PRAIRIE DEFENDER: THE MURDER TRIALS OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN

Southern Illinois University Press just sent me the copy for the dust jacket of the book, Prairie Defender, asking me to look it over and see if I approved of it. I read the copy and thought "Dad gum, that sounds like a good book. I'd like to read it." And I really would like to read it again--even though I've read it countless times already getting it ready for printing. That's the way I am with a book I really like, I read it and re-read it numerous times. When I was a kid, I read my grandmother's copy of Swiss Family Robinson until the covers fell off.

I thoroughly enjoyed writing Prairie Defender, and I thoroughly enjoy every re-reading of it. I certainly hope the reading public gets as much pleasure out of it as I do. Here's the copy that's going to be on the inside flap of the dust cover:

According to conventional wisdom, Abraham Lincoln spent most of his law career collecting debt and representing railroads, and this focus made him inept at defending clients in homicide cases. In this unprecedented study of Lincoln’s criminal cases, George Dekle disproves these popular notions, showing that Lincoln was first and foremost a trial lawyer. Through careful examination of Lincoln’s homicide cases and evaluation of his legal skills, Dekle demonstrates that criminal law was an important part of Lincoln’s practice and that he was quite capable of defending people accused of murder, trying approximately one such case per year.

Dekle begins by presenting the viewpoints of not only those who see Lincoln as a perfect lawyer whose only flaw was his inability to represent the wrong side of a case but also those who believe Lincoln was a less-than-honest legal hack. The author invites readers to compare these wildly different stereotypes with the flesh-and-blood Lincoln revealed in each case described in the book, including an axe murder suit in which Lincoln assisted the prosecution, a poisoning case he refused to prosecute for $200 but defended for $75, and a case he won by proving that a supposed murder victim was actually still alive.

For each case Dekle covers, he first tells the stories of the feuds, arguments, and insults that led to murder and other criminal activity, giving a gripping view of the seamy side of life in nineteenth-century Illinois. Then he traces the course of the pretrial litigation, describes the trials and the various tactics employed in the prosecution and defense, and critiques the performance of both Lincoln and his adversaries.

Dekle concludes that Lincoln was a competent, diligent criminal trial lawyer who knew the law, could argue it effectively to both judge and jury, and would use all lawful means to defend clients whether he believed them to be innocent or guilty. His trial record shows Lincoln to have been a formidable defense lawyer who won many seemingly hopeless cases through his skill as a courtroom tactician, cross-examiner, and orator. Criminal defendants who could retain Lincoln as a defense attorney were well represented, and criminal defense attorneys who sought him as co-counsel were well served. Providing insight into both Lincoln’s legal career and the culture in which he practiced law, Prairie Defender resolves a major misconception concerning one of our most important historical figures.

PRAIRIE DEFENDER: THE MURDER TRIALS OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN

My next book is a survey of the criminal trial practice of Abraham Lincoln which focuses on the homicide cases which he both prosecuted and defended. The book is now in the copy editing stage, and it should be published sometime next year. Southern Illinois University Press is already taking pre-publication orders for it. It's also being sold on Amazon and Barnes & Noble.

As a sort of a preview of the book, here is the annotated table of contents:

TABLE OF CONTENTS: 

PRAIRIE DEFENDER: THE MURDER TRIALS OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN

INTRO: THE LEGEND OF LINCOLN THE LAWYER:
Discusses the commonly told stories about Lincoln as a practicing lawyer, roughly dividing them into two types: "Lincolnolatry," which portrays Lincoln as a saintly lawyer who never raised technical defenses and could not defend guilty clients; and "Lincolnoclasm," which portrays him as an unethical legal hack with marginal lawyerly skills.  Also discusses the commonly  held belief that Lincoln was not an accomplished criminal trial lawyer.

CH. 1: PEOPLE versus HENRY B. TRUETT, October 13, 1838:
 In his first murder case, which was prosecuted by Stephen A. Douglas, the defense faces the daunting task of trying to neutralize an almost open-and-shut case for the prosecution. Lincoln is trusted by his far more experienced co-counsel to give the summation for the defense. He talks the jury into acquitting.

CH. 2: PEOPLE versus WILLIAM FRAIM, April 23, 1839:
William Fraim stabs a man to death because the man blew cigar smoke in his face. Lincoln is appointed to represent him, loses the case, and Fraim is hanged despite Lincoln's efforts to have the case dismissed on a technicality.

CH. 3: PEOPLE versus SPENCER TURNER, May 23, 1840:
Lincoln teams with Stephen A. Douglas to successfully defend a man on a charge of murder and has to sue him to collect his attorney’s fee.

CH. 4: PEOPLE versus ARCHIBALD AND WILLIAM TRAILOR, June 18, 1841:
In a case which remains a mystery to this day, Lincoln defends two brothers accused of murder and proves they are not guilty by proving (much to his clients’ surprise) that the victim is not dead. Lincoln again has to sue to collect his fee. He later writes an article about the case entitled “Remarkable Case of Arrest for Murder.”

CH. 5: VARIOUS CRIMINAL CASES, 1845-1846:
Discusses a number of cases for which very little evidence has survived.
 
CH. 6: PEOPLE versus JAMES AND GEORGE DENTON, June 12, 1846:
Lincoln is retained to assist the prosecution in an axe murder. The first trial results in a hung jury, and the second results in an acquittal. This trial is cited as evidence of Lincoln’s inability to prosecute. The chapter investigates whether this case really supports the claim that Lincoln was not a good prosecutor.

CH. 7: VARIOUS CRIMINAL CASES, 1850-1853:
Discussion of more cases for which very little evidence survives.

CH. 8: PEOPLE versus MOSES LOE, May 19, 1853:
Loe waylays Gray, knocks him to the ground with a club, and then stabs him in the throat. It’s an open and shut case of murder. Through some adroit pretrial maneuvering and skillful trial work Lincoln is able to obtain a manslaughter conviction, which courtroom observers count as a loss for the prosecution.

CH. 9: PEOPLE versus DAVID LONGNECKER, June 3, 1856:
Longnecker, a lawyer, stabs a former client to death in an argument over unpaid legal fees. He is indicted and tried for murder, and the jury hangs. When the case comes up for retrial, Lincoln has joined the defense team. The jury hangs again. Lincoln writes and circulates a petition asking the prosecutor to drop the charges. It is signed by 14 members of the bar. The prosecutor dismisses the case.

CH. 10: LINCOLN'S PARDON PRACTICE:
Discusses Lincoln’s very active and successful practice in obtaining pardons for his clients. Pays particular attention to the case of George High, where Lincoln obtained a pardon for the leader of the Redwood Gang, a gang of horse thieves which engaged in interstate trafficking in stolen horses and used classic organized crime tactics. Attempts to understand how Lincoln could have associated himself with efforts to pardon such an unrepentant and unworthy person as George High.

CH. 11: PEOPLE versus JANE AND THEODORE ANDERSON, November 28, 1856:
Lincoln turns down an offer of $200 to prosecute a poisoning case and accepts a $75 fee to defend it. In a sensational, high-profile case Lincoln obtains an acquittal.

CH. 12: PEOPLE versus ISAAC WYANT, April 4, 1857:
Lincoln prosecutes one of the first cases in U.S. jurisprudence where the insanity defense is successfully interposed. This is another case cited as authority for the proposition that he was not a good prosecutor. We investigate the validity of charges that Lincoln botched the prosecution.

CH. 13: PEOPLE versus JOHN BANTZHOUSE, October 2, 1857:
Lincoln's client is freed when a murder indictment is dismissed on a technicality, and he flees the jurisdiction before the prosecutor can obtain another indictment. This case is often cited as an example of Lincoln's use of underhanded tactics. We investigate whether Lincoln engaged in improper conduct in the case.

CH. 14: PEOPLE versus MELISSA GOINGS, October 10, 1857:
Lincoln defends a woman charged with killing her husband. She disappears from the courthouse during a recess in the proceedings. When asked where she was, Lincoln is supposed to have said “She asked me where she could get a drink of water, and I told her there was some mighty good water in Tennessee.” Did he advise his client to flee the jurisdiction? Could this possibly have happened? We investigate the likelihood of this incident actually happening. If it did happen, what does this say about Lincoln’s ethics?

CH. 15: PEOPLE versus DUFF ARMSTRONG, May 7, 1858:
We give an outline sketch of Lincoln’s famous Almanac Trial, discussing certain aspects of the case not covered in Abraham Lincoln's Most Famous Case: The Almanac Trial. 

CH. 16: PEOPLE versus TOM PATTERSON, April 21, 1859:
This is the case which is most often cited for the proposition that Lincoln could not defend a guilty client. Lincoln supposedly decided midway through the trial that his client was guilty and refused to participate further in the defense. We examine the evidence that Lincoln quit in the middle of the case and weigh it against conflicting evidence that he did no such thing.

CH. 17: PEOPLE versus PEACHY QUINN HARRISON, September 3, 1859:
Lincoln defends the grandson of his old political rival Peter Cartwright against a charge of murdering a former law student of Lincoln’s. Some suggestion has been made that Lincoln used questionable tactics to introduce inadmissible evidence and free a murderer. We investigate this charge to determine its merits.

CH. 18: THE LEGACY OF LINCOLN THE LAWYER:
We assess the Lincoln shown by the historical record against the Lincoln of the Lincolnolators and the Lincoln of the Lincolnoclasts.

PRAIRIE DEFENDER: THE MURDER TRIALS OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN

When I was writing AbrahamLincoln’s Most Famous Case: The Almanac Trial I was struck by the fact that Lincoln had tried a lot of interesting murder cases. I decided to write a book about Lincoln’s last murder case, People v. Peachy Quinn Harrison, because (1) it contrasted quite nicely with the Almanac Trial, and (2) a transcript of the trial has survived to this day and is available in pdf online at the Law Practice of Abraham Lincoln website. With the Almanac The only evidence was the reminiscences of the participants; with the Harrison trial we had a transcript and numerous newspaper reports. The defendant in the Almanac Trial came from a family that was poor as church mice; the defendant in the Harrison case came from a rich and powerful family. The victim in the Almanac Trial was a poor dirt farmer; the victim in the Harrison case was the son of a rich and powerful politician. Both cases had about an equal number of witnesses, and both cases had about the same degree of complexity; but the Almanac Trial was tried in an afternoon and the Harrison trial took a week. Did Lincoln try harder when there was money to be made defending a case?

I soon realized that the Harrison case wasn’t going to make a very thick book, so I decided to expand the book to cover all of Lincoln’s homicide trials, both murder and manslaughter. Devoting a chapter to each trial, and taking the trials in chronological order, I tell the story of the killing, introduce the lawyers, and describe how they contested the cases. Trying a case back then was somewhat more primitive than today, but reading those cases brought back memories of my early days as a public defender in the Third Circuit of Florida. Believe it or not, the 1970’s Third Judicial Circuit was very much like Illinois’ 1850’s Eighth Judicial Circuit. The main difference was that I rode an un-airconditioned Dodge Dart around the Third Circuit and Lincoln rode a horse around the Eighth. Well, there may have been more differences than that, but the atmosphere of the two circuits was very similar. We tried cases just as fast and furious as they did back before the Civil War, and we did it with about the same amount of discovery. But I’m digressing.

We know very little about some of Lincoln’s cases, so I have three summary chapters to talk about the less-well-documented cases. And I look at some interesting non-murder cases, too, like the time Lincoln defended an organized crime boss. I couldn’t help but be struck with what a good trial lawyer Lincoln was. The conventional wisdom says Lincoln was first and foremost a politician, but looking at his cases tells a different story. Something else that struck me was how good some of the lawyers he opposed were. There was Leonard Swett, who was probably the best criminal defense attorney in Illinois; and T. Lyle Dickey, who could talk a judge into freeing a convicted killer; and Stephen T. Logan, who taught four future U.S. Senators, three future governors, and one future president how to practice law. 

And an amazing number of Lincoln’s colleagues at the bar went on to distinguish themselves as general officers in the Civil War. There was Major General John A. McClernand, who served as Grant’s second in command at Vicksburg; and Major General John M. Palmer, who distinguished himself at Stones River and Chickamauga; and Brigadier General William Orme, who contracted tuberculosis at Vicksburg. My favorite has to be Brevet Brigadier General Caleb Dilworth, who became a brigade commander because all the officers above him were killed in action. Dilworth distinguished himself at Kennesaw Mountain, Chickamauga, and the Siege of Atlanta. Then there was the tragic figure of Edward D. Baker, a sitting U.S. Senator who declined an appointment as Major General to serve as a Colonel, and was killed in action at the Battle of Ball’s Bluff. Lincoln cried when he heard of Baker’s death.

Just as the Third Circuit of the 1970’s had its share of colorful lawyers, Lincoln’s Eighth Circuit had some colorful lawyers, too. There was Ward Hill Lamon, who liked to engage in wrestling matches during court recesses; and Usher F. Linder, who didn’t care what the judge said, he was going to smoke in court come Hell or high water; and Josiah Lamborn, who thought that a prosecutor was an Avenger of Blood rather than a minister of justice, who once browbeat a man into confessing to a murder that never happened; and David Longnecker, who stabbed a client to death in an argument over a $40.00 legal fee. Discretion prevents me from naming or describing any of the colorful characters of the Third Circuit.

So I wrote Lincoln for the Defense: The Criminal Law Practice of Our Sixteenth President, and I had more fun writing it than any previous book I've written. Only the publisher didn't like the title. And they had some ideas for changing some other things about the book. So the thesis of Lincoln for the Defense met the antithesis of the Southern Illinois University Press, and the synthesis was Prairie Defender: The Murder Trials of Abraham Lincoln. I had to tighten the book up some, remove a number of irrelevant digressions, and give the book an actual structure rather than just having a collection of good stories about interesting cases Lincoln tried. And I have to admit that Prairie Defender is better than Lincoln for the Defense. 

Prairie Defender comes out in July of next year, but SIU is already taking pre-publication orders for it.