the act does not pass beyond the domain of intention.
Is this punishable? No; not until it is followed up by actions.
A distinguished lawyer of our bar, having been consulted specially on the subject of this letter, expressed in his reply the same view as that which we have stated.
In view of the weight to which his opinion is entitled, we are happy to appropriate his remarks, which treat the question fully and fairly.
I give some extracts from his opinion: “What crime would have been committed if the letter had said, in so many words, ‘I need $2,500—not a cent less—to place myself at the head of the revolution, and I beg you to send me that sum, as I have no one else to apply to’? This is not the crime of rebellion, because Sanguily did not rise publicly and in open hostility against the Government (article 237). Nor does it appear that he induced Betancourt to revolt. It rather appears from the letter that Betancourt was interested in having Sanguily rebel, and that the latter attached a condition to it.
“It is true that others rose in rebellion; but, either because that condition was not fulfilled or because he did not wish to rebel, the fact is that on the 24th of February, at 7 a.m., Sanguily was sleeping quietly in his house when he was arrested by the police.
“There is no evidence that Sanguily was the person designated to head the rebellion; no doubt, as he was a leader in the ten years’ war, it might reasonably be thought that he would have been regarded in that light if he had rebelled.
“There is, therefore, on the part of Sanguily, so far as the letter is concerned, no consummated or prevented crime nor attempt at rebellion. The letter, even when taken in connection with other evidence, does not reveal any fixed and absolute intention of rebelling, as he attaches a specific condition to it, and as a mere intention it is not punishable.”
Carrara corroborates these views in the following language: “To find the attempt in the mere intention, however firmly resolved to do an injury without the actual commission of that injury, is the same thing as to punish the simple intention, taking the mere moral beginning as the basis of the political guilt.”
Pessina expresses the same views in the following words: “It is a universal principle in legislation and science that the criminal intent does not constitute a crime, but that it is necessary that an illegal overt act should appear.”
And Don Joaquin Francisco Pacheco, to conclude the citations, treats this point in the following manner:
“The thought of evil is what first presents itself—like a cloud darkening the serenity and purity of the mind. The wish, with its hesitations and doubts, follows; then comes the decision; then, perhaps, the participation or agreement with other persons; in some cases the threat follows; preliminary acts frequently come next; and, after all this, there may be beginnings of execution, suspended by the will of the criminals themselves; there may be abortive attempts; there may be, lastly, frustrated crimes; and all this without there having been real crimes.
“There may be in these thoughts, in these wishes, in these decisions all the moral, purely moral, evil that can be imagined, and Divine justice, before which all the depths of the intention are revealed, will doubtless weigh them and punish them with as much severity as if they had been converted into acts and completed the circle of their aims. But we have already seen, some lessons back, that neither the power nor the right of human justice goes so far; its nature limits it to correcting those evils which cause substantial, visible injury to society, and its means, which are powerless to scrutinize crimes of intention, prohibit it from passing that line and chain it within material limits. Its want of right and its want of power, therefore, evidently unite in this case to oppose to it a barrier which it is unable to overthrow.
[Page 807]“Human justice has not yet any hold on the person who has resolved to be a criminal. It may have it if, among the acts preliminary to the execution, there are any which have in themselves that character; hut if, in themselves, they are harmless, if the whole evil of their execution consists in the moral evil derived from the intent with which they are carried into execution, this fact in itself proves that they have not yet come under the jurisdiction of the powers of this world, and that they can not be punished by those who can not rise to the region of conscience. All that the authorities can and should do consists in watching those who show by their actions that they are possibly cherishing criminal designs. It is just that their conduct should be marked and investigated; but there is always a considerable interval between measures of police and those of criminal procedure, and one which can not be overstepped without legitimate grounds without the existence of an actual crime.”
I did not intend to speak of the letter which appears at folio 94 of the record, because, in reality, it is not of a nature to exercise any influence on the result of the trial; but it is mentioned by the prosecuting attorney, and this compels me to refer to a document which did not come into this case by the middle door, the legal channel. It has a spurious and repugnant origin. The person who presents it has informed us that he obtained it by committing an act, more than an abuse of confidence, an act of actual fraud. If I wished to use hard words concerning this base act of the police, I might say that the proceeding in the case of the letter might be characterized as taking possession of another person’s personal property without the use of force toward the article or of violence toward the person, under the stimulus of an ardent desire to gain reputation or credit, all which constitutes the definition of a crime given in the criminal code.
But I refrain from raising any objections on this point.
It appears that the person who obtained possession of the letter states candidly that, having learned that some furniture was for sale at Señor Portela’s works, he pretended to be a furniture dealer, went on the premises, and made that statement to the servant, Caridad, who has testified in this trial. He procured from her admission into the house, in company with another policeman, and the two secretly possessed themselves of some papers, among which, they say, there was a diary of Sanguily’s, from which fact the prosecuting attorney immediately assumes, gratuitously, that the fact that the letter belonged to the prisoner appears to be proved.
And I take the liberty of assuming that the whole thing is a mere invention of the police; and the assumption is probable, in view of the fact that the entrance into the house and the search were made in a manner positively forbidden by law.
Even if this were not the case, it would still appear that the letter was not found on Sanguily; that it is not shown that it was addressed to him; that the handwriting is not his; that it was seized in another person’s house, and in such an absolutely illegal manner that I have characterized the act as punishable under an article of the criminal code.
Besides, the letter says generally that it is greatly to be regretted that the revolutionists who were exerting themselves abroad could not count on the powerful aid of the anonymous person to whom the letter is addressed. The date of the document is September 8, 1893. In what way can this document prejudice Don Julio Sanguily f
There is another circumstance which, though trifling, is not without its relative importance in this case. It is assumed that the prisoner was the chief of the provinces of Habana, Matanzas, and Santa Clara, and Azcuy’s appointment appears to have been made for Pinar del Rio. How, then, could it be issued by the supposed chief of other provinces?
The fact is that the truth is brought out by all the deductions, great and small, that are attempted to be drawn from it. It is not true that Sanguily was the selected leader of the revolutionary movement which was about to take place, and, as this is the truth, there is no evidence, however insignificant it may be, that fails to corroborate that fact.
The jurisdiction of the court is great, omnipotent, so far as relates to the weighing the value of the facts proven. Neither the King nor the Cortes nor the supreme court has the right to interfere to modify what your excellency has declared to be a proven fact. But can such a fact never be the product of invention, of caprice, of intuition?
No, your excellency, such a proven fact, constituting guilt, does not arise in the mind of a magistrate by spontaneous generation; it is produced by external elements, and in this case the evidence, in all its parts, the documentary, that of the experts, and that of the witnesses, all combine to impress upon the mind of the court that the only fact really proved in this trial is the full and complete innocence of the prisoner, who has been wrongfully accused by the prosecuting ministry.
But it is said that a political principle is involved in this case. Does it follow that your excellency, in your character as a citizen, actuated by the purest patriotism, must look with involuntary abhorrence upon a prisoner to whom contrary views are [Page 808] attributed? It makes no difference, as he can not be convicted, consistently with the requirements of justice, upon vague and intangible suspicions excited by patriotism. The famous words, uttered on a day which was a sad one for justice, “I look for judges and I find only accusers,” can not be heard in an impartial court like this.
I care not for the assumption of the fact that Don Julio Sanguily is believed to be a sympathizer with revolutionary ideas. This has only a political bearing, not a judicial one. Your excellency has a loftier duty to perform. You do not know the prisoner; you are ignorant of his antecedents; you do not deduce proven facts from portions of his personal history; and you are trying this man by what appears from the evidence, acquitting or convicting him. And that evidence, as your excellency has seen, only refutes the assertions of the prosecuting attorney.
What remains for me to say in contradiction of what has been stated by the prosecuting attorney is of secondary importance. There remain only confused and disjointed fragments of the primary charges. The apparent reality created by the argument of the prosecution has disappeared. There are no convicting charges. There remain the secondary charges, which I proceed to refute rapidly and briefly.
The pawned revolver and machete: If they were pawned before the 24th of February it tends to prove that the intention of rebelling on that day had not entered Sanguily’s mind.
The prosecuting attorney said that he did not think that the counsel for the defense would resort to the expedient, which he characterizes as vulgar, of finding fault with the employment in this trial of the preliminary proceedings. In this instance the public ministry is right. If the counsel for the defense wished to raise difficulties unworthy of the solemnity of this trial—for a controversy in which one party demands the unconditional acquittal of the prisoner and the other asks that the penalty of imprisonment for life be imposed upon him is always solemn—he would say what is the indisputable truth, to wit, that the preliminary proceedings are void from the first to the last line because the treaty of 1795 with the United States, still in force, prohibits in its seventh article all secret preliminary proceedings.
On the other hand, if the prosecution modified its position and, having been defeated on the untenable point of the rebellion, persisted in that of the conspiracy, it would still be in the wrong, because a conspiracy requires the agreement of wills for the commission of a crime and the determination to commit it; and from the evidence in this case there appears only the vague expression of a wish, an Isolated and conditional intention at the most. I have already spoken at length on this point in discussing the letter supposed to be addressed to Betancourt, which letter, by the way, both Sanguily and Betancourt disown.
The prosecuting attorney does not regard the alternative form employed by the defense in its inferences as consistent with legal procedure. Without entering into a useless discussion on the subject, the counsel for the defense insists that the law does not authorize the mode of prosecution employed; and even if this were not the case, pardons have a general and obligatory character and can not be waived. The ingrates who repudiate them receive the same benefit from them as those persons who gratefully accept them.
It is, in my opinion, indisputable that General Calleja’s proclamation applies to the case of Don Julio Sanguily. As the criminal law is always construed in favor of the prisoner, as in the high state of our civilization and according to the present views of justice, not the justice of the inquisitional epoch, nor that of the council of ten, it is not permissible to say to the prisoner, “As I imprisoned you before you committed the crime, I pardon the principals, but I except you. I condemn you as guilty of the attempt, although I pardoned those who consummated the crime.”
And, lastly, all doubt on this point is removed if we consider, as a practical example, what occurred in the case of Betancourt. He was not a rebel who had risen; he was a mere conspirator. He hid himself on the 24th of February. This is stated by the district government of Matanzas and by the chief of police in this city. Now, this head of a conspiracy, this conspirator who did not rebel, who hid himself at the time when the revolutionary movement broke out, sent an agent to the governor of Matanzas as soon as the amnesty was proclaimed, and asked him whether the said amnesty included him; and the governor, after consultation with his excellency the Governor-General, decided that it did include him. A passport was consequently issued to Betancourt, enabling him to take his passage freely for the Peninsula. All this is fully proved in the case. Sanguily’s case is identical with that of Betancourt.
All the charges of the prosecution having now been refuted, I cherish the full conviction that there is not a single proof on which to base the prisoner’s guilt. And this being true, and there being nothing upon which to base the supposed guilt of the prisoner, I rise, in the name of justice and the law, to ask the court to be pleased, first, to render a judgment of acquittal; and, secondly, to order my client’s immediate release.
Sanguily’s Case.
remarks of the counsel for the defense.
The argument of the Government attorney having been made, the presiding Judge told the counsel for the defense that he was at liberty to speak. Don Miguel Viondi, the distinguished lawyer, began by saying that the defense of Don Julio Sanguily was an easy matter. I should have been glad, said he, if my client could have been defended by some great legal light, but the task is so easy that a lawyer of moderate abilities may undertake it without hesitation.
He added that he hoped to prevent the act of his client from being characterized in the sentence as an act which had been proved and which constituted a crime. The charge made by the Government attorney seemed, he said, like a romance, which could only acquire force and dimensions in the fertile soil of the imagination.
He expressed his astonishment that the Government attorney had not modified his argument in such a way as to ask for the discharge of the prisoner. That argument, he said, was full of exaggeration. He attributed this fact to the moral pressure exercised on the mind by ideas under whose influence certain views are accepted as true, which, in point of fact, are but the illusions of a disordered brain.
Passion, which is a bad adviser, especially in judicial proceedings, is, in political cases, necessarily derived from preconceived ideas, and when such views, as is now the case, are wholly at variance with those of the person who is on trial, the latter has to face a multitude of prejudices, and the Government attorney, who should be the impassive representative of the law, unwittingly yields to his feelings.
The feeling of the counsel for the defense is different, and the proceeding of which he must avail himself is different. To the vague assertions of the Government attorney he will oppose his own, which are positive and decided, and to each one of them he will add an indisputable fact.
Your honor will now see that the Government attorney has no ground to stand on, while the counsel for the defense will, by his irresistible arguments, carry the court with him and secure its unanimous vote, and that without any fawning or flattery, but by the justice of his cause alone.
The counsel for the defense further said that he intended completely to demolish the arguments of the Government attorney and to secure an acquittal from the court. He developed this view in various aspects.
The first proposition, said the learned counsel, which I am going to submit to the court for examination and to which I should have been glad if the Government attorney had paid some attention, because, notwithstanding his audacity—
(The presiding judge here called the counsel for the defense to order.)
In this case, your honor, there has been neither a public trial nor a prisoner. On the occasion of the last session the court should have observed that there was no prisoner here.
Counsel then stated that proceedings were begun by the military authorities; that the United States consul requested those authorities not to continue the trial, and that the Governor-General, in compliance with that request, had the proceedings transferred to the civil authorities. There Was no doubt, and no discussion.
Citizens of the United States can not be tried by the military courts of Spain, unless they are taken with arms in their hands.
He then read the warrants for the provisional arrest of Mr. Sanguily and the protest of the United States consul, based upon the fact that no citizen of that country, residing in Spain or the Spanish possessions, and charged with the crime of rebellion against the integrity of the territory or other similar acts, can be tried by a special court, but that he must be tried by the ordinary courts, unless taken with arms in his hands, so that, in pursuance of the instructions of his Government, the United States consul had most solemnly protested against all action by the military authorities in trying the case of Sanguily.
The protest was accepted by the General Government. The warrant of the judge who conducted the preliminary examination can not be valid, because in default of other grounds he bases the warrant for the prisoner’s arrest on the information transmitted to him by the military court.
I consider that this is the way in which international conflicts are created.
He next spoke of the case of a citizen of the United States in Madagascar, whom the French considered as a spy. In this connection he developed various theories of international law, and added that this case might occasion a conflict in which our nation would not get the best of it [excitement].
Everything has been done in this case on the ground of a mere charge which has not been confirmed. On no other basis than this a warrant is issued and my client is arrested and refused even the right to furnish bail. In the meantime his crime, [Page 810] which is supposed to be of immense importance, is, in point of fact, a very insignificant matter.
This trial is based upon a false foundation, or rather, it has no foundation at all.
But, even admitting that the case is as stated by the Government attorney and accepting his views as my own, still no punishable case has been made out. This I propose to show so clearly and in such a way that the court will have no doubt, and even the Government attorney will, I think, in his inmost soul, think just as I do.
If, after what I am going to say, a single word of the Government attorney remains undemolished, I will accept a condemnatory sentence for my client.
The first assertion of the Government attorney was based upon false elements. The Government attorney accepted them because they came from a high source, and he thought that that source was infallible. Such an element, however, is of no value in this case.
I do not see how a charge can be sustained when it may cause a person to be imprisoned for life, unless, indeed, it has perfectly overwhelming evidence to support it.
(At this point the presiding judge inquired of the learned counsel whether he still bad much to say, and on receiving an affirmative reply, adjourned the court until 12 o’clock at noon yesterday.)
The court was opened yesterday at half past 12 and Mr. Viondi continued his able argument, a summary of which we give below.
I propose, said he, wholly to demolish every assertion contained in the argument of the Government attorney, and, when I have done so, I shall have a right to hope that your honor will not consider that my client has been proved to be guilty of any crime.
My work must necessarily be analytical, long, and tiresome, and I consequently need all the attention of the court, proposing, with the tacit approval even of the Government attorney, to demonstrate the fact that his argument is erroneous, fanciful, and groundless.
I shall begin by repeating to your honor the argument of the Government attorney, with a view to demolishing it point by point:
Mr. Sanguily, an American citizen born in the Island of Cuba, was, up to February 24 of the present year, one of the most active abettors of the insurrection, and was designated to be the leader of the insurrectionary movement in this province and in those of Matanzas and Santa Clara, in futherance of which object he issued, as the leader and principal chief of that movement and as a delegate of the Revolutionary Junta in New York, such appointments as he thought proper, among them the appointment of Don José Inocencio Azcuy as a colonel in the insurgent army. I am going to divide this assertion into four parts:
- 1.
- Until February 24, the day when he was arrested, he was one of the most active abettors of the insurrection.
- 2.
- He was designated to lead the insurrectionary movement in this province, and in those of Matanzas and Santa Clara.
- 3.
- As the leader and principal chief, and as the delegate of the Revolutionary Junta in New York, he made such appointments as he thought proper.
- 4.
- Among these was the appointment of Don José Inocencio Azcuy as colonel.
If this assertion could be proved, the prosecution would be entirely right and the efforts of the defense in this case would be of little avail. On the other hand, if the source from which this assertion has been taken is vitiated, if, in the analysis which I shall make of that source, I reveal a series of inaccuracies of which there is abundant proof; if it shall appear that there is no basis whatever for the argument of the Government attorney, the entire edifice which he has raised falls to the ground.
The Government attorney read a document yesterday which he quoted in his argument and which document is the following: (Counsel here read General Calleja’s official statement, which is already known to our readers.)
Here an authority speaks, a high functionary, and for all legal effects that functionary exists as long as the charge exists of which he is a mere agent.
The Government attorney had not asked General Calleja’s ratification, but it is a positive fact that the Governor-General was the person who made that declaration and it is important to know and to consider who made those revelations to him. Well, their origin deprives them of all validity.
The chief of police has stated, and he ratified that statement yesterday, that he had no information except public report. So that if that is his only authority, the argument of the Government attorney is reduced to a literal copy of General Calleja’s declaration, which was simply an echo of the information, based upon mere rumor, that was furnished by the police.
The words Habana, Matanzas, and Santa Clara are not found save in General Calleja’s declaration. There is nothing else to attest their genuineness, and I propose to prove that those words have no foundation whatever.
The examining judge, who held the preliminary examination when the military [Page 811] authorities no longer had anything to do with the case, thought, very properly, that that declaration of General Calleja was not valid, it having been made in a proceeding which was null and void; he desired that the general should ratify the proceedings, and to that end issued an order requesting the Captain-General to state whether he had received any subsequent information confirming his statements.
He was told in reply that there was no information in the Captain-General’s office, bearing date of August 10, of the present year, and signed by Captain-General Martinez Campos. The judge then addressed a communication to the Governor-General and was told that the desired information did not exist in that magistrate’s office either.
Now, your honor, it appears that a declaration is on file, but that the statements which it contains can not be confirmed; that the police base their belief simply on public report; and it next appears that the examining judge addressed the Captain-General and the Governor-General, soliciting the information which had been promised, and that he was told in reply that that information was to be found neither in the office of the Captain-General nor in that of the Governor-General. To what, therefore, does the assertion of the governor attorney amount, since it is a mere copy of the declaration made by General Calleja, which has in nowise been proved? And if all its statements are demolished, what value has the argument of the Government attorney?
I might have raised an objection in that which refers to General Calleja, but this might have originated a certain degree of doubt, and it has seemed preferable to me, in conducting this defense, to oppose to General Calleja’s assertions those of one who is as great a man as he is, and who represents at least as much as he does; I mean Gen. Martinez Campos. This is no dispute between the humble lawyer like myself and the distinguished Government attorney; the issue lies between General Calleja and Gen. Martinez Campos. The latter general stands before the former with the importance, not of his position, but of his person and his history, which are admired both in Spain and in other countries.
The Government attorney then says, referring to Sanguily, that, as the leader and principal chief of the movement and as a delegate of the junta in New York, he made such appointments as he thought proper, among them that of Don José Inocencio Azcuy as an insurgent colonel.
Observe, your honor, in the first place, that even if this story about the appointment of Azcuy were true, it would not have the importance which is sought to be attributed to it, those assertions being demolished.
It is not the same thing when a person having authority makes such appointments, and when another, who has no authority, does it from caprice. The importance of the fact would lie in Sanguily’s really having been a delegate of the Revolutionary Junta. But if this were not the case, if it should appear (I am speaking hypothetically) that Sanguily had made that appointment on his own responsibility, just as if I, in a fit of insanity caused by a troublesome situation, should appoint colonels in my mere capacity as a lawyer, what importance would this have? It would be a stillborn child, and could have no effect whatever.
The Government attorney, perhaps owing to his excessive fluency of expression, has exaggerated the crime with which he charges Sanguily by putting it in the plural, since he speaks of appointments, when there is but one appointment in the case, and this is nothing but a paper the writing on which can not be deciphered.
How does the Government attorney know that that unintelligible paper is the appointment of a colonel? He must have found it out by divination, since there is no record and no elements sufficient to authorize him to assert it.
The Government attorney has told us (and I believe it) that he who has special knowledge as a reader of documents has most carefully studied the fragment of the letter in possession of the court, and that he has deciphered its contents. He will not, however, be offended if nobody believes him on his word; and if every one, especially the court, declines to recognize him as possessing any authority in this matter, although he has such high authority as the representative of the Government, who is probably soon to be appointed to a magistracy, nor will he be offended if great importance is attached to the authority of the experts who are acting in an official capacity; that is to say, to those gentlemen who have declared, and ratified their declaration, that the document is absolutely undecipherable. If that document, then, had been issued by Sanguily, it would have had no authority, having been issued by a private individual, and even then there is nothing to show, nor is there any ground to assert that it was issued by Mr. Sanguily, since two of the experts disagree entirely with the conclusions of the Government attorney.
But the Government attorney will say: “Azcuy affirms it.” And I say: “Sanguily denies it.” And as we have before had to deal with the opposing opinions of Calleja and Martinez Campos, so we now have the opposite assertions of the Government attorney and of the experts.
It is to be observed that, in that document, there appears a P, which can not be [Page 812] explained, by the side of Sanguily’s signature. Azcuy states, moreover, that that document was given to him by a nephew of his, who had received it from the Revolutionary Junta. The court will please consider that Mr. Sanguily, who was in Habana, could not have issued that document.
But Azcuy says, in his statement, something that deprives that document of any importance. A Mr. Collazo, who is an influential member of the New York Junta, said when Azcuy presented himself with the document, that he did not recognize him as having any authority, because such military grades were earned in war.
That paper, therefore, has no significance whatever. Even if it were intelligible, it would be of no importance, since its importance would depend upon the authority of the person who issued it; as it is, it is nothing but a piece of paper without any meaning whatever. That document, moreover, is written in a hand which is not Sanguily’s, nor has it been recognized as such, since Mr. Biosca, the expert, who declared that it was the same as that of the other letters written by Sanguily which are in possession of the court, had no right to make a statement before the civil authorities, since he was bound by the oath which he had made be ore the military authorities. I can not understand how the Government attorney has introduced that expert here, since he necessarily, and even under penalty of being prosecuted for perjury, had to repeat what he had stated before the military authorities.
The experts, moreover, were not summoned according to law. In the treaty concluded by Spain with the United States, which was signed in 1795, ratified in 1819, and definitely confirmed in 1821, as likewise in the protocol of 1877, it is provided that persons of both nations who are under prosecution shall be permitted, with entire reciprocity, to employ lawyers and attorneys in whom they have confidence, and that they may cause them to take part in any business that they may think proper, any secrecy in the preliminary examination being prohibited.
This course was pursued when experts were summoned to examine the letter addressed by Mr. Sanguily to Dr. Betancourt. The attorneys of the parties were then summoned, but when it was sought to compare the handwriting of that letter with that of the so-called appointment as colonel and to amplify, at the same time, the investigation concerning Messrs. Sanguily and Azcuy the Government attorney alone was present, the attorneys of the accused parties not having been summoned, so that Mr. Sanguily was deprived of the guaranties of the treaty of 1795.
The proceedings of yesterday are, as regards their legal effects, null and void, and it may consequently be asserted that neither the document in question was issued by Don Julio Sanguily, nor has it since been elicited, nor the handwriting recognized.
Now, if this is so, what remains of the argument of the Government attorney? I divided it into four propositions; some are contradicted by the Governor-General, and the others are entirely demolished in the analysis which I have made of the facts. I therefore have a right to say that no legal charge has been formulated here against Don Julio Sanguily.
The learned counsel then said that he had not thought of referring to the anonymous letter in possession of the court, in which Sanguily is urged to direct the revolutionary movement, because that letter did not properly come into the possession of the court. It was apparently taken from a closet in which Mr. Sanguily kept some of his effects on the estate Portella. The person who took it did so against the will of its owner. That person was a policeman, who at the same time took what is said to be a diary kept by Sanguily, and, as the proceeding was a repulsive one, and moreover as nothing shows that that letter was not written by the policeman himself, counsel did not think that the court should pay any attention to such a document, the manner in which it was obtained being inadmissible and repugnant to every feeling of propriety.
But, at all events, as in that letter Sanguily is urged to lend his support to the revolution, the letter becomes evidence that Sanguily had nothing to do with the movement.
Let us now take up a highly important subject; and I will begin by admitting to the court that I propose to refer to the only document that has given rise to any doubt. I mean the letter Written to Betancourt. But does that letter to Betancourt say anything? There is something vague and confused that might be converted into a charge against Sanguily; but when all the previous arguments of the prosecution are reduced to zero, how should that letter be considered? It should be considered as alone and isolated, without connection of any kind.
(Counsel here read the last lines of the letter, which are as follows: “Cervantes did not eat any supper when he had finished Don Quixote, and I, being about to place myself at the head of a work of redemption, have not the means to send my cook to market.”)
The Government attorney understands that that work of redemption is the revolutionary movement. Well, I will accept that as a hypothesis, protesting, however, against any such interpretation. But even thus, that reveals nothing but the intent [Page 813] to commit an act. And where and when do his intentions subject a man to punishment? An intention is punishable only when it is carried out; only then can it furnish ground for repression; but the most frightful and guilty projects escape punishment so long as they do not go beyond the recesses of one’s mind.
When that letter was written—that is to say, on the 9th of February, 1895—the utmost that could be supposed was that Sanguily was thinking of placing himself at the head of a movement, no one knowing what is the exact meaning that is to be attributed to that expression “at the head.” But if the facts have deprived the intention which the writer of the letter may have had of any force, why does the Government attorney consider it as a charge?
Any doubt that I may have had on the subject has been dispelled not only by the writings of the ablest lawyers, but by the opinion of a distinguished legal gentleman of this bar, who is respected by everyone.
(He here read an opinion of that gentleman, whose name is not given, in which it is stated that if Sanguily had, for instance, asked for $2,500 to enable him to place himself at the head of the revolution, he would not have committed the crime of rebellion, because he laid down conditions to someone who desired him to take up arms, and confined himself to expressing an intention which was subject to determinate conditions.)
The learned counsel, however, quoted from Carrara, Pessina, and Pacheco, with a view to showing that intentions are not punishable; that they escape human punishment, and are punished in spiritual relations only. He then said that, even though all the proofs that had been demolished were still conclusive, we should then have nothing more than an intention to deal with.
The proceedings were adjourned at half past 2, owing to the fatigue of the learned counsel. They were shortly afterwards resumed, when he continued his argument. The documentary evidence and the evidence of experts being now at an end, and the evidence of the witnesses having been treated at considerable length, I propose, said he, to speak of another witness, viz, Don Ramón Sanchez, the owner of the pawn shop.
According to the statement of the Government attorney, Mr. Sanguily was regarded as the leader of the revolutionists who were to rise in Habana, Matanzas, and Santa Clara. It has been said that in this rather extensive circle of authority, but only within it, could he make appointments, and nevertheless this contradiction arises. A Mr. Azcuy, who says that he had received an appointment as colonel, signed by Sanguily, does not figure in any of those provinces but in that of Pinar del Rio. Observe the evident contradiction. By what authority was Mr. Sanguily, a leader in Habana, Matanzas, and Santa Clara, to authorize appointments in Pinar del Rio? The truth is that, as Don Julio Sanguily was not a revolutionary leader anywhere, that document, which at first seemed to be overwhelming, turns out to be in Sanguily’s favor. There are no witnesses here from Habana or Santa Clara, but those from Matanzas have positively and categorically said that they recognized Mr. Betancourt as their leader, and that the band was led by Coloma, who yesterday made a statement to the same effect. To this argument, therefore, the other is added.
Mr. Viondi then indulged in a lofty flight concerning the omnipotence of the court to declare the facts proved, saying that, in a monarchical government, not even Parliament has so much authority; but that this very fact imposes an immense responsibility upon the court in rendering its decisions.
In this case, a proved fact can not be deduced either from the documentary evidence nor from that of the experts and the witnesses.
What is a political cause? Is there anyone here or in a foreign country who will dare to formulate any charge against your honor? Prominent men are always exposed to be both praised and criticised. Your honor, as a man of the purest and most genuine patriotism, must feel repugnance at seeing an accused person to whom views are attributed which he does not entertain. No matter, your honor does not come here to discharge any function other than an impartial inquiry into the facts. A condemnatory sentence can not be pronounced in the name of patriotism. No, your honor, no; those words which were uttered before a revolutionary tribunal, “I ask for judges and find nothing but accusers,” have been banished by modern civilization from our judicial proceedings. What matters it that Don Julio Sanguily may have been suspected as a sympathizer with the revolution? This is considered in the political order of things, but your honor has a higher duty to perform. You do not know the prisoner, you are ignorant of his antecedents; you judge the man here for that which he is, and confine yourself to his penal history, the evidence of which is on file in this court.
Proved facts do not grow out of a sudden inspiration; they have their root in the inner conscience, and no one can dare to penetrate the inner conscience of the court; but they do not arise as a spontaneous production, they are formed of external elements [Page 814] which combine and give rise to conviction. And if from all these proceedings not even a remote fact is obtained, if those elements do not exist, whence is the proved fact to arise?
I hope your honor will consider the statement made by the owner of the pawn shop, who says that Sanguily pawned a revolver and a machete at his place; but that the month of February came, and that Sanguily had not redeemed that revolver and that machete. Your honor is aware that Sanguily’s pecuniary situation was not brilliant, and it was very natural that when he was able to purchase what he needed for a small outlay, he should not make a larger one. I understand, therefore, that the statement of the owner of the pawn shop is a confirmation of the fact that Mr. Sanguily did not think of taking any part in the revolutionary movement.
The Government attorney also said, although I will not stop long on this point, that he supposed that the counsel for the defense would censure the proceedings had at the preliminary examination. Since I who am convinced that these public trials are composed of everything, of the air which is breathed, of the paleness of the prisoner, of the most trifling details, I shall not disdain the elements furnished by the preliminary examination.
If I desired to create incidents not in harmony with the majesty of these proceedings (since a trial in which one party demands the acquittal of the prisoner, and the other demands his imprisonment for life, is always solemn) I should say that the preliminary examination was null and void from its first to its last line, because the treaty of 1795 with the United States prohibits any secret examination, and that clause was here violated. A Spanish citizen can not be prevented in the United States from taking part in all the proceedings of an examination, for if he should be, it would be a violation of law. Here, however, important proceedings have been held, in which my client has not been allowed to take part; there has been a secret examination.
But the Government attorney might say: It is true that there is no rebellion; it is true that those documents furnish no proof of the existence of one; yet the conspiracy remains.
It might be and would be punishable, but a conspiracy requires two elements—a concert of purpose and the intention to commit the act.
A conspiracy, according to the code, exists only when two or more persons arrange to commit a crime and resolve to carry out their purpose. In the letter attributed to Betancourt there is nothing but the vague expression of a desire; there is nothing but an intention. Sanguily, moreover, denies the genuineness of the document, and Betancourt, under oath and with all legal formalities, denies it before the United States consul, saying that the letter is spurious.
Passing on to another point, I must express the surprise which I felt when I heard that the Government attorney had said that this defense had not been conducted on correct lines because I had made an alternative request. If his client should not be acquitted, counsel had asked that he might be pardoned on the ground that he was included in the proclamation of February 27. The law does not prohibit the course which I have pursued, and I have based my action upon the provisions of the law.
I should be glad, however, if the Government attorney were right even for this once, viz, in saying that my request for a pardon could not be made in the improper form in which he alleges that I made it. But it is the same thing. A pardon has a general obligatory character and can not be renounced. It embraces him who is grateful for it, and favors the ingrate who feels no gratitude.
I say that the pardon, by its terms, embraces Don Julio Sanguily, even if he should be condemned. Does it favor the prisoner? Well, it embraces him. Was it extended on account of acts committed at the time when he was arrested? Yes. The justice of to-day is not that of the Council of Ten of Venice. Justice favors the prisoner, and the judicial code of this age of the world is not that of the Inquisition.
No one can say: “I keep you in prison; I pardon those who committed what you intended to commit, and I keep you in confinement.” No, the law is not now interpreted in that way; the law favors the prisoner so far as is compatible with justice, being based upon the humanitarian principles of Christianity.
But if this were not sufficient, there is a practical fact in this case. I refer to the case of Dr. Betancourt. He is not a rebel; he was a conspirator, the leader of those who rose in Matanzas. But the movement was inaugurated on the 24th of February; Betancourt took no part therein and hid himself; the pardon of February 24 was published, and Betancourt, who had committed no act of rebellion, who had not risen in arms, who was in the game situation in which the police think Sanguily is, asked the authorities of Matanzas whether he was embraced in the pardon. As those authorities could not decide the question, they referred it to General Calleja, who, in reply, said, “Yes;” and Betancourt was pardoned and received a passport for the Peninsula.
Betancourt’s case was therefore identical with that of Sanguily’s, and the pardon extended to Betancourt should necessarily be granted to Sanguily.
[Page 815]It seems to me that, inasmuch as I have demolished all the charges made by the Government attorney, I have a right to the conviction that there is not a single fact on which the guilt of the accused can he based. This being so, your honor, and as there is no cause on which a charge of guilt can be based, since all the theories of the Government attorney have been overturned, I think that in the name of justice and of the law I may ask your honor, in the first place, to acquit my client, and, in the second place, to order his release.
When Mr. Viondi had finished has argument, Sanguily was asked by the presiding judge whether he had any statement to make to the court, and, as he said that he had none, the proceedings were declared closed, in order that sentence might be pronounced.
erratum.
In our edition of yesterday morning, in the report of the statement made in his examination by Don José Inocencio Azcuy, which was read by the clerk at the request of both parties, an error occurred, which we hasten to correct.
Where it says that Enrique Collazo confirmed the appointment as colonel, it should say that he did not confirm it.
Sanguily’s Case.
the sentence.
Yesterday, at twenty minutes past 4 in the afternoon, the third section of the criminal court of this audiencia having met, the sentence of that court in the case of Don Julio Sanguily for the crime of rebellion was read by his honor Don José Pulido y Arroyo. The text of his sentence is as follows:
“In the city of Habana, on the 2d of December, 1895, the case, which had previously been before the examining judge, having been tried in public before the third section of the criminal court, one of the parties thereto being the Government attorney and the other the attorney Don Luis Plutarco Valdés, under the direction of Don Miguel Francisco Viondi, acting in behalf of and representing Don Julio Sanguily y Garit, a native and resident of this capital, an American citizen, 44 years of age, married, son of Don Julio and Doña Maria, of the mercantile profession, a man of education, without penal antecedents, arrested and placed on trial for rebellion, in which case the proper legal customs have been observed.”
The sentence was read by Don José Pulido, the presiding judge of this court.
- 1.
- Whereas, in the proceedings instituted by the military authorities for the crime of rebellion against Don Eladio Larranaga, Don Julio Sanguily, Don Jose Maria Aguirre, and others, it was ordered that testimony should be taken concerning everything relating to the aforesaid Sanguily and Aguirre, in order that it might be turned over to the civil authorities, for the reason that, according to the protocol of January 12, 1877, those authorities were the ones competent to take cognizance thereof, the prisoners being citizens of the United States; and the said testimony having been sent to the senior judge, he in turn transmitted it to the examining justice of the district of El Cerro, who proceeded to examine the case;
- 2.
- Whereas it is proved that Don Julio y Garit, whose affiliations were with the separatist party, in which he enjoyed influence and prestige owing to the services which he had rendered to the rebel cause in the insurrection which ended in 1878, sustained relations with persons residing in this island and abroad, for the purpose of organizing an uprising to secure independence, and was one of the abettors and leaders of that uprising;
- 3.
- Whereas it is proved that Don Antonio Lopez Coloma, a resident of the jurisdiction of Matanzas, came to this capital on the 21st of February for the purpose of receiving orders and instructions from Don Julio Sanguily, and of agreeing whether the cry of “Hurrah for independence!” was to be raised or not, they agreeing that the uprising should take place on the 24th, as it did take place, various bands rising in arms in open hostility to the Government, with a view to proclaiming the independence of this island, Lopez Coloma being in one of those bands, and the said Coloma having been taken by the forces of the army, and several weapons and various documents having, been taken from his person, among them a letter written by Don Julio Sanguily, dated February 9, and addressed to Mr. Betancourt, who was also concerned in the uprising, in which letter Sanguily, after lamenting his lack of means, and saying that he was so poor that he was unable to take the field and redeem a machete and a revolver which he had in pawn, urges Betancourt to get for him as soon as possible the $2,500 which he had promised him, adding that he had no head to think about anything that was of interest to him, and concludes by saying that while on the point of placing himself at the head of a work of redemption he had not even the means to send his cook to market;
- 4.
- Whereas it is proved that at the time when the letter in question was written Sanguily had in pawn, in the pawnshop known as La Equitati a, a machete and a revolver which were afterwards sold after his arrest, by his order;
- 5.
- Whereas it is proved that Don Julio Sanguily was arrested in the house where he resided in this capital, at an early hour of the morning of February 24, viz, the same day on which the uprising took place;
- 6.
- Whereas it is proved that when Don Jose Inocencio Azcuy arrived in this port from Tampa he was arrested by an inspector of police, who took from him a document which he had hidden in his cravat, and that when the aforesaid Azcuy saw that he was discovered he snatched a part of said document out of the hands of the inspector and put it in his mouth for the purpose of destroying it, and that the inspector compelled him by force to spit out the pieces, and that the said document was written and signed by Don Julio Sanguily, and contained an appointment as colonel in the insurgent army, with power to organize troops and to make appointments;
- 7.
- Whereas when the order to end the preliminary examination was confirmed, the previous session was held, and, in accordance with the request therein made by the Government attorney, an order was issued to quash the proceedings provisionally, one-half of the costs to be paid by Don José Maria Aguirre, and the public trial of Don Julio Sanguily was commenced;
- 8.
- Whereas the papers having been delivered to the Government attorney, that officer made an argument characterizing the acts as those of rebellion, provided for in article 237, No. 1, and punished in 238 of the penal code, and asked that Don Julio Sanguily y Garit should be sentenced as guilty of the aforesaid crime to imprisonment for life, with the accessory penalties of article 33 of the code, and to the payment of one-half of the costs;
- 9.
- Whereas the counsel for the defense, in his turn, asked for the acquittal of the prisoner on the ground that there was no legal reason to suppose that his client had committed the acts attributed to him, and proposed as an alternative that his client should be pardoned on the ground that he was included in the proclamation published on the 27th day of February;
- 10.
- Whereas, the proofs offered by the Government attorney and the prisoner’s counsel having been accepted, a day was appointed for holding the public trial, on which occasion they reiterated their previous arguments;
- 11.
- Whereas, according to article 8 of the civil code and article 41 of the law concerning foreigners, the penal laws are binding; upon all persons living in Spanish territory, and as, consequently, the provisions of the penal code are applicable to Don Julio Sanguily y Garit, since his American citizenship gives him only the rights granted by the protocol of January 12, 1877, which rights have been recognized;
- 12.
- Whereas, according to article 237, No. 1, of the penal code, persons who publicly rise in arms in open hostility to the Government in order to proclaim the independence of Cuba and Puerto Rico, or of either of them, are guilty of the crime of rebellion;
- 13.
- Whereas the acts declared to have been proved in the third “whereas” constitute the consummated crime defined in the twelfth “whereas,” since the object and purpose of the rising which took place on the 24th of February is to secure the independence of this island;
- 14.
- Whereas, according to article 238 of the same code, persons who induce others to become rebels by promoting or sustaining the rebellion, and the principal leaders thereof, are to be punished by imprisonment for life;
- 15.
- Whereas the facts declared to have been proved in the second, third, fourth, and fifth “whereases,” conclusively show that Don Julio Sanguily y Garit was guilty, through direct participation of the crime defined in the thirteenth “whereas,” and has rendered himself subject to the penalty provided for in the fourteenth, because not only was he one of the promoters of the rebellion but was also one of its leaders or principal chiefs, as has been shown to the satisfaction of the court, not only by the data in possession of the court and by the evidence taken at the public trial, but also by an examination and comparison of the documents connected with the third and sixth “whereases,” in the undoubted handwriting of the prisoner (which examination it performed in fulfillment of the duty made obligatory upon it by article 726 of the law governing criminal trials), and, moreover, by the context of the letter addressed to Betancourt fifteen days before the uprising took place, and by the context of the document taken from Azcuy, inasmuch as appointments of that importance can be made only by the directors or principal leaders of the rebellion;
- 16.
- Whereas the fact that Don Julio Sanguily was arrested on the morning of the very day on which the uprising took place does not authorize the court to consider him as guilty merely of a frustrated crime or attempt to commit rebellion, because from the letter and spirit of article 338 it is to be inferred that promoters of the rebellion are liable to the penalty therein provided, even though they are not at the head of any rebel bands or actually sustaining the rebellion, it being sufficient that they have promoted it, and because, it having been satisfactorily shown that Don [Page 817] Julio Sanguily was one of the principal leaders, it appears that he is certainly included in said article;
- 17.
- Whereas leaving out of consideration the fact that the alternative request made by the prisoner’s counsel should have been made as an article of “previo pronunciamiento,” in which case alone it could have been reproduced at the public trial, according to articles 666 and 678 of the law governing criminal trials, it is certain that the granting of that pardon does not come within the competency of this court, and that, on the hypothesis that the prisoner (although he was arrested three days before the publication of the Captain-General’s proclamation) was entitled to it, the granting of that pardon is wholly foreign to the existence of the crime of rebellion and may become a special case by itself, because, until its application, a crime exists which is punished by the code, and there are no subsequent legal circumstances that prevent its punishment, as was declared by the supreme court in its decision of July 16, 1873;
- 18.
- Whereas neither the Government attorney nor the counsel for the defense have pointed out any extenuating circumstances, and as none are to be deduced from the facts declared to have been proved, and as it is therefore proper to enforce the mildest penalty provided for the crime, viz, imprisonment for life;
- 19.
- Whereas there is no reason to enforce civil responsibility, and as the costs are understood to be required by law from those who are guilty of any crime:
Now, therefore, in view of the articles of the penal code which have already been quoted and also of articles 1, 11, 12, 26, 53, 62, 79, 89, and 741 of the law governing criminal trials, we pronounce sentence to the effect that it is our duty to condemn, and we hereby do condemn, Don Julio Sanguily to imprisonment for life, with the accessories of being deprived of his civil rights and being subjected to the vigilance of the authorities during his lifetime; and in case the principal penalty be remitted we condemn him to absolute deprivation of his civil rights and to subjection to the vigilance of the authorities during his lifetime unless these penalties shall be remitted in the pardon; and we further condemn him to the payment of one-half of the costs of the preliminary examination and to that of all those which have grown out of this case since the public trial was begun; and in view of the incident of seizure of property we declare Don Julio Sanguily to be insolvent for the purposes of this case. Thus by this our sentence we do pronounce, order, and sign.
- José Pulido.
- Francisco Pampillón.
- Vicente Pardo Bonanza.
- Adolfo Astudillo de Guzmán.
- Rafael Maydagán.
The foregoing sentence was read and proclaimed by his honor the presiding judge of this court, Don José Pulido y Arroyo, in public session held this day; to which I certify.
Acting Clerk of Court.