"amendment providing that the counsel for the
prisoner shall have the right to close the argu-
ment.
Mr. BOWIE. Move a separate article.
SEVERAL VOICES. Move a re-consideration.
Mr. DIRICKSON. I did not vote for the article.
Mr. PHELPS. I did—and I move a re-consid-
eration, so that the gentleman, (Mr. Dirick-
son,) can offer his amendment.
Mr DIRICKSON offered the following amend-
ment.
Add at the end of the article, the following:
"And upon his trial, "his counsel shall have the
privilege of making the closing address to the
court or jury."
Mr. JENIFER suggested, that perhaps the prop-
er place for this amendment would be the judi-
ciary bill.
Mr. DORSEY moved to amend the amendment
by adding at the end thereof, the following:
"And that the State have the same right of
challenging jurors that the accused has."
And the question being on the amendment to
the amendment,
Mr. STEWART, of Baltimore city, asked the
yeas and nays, which were ordered, and, being
taken, were as follows:
Affirmative—Messrs. Morgan, Blakistone, Dent,
Chambers of Kent, Mitchell, Donaldson, Dorsey,
Wells, Kent, Weems, Sellers, Brent of Charles,
Merrick, Jenifer, Chandler, John Dennis, Wil-
liams, Goldsborough, Bowie, Sprigg, McCubbin,
Gaither, Presstman, Davis, and Hollyday—25.
Negative—Messrs. Chapman, President, Lee,
Dalrymple, Bond, Buchanan, Bell, Welch,
Ridgely, Colston, Dashiell, Eccleston, Phelps,
Chambers of Cecil, Miller, McLane, George,
Dirickson, McMaster, Hearn, Fooks, Jacobs,
Shriver, Sappington, Magraw, Nelson, Carter,
Thawley, Hardcastle, Gwinn, Stewart of Balti-
more city. Brent of Baltimore city. Ware, Fiery,
John Newcomer, Michael Newcomer, Kilgour,
Weber, Slicer, Fitzpatrick, Ege, Shower, and
Cockey—43.
So the amendment to the amendment was re-
jected.
The question then recurred on the amendment
of Mr. DIRICKSON. ,
Mr. DONALDSON, said: it was proper that we
should know clearly what we are about when
we propose radical changes in the law. We live
in a community of honest men; and it is not the
fact that injustice was done to accused persons,
in our administration of the criminal law. When
a man charged with crime is put upon his trial,
his right of challenge is so extensive as in effect
to give him the choice of his own jury, whilst the
State can only challenge for cause He thought
that we ought not to extend the right of chal-
lenge to the State, as the practice now exists.
He had voted for it as an amendment to the
amendment of the gentleman from Worcester,
(Mr. Dirickson,) because he feared that amend-
ment might prevail, although he hoped it would
not. If the counsel for the accused was to have
the closing speech, he was in favor of allowing
the State the right of peremptory challenge.

Every facility is already afforded to an accused
person, to enable him to prove his innocence.
All presumptions of law are in his favor, and he
has the advantage of every technical defect
which astuteness may detect in the proceedings.
When his case comes up, even should the charge
be most heinous, the sympathy is almost always
on his side; counsel is provided for him, if he is
unable to pay for such services. The Attorney
General or his deputy is actuated by no vindic-
tive feelings; he is not like the avenger of blood
in the old testament, pursuing the slayer to the
cities of refuge. He stands in the position not of
counsel, but of judge advocate. He opens the
case with a description of the offence and its
circumstance, and states the law and its applica-
tion. The prisoner's counsel follows, examining
and often preventing the facts in evidence, ana
answering the arguments of the prosecutor. And
although the prosecuting attorney follows in re-
ply, lie is not permitted to introduce any new
matter; and not being an advocate, as his oppo-
nent is, but representing the dignity of the State,
he is bound not to descend to any unworthy arti-
fice. Great complaints have been made of the
extent to which the counsel for a prisoner fre-
quently goes in order to obtain an acquittal; and
if the advantage proposed by this amendment be
added to the facilities already allowed—if the
prisoner's counsel is to have the final speech and
thereby have full license, without contradiction,
to state such principles of law, and place such a
construction on facts as may most favor his end,—
it would be the means of throwing back into the
community a still greater number of persons who
ought to have been convicted. He knew that
the gentleman from Worcester was actuated by
pure motives when be offered this amendment,
but believing it would be mischievous, he felt
bound to oppose it.
Mr. DIRICKSON said:
He did not claim the entire credit of the
amendment which he had just submitted to the
Convention—it having been in part, suggested
by the honorable gentleman from Harford coun-
ty, (Mr. Magraw,) now upon his right. Fami-
liar with the proceedings of courts of justice from
his earliest manhood, it had been his fortune to
witness many prosecutions for criminal offences,
and he had often observed the terrible effect of
the last uncontradicted speech against the accus-
ed, The motive that had induced the offering
of the proposition, was in perfect harmony with
the humane spirit of that principle which was
eminently the characteristic of all criminal law
in all Christian lands' And when he said, it was
better "that ninety and nine guilty persons should
escape, rather than one innocent man receive
unmerited punishment," he uttered a doctrine
familiar to all—and one, the justice and propri-
ety of which, no one for a moment doubted. It
had been argued by the gentleman from Anne
Arundel county, that the prosecuting attorney
acted both as prosecutor and judge advocate.
That such ought to, 'and might occasionally, have
been the case, he did not deny—but he was in-
duced to believe that professional pride, must of-