have passed a dollar of money to any body. They continued their ordinary
habits of labor. No man saw money about them, nor any circumstance that
might lead to a suspicion that they had money. Nothing occurred tending in
any degree to excite suspicion against them. When arrested, and when all
this array of evidence was brought against them, and when they could hope
in nothing but their innocence, immunity was offered them again if they
would confess. They were pressed, and urged, and allured, by every motive
which could be set before them, to acknowledge their participation in the
offence, and to bring out their accomplices. They steadily protested that
they could confess nothing because they knew nothing. In defiance of all
the discoveries made in their house, they have trusted to their innocence.
On that, and on the candor and discernment of an enlightened jury, they
still rely. If the jury are satisfied that there is the highest
improbability that these persons could have had any previous knowledge of
Goodridge, or been concerned in any previous concert to rob him; if their
conduct that evening and the next day was marked by no circumstances of
suspicion; if from that moment until their arrest nothing appeared against
them; if they neither passed money, nor are found to have had money; if
the manner of the search of their house, and the circumstances attending
it, excite strong suspicions of unfair and fraudulent practices; if, in
the hour of their utmost peril, no promises of safety could draw from the
defendants any confession affecting themselves or others, it will be for
the jury to say whether they can pronounce them guilty.




The Dartmouth College Case.