asking Al Gore to run in 2008!
Political Chess: Winning the National Debate
Posted June 10th, 2008 by BLACK CELL
I hope that Barack Obama reject John McCain's Challenge to 10 town hall meetings. In a chess game, a great player doesn't waste his time playing weaker opponents. A weaker opponent only weakens the great players game.
McCain's challenge to Obama is also the equivalent of a weak trap. Great chess players never play into the oppositions trap, unless it is a part of his or her game plan. It make more sense for Obama to go on tour with Hillary Clinton between now & the convention than McCain. Force Hillary to live up to her help elect a Democrat propaganda (bs).
Yes, Obama has to debate McCain, but he shouldn't waste his time allowing McCain the opportunity to weaken his game. Great chess players don't play weaker opponents many games, because the great player starts making risky moves out of confidence. Next thing you know the weaker player start taking pieces & gaining momentum, because the great player acts as if he or she can win without the pieces & never regain the momentum.
I usually take my queen off the board in order to make the chess game interesting at the beginning of the game, with a weaker opponent. Politicians cant afford to take their most powerful piece off the board.
McCain's strategy is fascinating. He is banking on his right wing media stooges to paint Obama as an extreme liberal, in hope of whipping the fractured repug base into supporting him - in the last minutes of the election. While he (McCain) play political chess in the middle & grab all the Obama haters.
Thats a great strategy; controlling the middle of the board is the key to winning in a real chess game, just as it is in politics. McCain knows that he will never be able to convince the repug base to support him. He stands a better chance of winning their votes by allowing their repug Abubikas (gods) to whip up their support for him with Ba-lack Obama schemes.
Our opponents biggest weakness is his positions on the issues. This is a Smash Mouth Football game that has to be played fast because their are some issues where Obama & McCain are similar. like: not drilling for oil.
Repugs think they are gaining momentum on the issue of drilling for more oil. We can take their momentum away by agreeing with them & making an amendment to their propaganda. We should be saying, we are willing to drill for more oil if it is ONLY used in America . Were are not into putting our National oil reserves on the global market. Their big oil contributors want us to drill for more oil in America, so they can make the big bucks transporting that oil in the global markets: the high price of gas is a global problem.
Let's have the debate over nuclear power plants. It is more than likely McCain will not publicly support the repug agenda. Force him to make them angrier by making him say the things they, the repug base hates to hear.
When playing chess, it always make sense to take off the oppositions perceived strongest pieces on the board when he or she gives you an opportunity. McCain is perceived to be strong on national defense but he has set himself up to look weak on national defense. By claiming that we should do nothing while Iran is working on building a nuclear weapon along with his many foreign policy gaffs, McCain is proving himself to be weaker than Pres. Bu$h on foreign policy.
We should be doing everything we logically can to stop Iran from building a nuclear weapon. The Bu$h/McCain strategy is to wait until Iran build the weapon & then ???, it's a mystery.
Many political pundits believe that McCain's weakness is his positions on the economy, because he admitted that was his weak point. But, McCain's real weak point is fighting the war on terrorism. It makes sense for Obama to come out the shoot going after that dangling perceived strength & take it off the political chess board. Politicians are afraid to make adjustments to their rhetoric out of fear that they will be labeled a flip-flopper.
We shouldn't also let America forget about McCain's poor judgment when he walked threw that Market place. McCain claimed that there were neighborhoods in Baghdad where "you and I could walk through." In a press conference after his Baghdad tour, McCain told a reporter that his visit to the market was proof that you could indeed "walk freely" in some areas of Baghdad... Wrong!
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Preching the Repugnacious Gospel
By Black Cell
"It's not the truth that matters, it is what you can get people to believe."
Rush Limbaugh
Just imagine hearing your favorite politician attempt to blatantly play on your intelligence. How would you respond?
Watching the pugnacious conservative faction of the Republican Party attempt to convince voters that Barack Obama's tax plan to give more of the tax break to the middle class as raising taxes or some form of Jimmy Carterism, is up there with Hillary Clinton's response to the bitter comments made by Barack Obama.
Republicans are trying to trash a tax cut that gives more money to those in the middle class. When the host of ABC This Weeks, George Stephanopoulos asked The former Republican Senator Fred Thomson about fact that "more of the tax cuts are going to go to the middle class under Sen.Obama's plan," Thompson decided to answer the question by responding to a question that was never asked... Thomson avoided answering the question. Maybe Stephanopoulos should have asked the question in other ways, it would make it clear that the Repugs are indulging in Party politics. They are doing it in a way that undermine the truth & benefits no one but the person that use the psychobabble.
Republican voters seem to be comfortable with these kind of leaders representing them; it's one of the reasons why I know a Republican majority will never live up to the conservative foolishness they preach on the campaign trail.
Republicans also believe they can play on the American people intelligence; they know that their internal polling data shows confusion surrounding why we are forced to pay an high price for gas. Our Pugnacious friends will try to manipulate the masses for their big oil contributors by attempting to convince their supporters to help preach a false message that says if we drill for more oil, the oil companies wont come up with more lame excuses for not lowering the price of gas.
Even the Right wing Washington Times can't spin the fact that the Saudi's claim to increase their oil production wont lower the price of oil or gas: "Crude oil futures hit a record near $140 a barrel Monday as investors shrugged off Saudi Arabia's promise to boost production and instead focused on a weaker dollar. Retail gas prices rose to a record $4.08 a gallon." The oil execs will always have a convenient excuse to continue raising the price for gas.
You can't say that the conservative leaders don't see their base as blind faith stooges, who they, the repugs, use to help them manipulate the masses preaching repug gospel. I am still trying to figure out how do we promote Democracy to the world by acting like a despot dictator with our own versions of torture chambers & one sided tribunals that has more in common with Saddam Insane that it does American values.
The more I watch the debate between Democrats & Republicans, the more it reminds me of the early debate between two of our countries most important founders, Thomas Hobbes and John Locke. This is how ITP Alumni Blender defined the two:
Thomas Hobbes
According to Hobbes, society is a population beneath a sovereign authority, to whom all individuals in that society cede their natural rights for the sake of protection. Any abuses of power by this authority are to be accepted as the price of peace. In particular, the doctrine of separation of powers is rejected. the sovereign must control civil, military, judicial and ecclesiastical powers.
John Locke
Unlike Thomas Hobbes, Locke believed that human nature is characterized by reason and tolerance. Like Hobbes, Locke believed that human nature allowed men to be selfish. This is apparent with the introduction of currency. In a natural state all people were equal and independent, and none had a right to harm another's "life, health, liberty, or possessions." Locke never refers to Hobbes by name, however, and may instead have been responding to other writers of the day.[4] Locke also advocated governmental checks and balances and believed that revolution is not only a right but an obligation in some circumstances. These ideas would come to have profound influence on the Constitution of the United States and its Declaration of Independence.
The sad / good thing is that John Mc Cain is forced to have to preach their warped gospel in order to stand a chance in November.
Now that Conservatives have bitten into the poison apple called save ourselves, & f*** the world. It is time to start defining their perspectives as self serving & down wrong dishonest, while our perspective to more like Locke.
Repugs are like the Clintons on steroids, they have no shame & will continue to create foolish talking points because they have been forced to take & defend the low road. While repugs are playing defense, we should be driving the steak deeper into their vampire tactics by dissecting & marveling at their failed attempts to misinform voters.
P.S. This is my favorite.
I'm Voting Republican
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FiQJ9Xp0xxU
Here is a link to my blog called, "The Politico Insider."
http://thepoliticolinsider.blogspot.com/
More Repug Gospel
Mr. HALL of New York. Madam Speaker, over the weekend, gas reached the $4 national average for the first time in our Nation's history. The majority in Congress has worked to combat these prices by advancing new energy solutions and efforts to protect consumers. The standard refrain from the oil companies and their allies is, ``We need to drill for more oil here at home.'' I would ask them, ``Who is stopping you?''
The oil company myth is that we need to open up the Arctic refuge and give the oil company a free hand to go wherever and whenever they want to chase oil. The reality, however, is that about 75 percent of the oil in the United States is on land that is already open for production, but less than one-third of that land is actually being used by the oil companies.
They are literally sitting on 10,000 permits and millions of acres of leased land that would let them start pulling more oil out of the ground here at home. So I say to the oil company advocates, start drilling for more domestic supply. Start drilling on the lands that are already open, and stop posturing while American drivers are in pain at the pump.
Watch Video http://www.c-spanarchives.org/congress/?q=node/77531&id=8583217
Here is a link to my blog called, "The Politico Insider."
http://thepoliticolinsider.blogspot.com/
Supreme Court Cases
Ex Parte Milligan, 1866
Historical Background
During the Civil War, the United States was torn by conflicting loyalties. The question of States' rights versus national supremacy was finally decided by a military conflict which left 600,000 Americans dead. Persons living in the so-called border States along the northern boundary of the Confederacy, associated in business and friendship with persons in States just to the South, were particularly divided in their attitude toward the war. Maryland teetered on the brink of secession throughout the conflict; West Virginia was created as a State out of pro-Union counties in northwestern Virginia. Kentucky was a battleground, as was Missouri, where many people owned slaves.
Because of these unsettled conditions, President Abraham Lincoln ordered the border States placed under military rule as part of the war emergency. Each of the States was organized as a military district, with military courts established to hear cases related to espionage, rebellious action, and the giving of aid and comfort to the Confederacy. Regular State and federal courts were made subordinate to the military district courts in these matters. Peacetime guarantees of due process were suspended in many cases, and arrested persons were denied the use of writs of habeas corpus which required that a detained person be brought before a court to hear the reason why he or she was imprisoned.
In 1861, early in the war, Chief Justice Roger B. Taney and the Court overturned President Lincoln's emergency actions in a case entitled Ex parte Merryman. Subsequently, Congress passed the Habeas Corpus Act in 1863, which gave Lincoln broad discretionary power, including the power to suspend habeas corpus when and where he felt he should.
Circumstances of the Case
Lambden P. Milligan was arrested in Indiana in 1864 upon the orders of one General Hovey, commander of the military district of Indiana. He was accused of conspiring against the United States and "giving aid and comfort to its enemies" the South. He was tried in a military court created under Lincoln's orders. The court convicted Milligan of various acts of treason and disloyalty and sentenced him to death by hanging on May 19, 1865. Millligan appealed to the federal courts, claiming that his right to a trial by jury had been denied and that the proceedings of the military court were unconstitutional. Lower federal courts refused to issue an order to bring the case into the regular federal court system and the case was finally appealed to the Supreme Court.
Constitutional Issues
The cased addressed questions about suspending the rights of citizens in time of war and the legitimate authority of the President to suspend writs of habeas corpus. What limits did the Constitution contain concerning the suspension of civil liberties of citizens? Did the National Government have the authority to substitute trial by military courts created in States outside the area of military operations? Did the military courts have constitutional power and authority to try and punish Milligan?
Arguments
For Milligan: Congress under no circumstances has the authority to deprive citizens of due process. The Constitution's due process guarantees, other than habeas corpus, are absolute and not in any way qualified by circumstances or situation. Milligan should have been tried in the regular courts of the United States. The trial was illegal and the sentence should be overturned.
For the United States: A nation at war must take extraordinary measures to insure the safety of its citizens and government. Milligan was engaged in acts subversive to good order and was giving aid and comfort to the States in rebellion. The Constitution directly states that the writ of habeas corpus may be suspended in time of war. Extraordinary times and great danger require extraordinary measures and actions. Milligan, a convicted traitor, should hang.
Decision and Rationale
In a narrow 5–4 decision, Justice David Davis delivered the opinion of the Court overturning Milligan's conviction. He was joined in a concurring opinion by Chief Justice Chase, and Justices James M. Wayne, Noah H. Swayne, and Samuel F. Miller.
Under no circumstance, Davis wrote, "does either the President or Congress have the legal right to impose military justice on civilians outside an actual war zone…"
Davis affirmed the primacy of the Bill of Rights, regardless of the circumstances, noting: "[B]y the protection of the law, human rights are secured; withdraw the protection, and they [human rights] are at the mercy of wicked rulers, or the clamor of an excited people…The Constitution of the United States is a law for rulers and people, equally in war and in peace, and covers with the shield of its protection all classes of men, at all times, and under all circumstances.
"One of the plainest constitutional provisions was…infringed when Milligan was tried by a court not ordained and established by Congress, and not composed of judges appointed during good behavior…," the Court declared.
Davis then moved to the circumstances surrounding the case: "It is difficult to see how the safety of the country required martial law in Indiana. If any of her citizens were plotting treason, the power of arrest could secure them until the government was prepared for the trial…It is not easy to see how [Milligan] can be treated as a prisoner of war, when he lived in Indiana for the past twenty years, was arrested there, and had not been…[a] resident of any of the States in rebellion."
The Milligan decision clearly limited the powers of the President and Congress in time of war. The authority of military courts during the time of war was never tested in cases involving trials in the South by such courts after the military occupation of the Southern States during Recontruction.
Here is a link to my blog called, "The Politico Insider."
http://thepoliticolinsider.blogspot.com/
McCains NY Town Hall
Did you hear McCain complaining that Obama did not take him up on yesterday's NY "town Hall meeting? It turns out that McCain's camp was in charge of handing out tickets....to McCain supporters, campaigners and crew. It was actually a trap!
Hi Gailwind!
Long time, no speak.
Here is a link to my blog called, "The Politico Insider."
http://thepoliticolinsider.blogspot.com/
Turning Florida Dark Blue
Most great chess players set their opponent up with clever traps. Setting up a trap in a chess game is important. Political traps either will bare great fruit or just force the opposition to over-focus on a strategy that could definitely defeat him or her.
Great Political Chess Players create many potential game breakers. They know that: quietly, preparing for a major victory in places like Florida, New Mexico & Nevada set the table for a blowout.
Using trap States to force the opposition to focus & break himself by defending a potential gold mine (Purple State) has been part of the natural flow for political strategist. But, preparing for the inevitable, more voters, has not been a part of the recent norm for Democrats.
It all starts with challenging as many political offices with candidates who will help motivate & register voters. Then, prepare for the overload of voters on voting machines. We already know that many, if not most, of the technical difficulties volunteers are going to have to work threw will seem to be overwhelming at times. Trying to operate the flawed systems in a State like Florida will be even more difficult.
A great gamer will go back & study the assessments of the past two Presidential Elections. In those assessments, I am sure you will realized that Democrats have either failed to do their job correctly or was overwhelmed by mechanical difficulties at all levels, in different times.
I believe Democrats are going to take Florida in a BIG way... Prepare & watch the Smash Mouth Football in the Sunshine State.
Here is a link to my blog called, "The Politico Insider."
http://thepoliticolinsider.blogspot.com/
Court Says Detainees Have Rights, Bucking Bush
Supreme Court says Guantanamo detainees have constitutional rights, rebuking Bush
By MARK SHERMAN Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON June 12, 2008 (AP)
High court says GITMO detainees have the right to be tried in civilian courts.
Here is a link to my blog called, "The Politico Insider."
http://thepoliticolinsider.blogspot.com/
John Adams defends a British soldiers at the Boston Massacre
CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHTS FOUNDATION
Bill of Right in Action
Winter 1999 (16:1)
Matters of Principle
This issue of Bill of Rights in Action looks at individuals who have stood on principle against authority or popular opinion. The first article looks at John Adams and his defense of British soldiers at the Boston Massacre trials. The second article explores Archbishop Thomas Becket's fatal conflict with King Henry II. The final article examines Dr. Jack Kevorkian and the issue of mercy killing.
U.S. History: John Adams and the Boston Massacre Trials
World History: The Murder of an Archbishop
U.S. Government: Should We Have the Right to Die?
This issue of the Bill of Rights in Action is made possible by a generous grant from the W.M. Keck Foundation.
John Adams and the Boston
Massacre Trials
On March 5, 1770, British soldiers fired on a mob of colonists in Boston. This incident, known as the Boston Massacre, enraged American colonists. Yet John Adams, future second president of the United States and cousin of Boston Patriot-leader Sam Adams, ended up defending a group of hated British soldiers at their trials.
In the years leading up to the American Revolution, the British sought to establish firm control over their American colonies. In the British view, the colonies had prospered because British troops had protected Americans from the French, Spanish, and Indians. The king's chief minister proclaimed in Parliament in 1763: "Great Britain protects America; America is bound to yield obedience." Parliament then set on a course of passing laws to control trade, stop smuggling, restrict settlement beyond the Appalachian Mountains, and raise revenue from the colonies. Historically, the colonies had experienced little control or interference by the British, so they considered these laws oppressive and began to resist. Much of the resistance took place in Boston.
One target of American outrage was customs collectors, whose job was to stop smugglers and collect taxes. They sometimes conducted searches under writs of assistance. These were general warrants that allowed them to search any house for smuggled goods. When customs officials in 1768 seized John Hancock's ship on charges of smuggling wine, Boston mobs attacked them. The British government ordered two regiments of soldiers to occupy the town. About 700 British regulars marched with fixed bayonets into Boston. The people refused to take the troops into their homes, so units of soldiers were quartered in public buildings and warehouses.
The troops trained on Boston Common and stood guard in front of government offices, including the Customs House. The occupying army and the townspeople grew to hate each other. The soldiers, wearing distinctive red coats and armed with muskets and swords, intimidated the people with insults and threats. Boston workmen, sailors, and teenage apprentices cursed at the redcoats and challenged them to fistfights. Meanwhile, the Sons of Liberty, a radical Patriot organization led by Sam Adams, agitated for an end to the military occupation.
The Boston Massacre
On Friday, March 2, 1770, an off-duty British soldier asked a group of Boston rope makers if there was any work. One of the rope makers replied there was. "Go clean my outhouse," he jeered. A fight broke out. The soldier was knocked about and then fled. But a little while later, the soldier returned with friends and a brawl erupted. One of the soldiers, Matthew Killroy, and one of the rope makers, Samuel Gray, would meet again soon in much bloodier circumstances.
On the evening of Monday, March 5, a lone British sentry guarded the entrance to the Boston Customs House where officials collected import duties for the king. The sentry got into an argument with a barber's apprentice and swung his musket at him, hitting the boy on the head. Other apprentices gathered, daring the sentry to fight. "Bloody lobster back!" they yelled, taunting the soldier and his red coat.
By about 9 p.m., the crowd around the Customs House steps had grown to about 50 to 100 people. Some began to throw snowballs and chunks of ice at the sentry. He loaded his musket. "Fire, damn you, fire, you dare not fire!" the crowd taunted.
The sentry finally called for help when a group of about 25 American sailors arrived, yelling, whistling, and carrying wooden clubs. A tall, stout man named Crispus Attucks led this noisy band. Part Indian and black, Attucks pushed his way to the front of the crowd, club in hand.
Captain Thomas Preston, officer of the guard, turned out a squad of six privates and a corporal. In the squad was Private Matthew Killroy, who had been involved in the rope-maker brawl. The soldiers marched with their muskets and bayonets to the Customs House to join the beleaguered sentry. They lined up facing the crowd. The corporal then ordered the soldiers to load their muskets with two lead balls per gun. Capt. Preston stood behind his men.
From 300-400 people had now gathered. "Lobsters!" "Bloody backs!" "Fire! Why don't you fire?" many shouted. Some threw snowballs, ice, oyster shells, and even lumps of coal at the soldiers. Crispus Attucks and others struck the soldiers' musket barrels with sticks and clubs. Attucks yelled, "Kill them! Kill them! Knock them over!"
Then, someone from the back of the mob threw a club that hit Pvt. Montgomery, knocking him to the ground. "Damn you, fire!" someone shouted. Enraged, Montgomery rose to his feet and fired his musket killing Crispus Attucks. Soon, most of the other soldiers were erratically firing into the mob. When Pvt. Killroy fired, rope-maker Samuel Gray fell dead. As the men began to reload, Capt. Preston ordered, "Stop firing! Stop firing!" Five men lay dead or dying in the bloody snow.
Capt. Preston managed to march his men back to their barracks. Acting Governor Thomas Hutchinson, a strong Tory Loyalist, finally arrived to try to calm the people. "Let the law have its course," he pleaded.
The next day, Sam Adams led a huge protest meeting demanding that all British soldiers be ordered out of Boston. Reluctantly, Gov. Hutchinson made an agreement with the British army commander to remove the soldiers to a fortified island in Boston Harbor. Boston residents lined the streets to insult and curse the redcoats as they evacuated the town.
On March 13, the colony's attorney general issued 13 indictments for murder. There would be three trials. Capt. Preston would be tried first followed by a separate trial of the eight soldiers. Four customs officers, accused of shooting into the crowd from the Customs House windows, would be tried last. (This final trial ended abruptly when the jury found out that the main prosecution witness had falsely accused the officers.)
The Trial of Capt. Preston
Before the trials began, a propaganda war of sorts took place. Gov. Hutchinson sent a report to London criticizing Boston for its violence and mob actions against the British soldiers. He later wrote, "government is at an end and in the hands of the people." Sam Adams and the Sons of Liberty took the testimony of witnesses for their own document, which they titled, "A Short Narrative of the Horrid Massacre in Boston." But the most effective propaganda piece was Paul Revere's widely printed cartoon, "The Bloody Massacre," an exaggerated misrepresentation of what really happened.
The court appointed Samuel Quincy, a strong Tory (British sympathizer), as special prosecutor. Sam Adams persuaded the town of Boston to pay for a second prosecutor, Patriot Robert Treat Paine.
Capt. Preston could not get anyone to defend him in court until a Tory merchant persuaded lawyer John Adams to do so. Although he was one of the Patriot leaders in Boston, the 35-year-old Adams believed that it was vital that the British soldiers and their captain receive fair trials. Adams believed that the cause for self-government would be damaged if Boston justice turned out to be little more than lynch law. Joining Adams on the defense team were a a Tory judge, Robert Auchmuty, and a young fiery Patriot lawyer, Josiah Quincy, the younger brother of the special prosecutor. Ironically Tory Loyalist Samuel Quincy had the job of convicting the king's men of murder, while Patriot John Adams led the effort to defend them.
Amid continued mob activities and threats of lynching, Capt. Preston's trial began on October 24, 1770. It lasted six days, an extremely long time then for a criminal trial. The court also took the unusual step of sequestering the jury (keeping jury members away from their family and friends).
Four judges, wearing red robes that signified a death penalty case, presided at Capt. Preston's trial. The key question was whether he actually gave an order to his men to fire at the mob. Preston denied giving the order, but did not testify. Some witnesses said he gave such a command; most said he did not. Much of the testimony centered on who was shouting the word "Fire!" when the shooting began. In the end, the Boston jury found Capt. Preston not guilty.
To Sam Adams and the other Sons of Liberty, Capt. Preston's acquittal was disturbing, but not entirely unexpected. After all, Preston was never accused of shooting at the crowd himself. But the strong feeling in the town remained that someone would have to pay for the five men who died.
The Trial of the British Soldiers
The trial of the eight British soldiers began on November 27 with a different jury (again sequestered), but before the same four judges as in the Preston case. Samuel Quincy and Robert Treat Paine continued to prosecute. Sampson Blowers joined John Adams and his former Harvard classmate Josiah Quincy for the defense. This trial lasted seven days with more than 80 witnesses testifying.
The prosecutors only had to prove that one of the soldiers fired with malice and the intent to kill. All the soldiers would then be equally guilty of murder and would hang.
The prosecution tried to show that after months of abuse from the town's people, all the soldiers had revenge in their hearts. In particular, a witness testified that one or two weeks before the shooting, Pvt. Killroy had said that "he would never miss an opportunity, if he had one, to fire on the inhabitants, and that he had wanted to have an opportunity ever since he landed." After Pvt. Montgomery fired the first shot, the prosecution argued, Killroy had his opportunity and shot rope-maker Samuel Gray to death.
The defense team had to overcome some major problems. If Capt. Preston did not order his men to fire, as Preston's jury had ruled, then why did the men fire? Adams and the other defense lawyers had to show that the crowd was endangering the soldiers. They would have to persuade a jury that probably held strong anti-British feelings.
The defense thus concentrated on the actions of the specific mob that threatened Capt. Preston and his men. Witnesses for the defense described the insults, curses, threats, taunts, and the physical objects that the mob hurled upon the soldiers. Dr. John Jeffries, who treated victim Patrick Carr for 10 days before he finally died, gave especially effective testimony. Dr. Jeffries related that Carr, on his deathbed, said that he believed the soldiers fired to defend themselves and that he did not blame the man who shot him.
John Adams spent much of his closing argument educating the jury on the law of self-defense. He recalled the testimony about the "people crying kill them! kill them! knock them over! heaving snowballs, oyster shells, clubs, white birch sticks." Adams then asked the jurors to "consider yourselves, in this situation, and then judge whether a reasonable man . . . would not have concluded they were going to kill him."
Adams referred to Pvt. Montgomery, the first to fire. "He was knocked down at his station," Adams continued. "Had he not reason to think his life in danger?" As for Pvt. Killroy, Adams pointed out that no one had testified that he had aimed at Samuel Gray rather than at the mob in general.
John Adams concluded by stating the law at the time: "If an assault was made to endanger their lives, the law is clear, they had the right to kill in self-defense . . . ." Adams conceded, however, that if the assault "was not so severe as to endanger their lives . . . [then] this was a provocation, for which the law reduces the offense of killing down to manslaughter."
Robert Treat Paine concluded the case for the prosecution. He told the jurors that the soldiers had unlawfully assembled in front of the Customs House, loading their muskets with double shot, which inflamed the crowd. The soldiers then opened fire without any order from Capt. Preston. They did this, Paine argued, not to defend themselves, but out of malice. The redcoats sought revenge for all the insults and harassment they had suffered since arriving in Boston. Thus he called on the jury to find the soldiers who fired guilty of murder.
After instructions from the judge, the case went to the jury to deliberate on a verdict. In the activity that follows, you will have a chance to act as the jury decide on your own verdict.
Here is a link to my blog called, "The Politico Insider."
http://thepoliticolinsider.blogspot.com/