ARGUMENT OF HON. DANIEL W. VOORHEES, OF TERRE HAUTE, INDIANA. DELIVERED AT CHARLESTOWN, VIRGINIA, NOVEMBER 8, 1859, UPON THE TRIAL OF JOHN E. COOK, INDICTED FOR TREASON, MURDER AND INCITING SLAVES TO REBEL, AT THE HARPER'S FERRY INSURRECTION

[np, 1859. 4pp. Caption title [as issued]. Folded, untrimmed. Blank margins badly chipped, several short closed tears at margins [no text loss]. Light soiling. Fragile copy. Good only.

One of two 1859 printings of Voorhees's argument in this historic case, the other having issued from Indianapolis. Voorhees, U.S. Attorney for Indiana, was a Democratic Congressman from that State during the Civil War. Cook, an enthusiastic co-conspirator with John Brown, was Indiana Governor Willard's brother-in-law; John Brown's raid was perhaps hastened by the (truncated) fact that Cook "was already at Harper's Ferry, where he soon found a job and a wife. Brown was acutely fearful that Cook would talk too much." Potter, Impending Crisis 369.
Cook's defense was rendered relatively simple by his confession to having collaborated in the botched raid and slave rebellion. Voorhees's jury argument begs for mercy and flatters the Virginians, who have "thrown around a band of deluded men, who invaded her soil with treason and murder, all the safeguards of her Constitution and laws, and placed them in her courts upon an equality with her own citizens...It is one of the chief blessings of power that it can extend mercy to the weak." Moreover, Cook was unduly influenced by the abolitionists and, especially, Brown himself: in Kansas, "that field of fanaticism, three years ago, this fair and gentle youth was thrown into contact with the pirate and robber of civil warfare."
During the Civil War Voorhees "was one of the most virulent of those Democrats whose criticisms were heard throughout the war period. To him abolitionism and secession were equally hateful; and he bewailed the breaches of the Constitution and the tyranny of the war government in terms of unmeasured opprobrium." DAB.
OCLC 5159556 [8] as of January 2025. See II Harv. Law Cat. 850 and Swem 6188 [Richmond: 1861]. Not in Sabin, Marke, Work, Blockson, Dumond, Bartlett, Eberstadt, Decker, Haynes, Finkelman. (Inventory #: 22999)