After disbarring Alexander and Smith, Chief Justice De Lancey had appointed attorney John Chambers to represent Zenger. Chambers was an able lawyer, but he didn’t care to become a martyr. In behalf of Zenger he entered a plea of not guilty. Attorney General Bradley opened for the Crown, accusing the printer of publishing newspaper items that were “false, scandalous and seditious.” Chambers countered weakly.
At this point an impressive, handsome, bewigged man arose from his seat among the spectators and said to the chief justice, “May it please your honor, I am concerned in this cause on the part of Mr. Zenger, the defendant.” He identified himself as Andrew Hamilton.
Andrew Hamilton? He was the most famous lawyer in all America! Born in Scotland, he had emigrated to this country, had settled in Philadelphia, and had become first attorney general of Pennsylvania and then speaker of that colony’s assembly. Hamilton was as renowned for his polished manners as for his ice-cold logic. Now the governor’s henchmen and benchmen realized they had a fight on their hands. Although the Philadelphia lawyer did not supplant Chambers as Zenger’s attorney, he ran the show for the defense from that moment on. The only people not surprised by Hamilton’s appearance were Zenger’s backers, who had planned the maneuver and kept it a deep secret.
In a clear and silvery voice Hamilton made a few introductory remarks, ending with these words: “I do, for my client, confess that he both printed and published the two newspapers set forth in the information, and I hope in so doing he has committed no crime.” Thereupon Attorney General Bradley declared that the jury must decide in favor of the king.
“By no means!” cried Hamilton. “It is not the bare printing and publishing of a paper that will make it libel. The words themselves must be libelous—that is, false, scandalous and seditious—or else my client is not guilty.”
In those days the common law held that the greater the truth, the greater the libel. Pointing this out, the attorney general argued that the truth of a libel was no defense and could not be admitted as evidence. He was backed up by the chief justice, who said to Hamilton, “The law is clear. You cannot justify a libel.” Hamilton, however, insisted that he would prove the truth of the statements published by Zenger and declared that it was the right of the jury to decide the intent of publication. By this line of attack Hamilton showed that he intended to air the delinquencies of New York’s royal administration. He went on:
Years ago it was a crime to speak the truth, and in that terrible court of Star Chamber many brave men suffered for so doing. And yet, even in that court and those times, a great and good man durst say what I hope will not be taken amiss of me to say in this place, to wit: “The practice of informations for libel is a sword in the hands of a wicked king, and an arrogant coward, to cut down and destroy the innocent. . . .”
All that hot summer of 1735 the trial of John Peter Zenger raged in the packed and stifling City Hall courtroom, while Philadelphia watched and Boston watched and even London watched, and men everywhere oppressed by British tyranny harkened to a new hope and took heart. Minds were stirred as seldom before, while new horizons seemed to unfold with each utterance of the silver-tongued Andrew Hamilton. Once and for all, this trial destroyed the notion that government officials are immune from criticism. It created a climate of civil disobedience. It marked the beginning of a movement for independence.
At last, in a courtroom throbbing with silence, except for his pulse-quickening voice, the Philadelphia lawyer delivered his memorable summation, saying in part:
The question before the court—and you, gentlemen of the jury—is not of small or private concern. It is not the cause of a poor printer, nor of New York alone, which you are now trying. No! It may in its consequences affect every freeman that lives under British government on the main of America! It is the best cause. It is the cause of liberty! And I make no doubt but your upright conduct this day will not only entitle you to the love and esteem of your fellow citizens, but every man who prefers freedom to a life of slavery will bless and honor you, as men who have baffled the attempt of tyranny, and by an impartial and uncorrupt verdict have laid a noble foundation for securing to ourselves, our posterity, and our neighbors, that to which nature and the laws of our country have given us a right—the liberty both of exposing and opposing arbitrary power—in these parts of the world, at least—by speaking and writing truth!
The moment Hamilton finished speaking, spectators jumped to their feet. They cheered. They applauded. The chief justice bellowed and pounded for order. The jury retired and then returned after only a few minutes of deliberation. The foreman of the jury was asked to announce the verdict. In a firm voice he said, “Not guilty.”
Never before in the history of the city had there been such shouting, thumping, stamping, whistling, clapping, and cheering in a courtroom. Strangers hugged one another, women wept, and one judge threatened to jail the leader of the demonstration; but nothing could quell this tribute to the champion of liberty, Andrew Hamilton. His face flushed with joy, he resisted attempts to raise him upon the shoulders of yelling men, who wanted to carry him from the courtroom in triumph. Zenger beamed and shook the many hands thrust toward him.
To the printer’s surprise and disappointment he was marched back upstairs to his prison cell, where he had to spend one final night until money was collected to pay for his keep during his imprisonment. Thus, he missed the victory banquet for his defender held that evening in the Black Horse Tavern.
This was a public testimonial for Hamilton, paid for by the city corporation, with liquor flowing in abundance and everyone pressing close to the guest of honor. The new mayor, Paul Richard, gave the principal address and then presented Hamilton with a gold box that contained a scroll bestowing on him the freedom of the city. After the banquet Hamilton was escorted to a ball, attended by citizens fighting the administration of Governor Cosby. The next day, as Hamilton left for his home in Philadelphia, he was accompanied to his barge by a crowd waving banners and cheering. A cannon boomed a final salute.
Zenger’s acquittal was the world’s first great victory for freedom of the press. However, it was not an end, but a beginning. A half century passed before the British government enacted into law the precedent established in this case: the right of a jury in seditious libel to pass on the truth of the matter published. Not until 1805 did the New York State legislature uphold the principle of freedom of the press, and not until 1821 was this principle incorporated into the state’s constitution.
Yet long after Zenger and Hamilton had died, the American statesman Gouverneur Morris declared, “The trial of Zenger was the germ of American freedom—the morning star of that liberty which subsequently revolutionized America.”
The Zenger case also gave us a figure of speech that has lasted to the present day: “as sharp as a Philadelphia lawyer.”
Chapter 9
THE CITY GOES MAD
MORTIFIED by Zenger’s acquittal and weakened by tuberculosis, Governor William Cosby died in 1736. Publicly the people faked grief, but privately they drank toasts to the passing of the tyrant and turned lightheartedly to other interests.
Ladies larded their hair with orange butter, flocked to public balls, vied for the attention of the newly arrived dancing master, and took French and Spanish lessons. Elaborately gowned, they attended the city’s first public musical concert, held on January 21, 1736, in the home of a vintner, named Robert Todd. It was staged for the benefit of Charles Theodore Pachelbel, a German musician who came here from Boston to play the harpsichord.
Underneath the culture and gaiety of society the poor suffered, and crime increased. Beggars were put to hard labor, and cruel punishments were inflicted on criminals. A garden was fenced in so that hogs could not eat the roots and herbs grown for the poor. Indigent sick were lucky to get one of the six beds in the house of correction erected on the site of the present City Hall.
In the spring of 1737, when word reached New York that smallpox and spotted fever
were raging in South Carolina, the city fathers established the first local quarantine. They ordered a pilot boat to lay in wait near Sandy Hook, the thin peninsula curving from the Jersey shore toward the Lower Bay of New York. Local doctors transferred from this boat to incoming ships to examine passengers and cargo. If infection was found, the vessel had to anchor just off the island that now holds the Statue of Liberty. The quarantine was ineffectual; smallpox broke out near the Battery two years later.
Frightened residents fled to the healthier climate of Greenwich Village north of town. Lieutenant Governor George Clarke, who had assumed charge after the death of Governor Cosby, let the assembly meet in a small house on the Hudson River two miles upstream. The largest Greenwich Village estate was owned by Peter Warren, a dashing British naval captain in charge of the fleet stationed here. He bought 300 acres on the west side of the village near the Hudson, and later the city granted him more land for his military feats. On high ground near the present intersection of Charles and Bleecker streets, Warren erected a magnificent poplar-shaded mansion, whose broad veranda faced the Jersey highlands and the hills of Staten Island. Then he was elected a Member of Parliament for the English city of Westminster and left New York in 1747, never to return.
Ever since the slave insurrection of 1712 New York’s white citizens feared the local Negroes. Treatment of slaves became harsher and more repressive. The whites called the Negroes the black seed of Cain. If three slaves were found chatting together on the street, they were caught, tied to whipping posts, and lashed forty times on their naked backs. The same number of lashes was given to Negroes who carried clubs while strolling without permission outside their masters’ grounds. John Van Zandt horsewhipped his slave to death for having been picked up at night by city watchmen. The coroner’s jury declared that “correction given by the master was not the cause of his death, but that it was by the Visitation of God.”
In 1741 New York had 10,000 inhabitants, including 2,000 slaves. Some of these were called Spanish Negroes because a British warship captured a Spanish vessel in West Indies waters, brought her to New York, and sold the Negro crew members as slaves. About the same time African tribesmen were thrust suddenly into eighteenth-century New York; their barbaric looks and uncouth behavior terrified white people. Other fears added to the growing public anxiety. With England and Spain at war, perhaps Spain would send a fleet to attack the city. And what were Spaniards? Catholics, of course.
The slaves, poor and underprivileged, were certainly petty thieves. In the spring of 1741 silverware, money, and linen were stolen from Robert Hogg’s house at the corner of Broad and Mill (now South William) streets. Suspicion fell on one of his blacks, who had met other slaves in a tawdry tavern on the Hudson River at the present corner of Greenwich and Thames streets. The place was run by a shifty white man, named John Hughson, who was already considered a receiver of stolen goods. Now police searched his premises—in vain.
Working for Hughson was a white indentured servant, sixteen-year-old Mary Burton. She had been born in England, served a jail term there, and then been shipped to New York. After the police had left her master’s place, she whispered to a neighbor that the items stolen from the Hogg home were hidden in Hughson’s house, but—mercy!—he would kill her if he learned that she had told. The neighbor repeated this to the authorities. They arrested Mary Burton for alleged complicity in the theft, threw her into jail, and then promised her freedom if she turned informer.
Hating her master and basking in the attention paid to her by city officials, Mary began to talk. As a result of her “confession,” the police arrested Mr. and Mrs. Hughson, together with a prostitute, called Peggy Carey. At their trial in City Hall, Mary Burton testified about a Negro, known as Caesar Varick. Slaves were called by their masters’ surnames. Mary said that Caesar had left stolen goods and money with Peggy Carey. This was denied by Peggy. Mary also claimed that Caesar had given part of his loot to Hughson to hide. Hughson admitted that he had stashed away silver and linen. The police arrested Caesar and also nabbed another Negro, named Prince Amboyman. Although they denied taking part in any robbery, stolen goods were discovered under the kitchen floor of the house owned by Caesar’s master.
This was where matters stood until 1 P.M. on March 18, 1741, when fire broke out on the roof of the governor’s house inside the fort. The city’s two fire engines responded, but a brisk southeasterly wind and the dryness of the cedar shingles thwarted the efforts of the firemen. In less than two hours the governor’s house, the chapel, the secretary’s office, the stables, and the barracks were ashes. Lieutenant Governor Clarke said that the blaze had been caused by careless workmen repairing a gutter.
A week later sparks flew from Captain Peter Warren’s house in downtown Manhattan. A few days afterward still another fire started in the storehouse of John Van Zandt, the Dutchman who had whipped his slave to death. Despite suspicions, it was proved that a careless smoker had dropped pipe embers inside the place. Then another and another and another fire started, sometimes as many as four a day.
New Yorkers grew apprehensive. With the outbreak of still another blaze the police arrested a Spanish Negro, who lived next door to the destroyed house. Under questioning, he seemed evasive. Now white people began muttering. One after another, they cried, “The Spanish Negroes! The Spanish Negroes! Take up the Spanish Negroes!” The police jailed other Spanish Negroes, along with a slave, called Quack. Asked about the origin of the fires, he stammered incoherently. City magistrates became so alarmed that they met to ponder the possibility of arson, and even as they sat, still another fire trembled like a cockscomb along the roof of a second storehouse. Apprehension then churned into terror, and terror curdled into universal panic. Here, there, everywhere in town, Negroes—even some known to have helped quench the flames—were seized indiscriminately. So many were jailed that the magistrates couldn’t possibly examine them all.
On April 11, 1741, the council met to discuss the worsening situation. City Recorder Daniel Horsemanden vowed that they “must necessarily conclude that the fires were occasioned and set on foot by some villainous confederacy of latent enemies amongst us.” He urged the lieutenant governor to issue a proclamation offering an amnesty and a reward to anyone giving information about the alleged plot.
Clarke now offered 100 pounds to any white informer; 45 pounds to free Negroes, Indians, or mulattoes; and 20 pounds and freedom to slaves. He also promised an automatic pardon to informers.
The proclamation was read to Mary Burton, who began spouting sensational charges about Caesar Varick, Prince Amboyman, and Cuff Philipse. According to her, these slaves often met at Hughson’s tavern to chatter about burning the fort, putting the torch to the entire city, and massacring all the white people. Mary also said that Mr. and Mrs. Hughson had promised to help. Then, after the slaves had taken over, they planned to establish a monarchy, with Hughson as king and Caesar as governor. Except for the Hughsons and Peggy Carey, according to Mary, no other white person had overheard the diabolical plot.
Her fantastic story was believed by the magistrates. They petted and praised Mary Burton, who became the town heroine. Then Peggy Carey was promised a pardon and reward if she would support Mary’s allegations. Despite Peggy’s low morals, she refused to slander innocent persons. But now the authorities applied pressure by convicting her of receiving and hiding stolen goods. The sentence? Death! Also condemned to die were Caesar and Prince and Sarah Hughson—John Hughson’s mulatto daughter by one of his Negro slaves.
Peggy Carey gulped and begged to be examined a second time. Now she “confessed” to wildly outlandish matters. Last December, she stuttered, she had attended a Negro meeting in another evil tavern, run by John Romme, a white man. He had told the slaves that if they would set fire to the city, slay all the white people, and bring their plunder to him, he would help them escape to a land where they could live in freedom the rest of their lives. Peggy obviously was telling the authorities what she thought
they wanted to hear. Although some found it difficult to swallow her words, they managed to do so and begged for more. After all, the public was clamoring for victims. Peggy now said that she remembered the names of seven of the conspirators. When they were led into her presence, she accused them to their faces. Meanwhile, John Romme heard of Peggy’s lies and scampered out of town. His wife, however, was arrested.
Several fires broke out in Hackensack, New Jersey, across the Hudson River. Later two Negroes were convicted of arson and burned at the stake, although there wasn’t a shred of evidence against them. In New York’s jail the quaking Negroes now began accusing one another to save their hides. Sarah Hughson was granted a stay of execution. On May 11, 1741, Caesar and Prince were hanged on a small island in the Collect. They admitted being thieves, but to the end they denied plotting to burn down the town.
Next, the Hughsons and Peggy Carey were convicted of receiving stolen goods. Apparently realizing that she was already doomed, Peggy now declared that she had lied in accusing Mr. and Mrs. Hughson of complicity, but when she spoke the truth, nobody listened. On the other hand, everybody wanted to believe Mary Burton’s lies. Mary suddenly remembered seeing a slave give Hughson twelve pounds to buy guns. Also, her master had hidden these weapons under his attic floor. Police dashed there, ripped up the boards, and found nothing.
One Negro prisoner became clever at prying “confessions” from his cellmates, and circles of accusations spread like ripples on a slimy pond. Even ignorant slaves understood that to tell the truth meant to confess to a lie. On May 29 two Negroes, Quack and Cuffee, became the first persons convicted of the conspiracy itself—not just of thievery. When Quack spun an unlikely tale about setting fire to the governor’s mansion, nobody cared to remember that the lieutenant governor had attributed the blaze to careless workmen. Not a single lawyer defended the accused. Instead, every attorney in town sided with the prosecution. Even James Alexander and William Smith, who had acted so nobly for Rip Van Dam and John Peter Zenger, now joined in demands that the Negroes be put to death.
The Epic of New York City Page 15
