The Loeb-Leopold case - The Clarence Darrow Collection

The Loeb-Leopold Case
They are either lying to this court, or their opinion
is good. On the other hand, not one single man
called by the State had any chance to know. He
was called in to see these boys, the same as the State
would call a hangman: " Here are the boys; officer,
do your duty." And that is all there was of it.
I want to discuss now another thing which this
court must consider and which to my mind is abso-
lutely conclusive in this case. That is, the age of
these boys. I submit, your Honor, that it is not
possible for any court to hang these two boys if he
pays any attention whatever to the modern attitude
toward the young, if he pays any attention whatever
to the precedents in this country, if he pays any at-
tention to the humane instincts which move ordi-
nary men.
I have a list of executions in Cook County, begin-
ning in 1840, which I presume covers the first one,
because I asked to have it go to the beginning.
Ninety poor unfortunate men have given up their
lives to stop murder in Chicago. Ninety men have
been hanged by the neck until dead, because of the
ancient superstition that in some way hanging one
keeps another from committing a crime. The ancient
superstition, I say, because I defy the State to
point to a criminologist, scientist, a student, who
has ever said it. Still we go on, as if human conduct
was not influenced and controlled by natural laws
the same as all the rest of the universe is the subject
of law. We treat crime as if it had no cause. We
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