Lend Me Your Ears: Great Speeches in History

by Unknown

  I was thinking last night about this case and their theory and how it didn’t make sense and how it didn’t fit and how something is wrong. It occurred to me how they were going to come here, stand up here and tell you how O. J. Simpson was going to disguise himself. He was going to put on a knit cap and some dark clothes, and he was going to get in his white Bronco, this recognizable person, and go over and kill his wife. That’s what they want you to believe. That’s how silly their argument is.

  And I said to myself, maybe I can demonstrate this graphically. Let me show you something. This is a knit cap. Let me put this knit cap on. [Puts on cap.] You have seen me for a year. If I put this knit cap on, who am I? Still I’m Johnnie Cochran with a knit cap. And if you looked at O. J. Simpson over there—and he has a rather large head—O. J. Simpson in a knit cap from two blocks away is still O. J. Simpson. It’s no disguise. It’s no disguise. It makes no sense. It doesn’t fit. If it doesn’t fit, you must acquit….

  I hope that during this phase of my argument I have demonstrated to you that this really is a case about a rush to judgment, an obsession to win, at all costs, a willingness to distort, twist, theorize in any fashion to try to get you to vote guilty in this case where it is not warranted. These metaphors about an ocean of evidence or a mountain of evidence are little more than a tiny, tiny stream, if at all, that points equally toward innocence, that any mountain has long ago been reduced to little more than a molehill under an avalanche of lies and complexity and conspiracy.

  This is what we’ve shown you. And so as great as America is, we have not yet reached the point where there is equality in rights or equality of opportunity.

  I started off talking to you a little bit about Frederick Douglass and what he said more than a hundred years ago, for there are still the Mark Fuhrmans in this world, in this country, who hate and are yet embraced by people in power. But you and I, fighting for freedom and ideals and for justice for all, must continue to fight to expose hate and genocidal racism and these tendencies. We then become the guardians of the Constitution….

  This case is a tragedy for everybody, for certainly the victims and their families, for the Simpson family—and they are victims, too, because they lost the ex-daughter-in-law—for the defendant. He has been in custody since June of 1994 for a crime that he didn’t commit. Someone has taken these children’s mother. I certainly hope that your decision doesn’t take their father….

  I may never have an opportunity again to speak to you, certainly not in this setting…. In times like these we often turn to the Bible for some answers…. I happen to really like the book of Proverbs and in Proverbs it talks a lot about false witnesses. It says that a false witness shall not be unpunished and he that speaketh lies shall not escape.

  That meant a lot to me in this case because there was Mark Fuhrman acting like a choirboy, making you believe he was the best witness that walked in here, generally applauded for his wonderful performance. It turns out he was the biggest liar in this courtroom during this process, for the Bible had already told us the answer, that a false witness shall not be unpunished and he that speaketh lies shall not escape. In that same book it tells us that a faithful witness will not lie but a false witness will utter lies. Finally, in Proverbs it says that he that speaketh the truth showeth the forthrightfulness but a false witness shows deceit.

  So when we are talking about truth, we are talking about truth and lies and conspiracies and cover-ups. I always think about one of my favorite poems, which I think is so very appropriate for this case. You know when things are at the darkest there is always light the next day. In your life, in all of our lives, you have the capacity to transform Mr. O. J. Simpson’s dark yesterday into bright tomorrow. You have that capacity. You have that power in your hands. And James Russell Lowell said it best about wrong and evil. He said that truth forever on the scaffold, wrong forever on the throne, yet that scaffold sways the future and beyond the dim unknown standeth God within the shadows, keeping watch above his own.

  You walk with that every day, you carry that with you and things will come to you and you will be able to reveal people who come to you in uniforms and high positions who lie and are corrupt. That is what happened in this case and so the truth is now out. It is now up to you. We are going to pass this baton to you soon.

  You will do the right thing. You have made a commitment for justice. You will do the right thing. I will someday go on to other cases, no doubt as will Miss Clark and Mr. Darden. Judge Ito will try another case someday, I hope, but this is O. J. Simpson’s one day in court.

  By your decision you control his very life in your hands. Treat it carefully. Treat it fairly. Be fair. Don’t be part of this continuing cover-up. Do the right thing, remembering that “If it doesn’t fit, you must acquit.” That if these messengers have lied to you, you can’t trust their message. That this has been a search for truth. That no matter how bad it looks, if truth is out there on a scaffold and wrong is in here on the throne, when that scaffold sways, in the future and beyond the dim unknown standeth the same God for all people keeping watch above his own.

  He watches all of us and he will watch you in your decision. Thank you for your attention. God bless you.

  VI

  GALLOWS AND FAREWELL SPEECHES

  Socrates, Condemned to Death, Addresses His Judges

  “It is now time to depart—for me to die, for you to live. But which of us is going to a better state is unknown to everyone but God.”

  Wise, principled, good-natured even in the face of death, Greek philosopher Socrates lived his philosophy of seeking virtue in self-knowledge.

  Son of an Athenian sculptor, Socrates eschewed other employment to be a public teacher, using questions to elicit dialectical truths. Falling into disfavor with the ruling powers of Athens, however, he was arrested and tried, ostensibly for two stated charges: “firstly, of denying the gods recognized by the state and introducing new divinities; and, secondly, of corrupting the young.” Found guilty in a trial clouded by political issues, he refused to compromise his principles by seeking a lighter sentence and was condemned to death in 399 B.C.

  Perhaps most remarkable about his address to the judges is his evenness of temper, evinced by a gentle humor and spirit of teaching that belie any fear of impending death. With an expert use of direct address (“O Athenians” and “O my judges”) and allusions to historical figures “who have died by an unjust sentence,” he leads his listeners into a philosophical contemplation of death and the desire for good.

  The peroration, or dramatic conclusion to the speech, summarizes his central point, “that to a good man nothing is evil, neither while living nor when dead.”

  ***

  THAT I SHOULD not be grieved, O Athenians, at what has happened—namely, that you have condemned me—as well many other circumstances concur in bringing to pass; and, moreover, this, that what has happened has not happened contrary to my expectation; but I much rather wonder at the number of votes on either side. For I did not expect that I should be condemned by so small a number, but by a large majority; but now, as it seems, if only three more votes had changed sides, I should have been acquitted….

  For the sake of no long space of time, O Athenians, you will incur the character and reproach at the hands of those who wish to defame the city, of having put that wise man Socrates to death. For those who wish to defame you will assert that I am wise, though I am not. If, then, you had waited for a short time, this would have happened of its own accord; for observe my age, that it is far advanced in life and near death. But I say this not to you all but to those only who have condemned me to die. And I say this, too, to the same persons. Perhaps you think, O Athenians, that I have been convicted through the want of arguments, by which I might have persuaded you, had I thought it right to do and say anything, so that I might escape punishment. Far otherwise: I have been convicted through want indeed, yet not of arguments but of audacity and impudence, and of the inclination to say s
uch things to you as would have been most agreeable for you to hear, had I lamented and bewailed and done and said many other things unworthy of me, as I affirm, but such as you are accustomed to hear from others. But neither did I then think that I ought, for the sake of avoiding danger, to do anything unworthy of a freeman, nor do I now repent of having so defended myself; but I should much rather choose to die, having so defended myself, than to live in that way. For neither in a trial nor in battle is it right that I or anyone else should employ every possible means whereby he may avoid death; for in battle it is frequently evident that a man might escape death by laying down his arms and throwing himself on the mercy of his pursuers. And there are many other devices in every danger, by which to avoid death, if a man dares to do and say everything. But this is not difficult, O Athenians, to escape death; but it is much more difficult to avoid depravity, for it runs swifter than death. And now I, being slow and aged, am overtaken by the slower of the two; but my accusers, being strong and active, have been overtaken by the swifter, wickedness. And now I depart, condemned by you to death; but they condemned by truth, as guilty of iniquity and injustice: and I abide my sentence, and so do they. These things, perhaps, ought so to be, and I think that they are for the best….

  I say, then, to you, O Athenians, who have condemned me to death, that immediately after my death a punishment will overtake you far more severe, by Jupiter! than that which you have inflicted on me. For you have done this, thinking you should be freed from the necessity of giving an account of your lives. The very contrary, however, as I affirm, will happen to you. Your accusers will be more numerous, whom I have now restrained, though you did not perceive it; and they will be more severe, inasmuch as they are younger, and you will be more indignant. For if you think that by putting men to death you will restrain anyone from upbraiding you because you do not live well, you are much mistaken; for this method of escape is neither possible nor honorable; but that other is most honorable and most easy, not to put a check upon others, but for a man to take heed to himself how he may be most perfect. Having predicted thus much to those of you who have condemned me, I take my leave of you….

  To die is one of two things: for either the dead may be annihilated and have no sensation of anything whatever, or, as it is said, there are a certain change and passage of the soul from one place to another. And if it is a privation of all sensation—as it were, a sleep in which the sleeper has no dream—death would be a wonderful gain. For I think that if anyone, having selected a night in which he slept so soundly as not to have had a dream, and having compared this night with all the other nights and days of his life, should be required, on consideration, to say how many days and nights he had passed better and more pleasantly than this night throughout his life, I think that not only a private person but even the great king himself would find them easy to number, in comparison with other days and nights.

  If, therefore, death is a thing of this kind, I say it is a gain; for thus all futurity appears to be nothing more than one night. But if, on the other hand, death is a removal from hence to another place, and what is said be true, that all the dead are there, what greater blessing can there be than this, my judges? For if, on arriving at Hades, released from these who pretend to be judges, one shall find those who are true judges and who are said to judge there, Minos and Rhadamanthus, Aeacus and Triptolemus, and such others of the demigods as were just during their own lives, would this be a sad removal? At what price would you not estimate a conference with Orpheus and Musaeus, Hesiod and Homer? I, indeed, should be willing to die often, if this be true. For to me the sojourn there would be admirable, when I should meet with Palamedes, and Ajax, son of Telamon, and any other of the ancients who have died by an unjust sentence. The comparing my sufferings with theirs would, I think, be no unpleasing occupation. But the greatest pleasure would be to spend my time in questioning and examining the people there as I have done those here, and discovering who among them is wise, and who fancies himself to be so, but is not. At what price, my judges, would not anyone estimate the opportunity of questioning him who led that mighty army against Troy, or Ulysses, or Sisyphus, or ten thousand others whom one might mention, both men and women—with whom to converse and associate, and to question them, would be an inconceivable happiness? Surely for that judges there do not condemn to death; for in other respects those who live there are more happy than those who are here, and are henceforth immortal, if, at least, what is said to be true.

  You, therefore, O my judges, ought to entertain good hopes with respect to death, and to meditate on this one truth, that to a good man nothing is evil, neither while living nor when dead, nor are his concerns neglected by the gods. And what has befallen me is not the effect of chance; but this is clear to me, that now to die and be freed from my cares is better for me. On this account the warning in no way turned me aside; and I bear no resentment toward those who condemned me, or against my accusers, although they did not condemn and accuse me with this intention, but thinking to injure me: in this they deserve to be blamed.

  Thus much, however, I beg of them. Punish my sons when they grow up, O judges, paining them, as I have pained you, if they appear to you to care for riches or anything else before virtue; and if they think themselves to be something when they are nothing, reproach them as I have done you, for not attending to what they ought, and for conceiving themselves to be something when they are worth nothing. If ye do this, both I and my sons shall have met with just treatment at your hands.

  But it is now time to depart—for me to die, for you to live. But which of us is going to a better state is unknown to everyone but God.

  Charles I and, Later, His Regicide Speak from the Scaffold

  “Hurt not the ax that may hurt me.”

  The upheaval of the English monarchy during the seventeenth century led inevitably to civil war, retributions, and bloodshed.

  More than two decades after James VI of Scotland became James I of England, the king died. His second son survived him and in 1625 ascended to the throne as King Charles I. A ruler more interested in the privileges of kingship and the reign of the Stuarts than in governance of the people, Charles I became embroiled in confrontations with Parliament that evolved into armed conflict. Oliver Cromwell, general and statesman, led the Roundheads—Parliament’s army, their hair cropped short to set them apart from the Cavaliers—to victory, and Charles I was condemned to death.

  His beheading, on January 30, 1649, followed a royal address from the scaffold in Whitehall. In this final speech, Charles I professes his faith, with New Testament overtones of charity and forgiveness for those who will execute him. The speech’s emphasis on endings is underscored by the king’s use of epistrophe, particularly in the repetition of the word “due” in “God will never prosper you, until you give God his due, the king his due…, and the people their due.”

  The turbulence between 1649 and 1660, a period that became known as the interregnum (“between kings”), ended when Charles I’s eldest son was called from Paris to assume the English throne as Charles II. Among the many regicides arrested in 1660 for the king’s death eleven years earlier, Thomas Harrison became the first put to death.

  Speaking in measured phrases, expressing no remorse for Charles I’s death, Harrison explains the palsy that makes some scoffers think he is “afraid to die.” With Christian humility that pervades his self-references as “poor worm” and “nothing creature,” he expresses his final thoughts with professions of joy and willingness to face death. The parallel structure found in most of his sentences (“by God I have leaped over a wall, by God I have run through a troop, and by my God I will go through this death”) shows the evenness of temperament—though not the royal generosity—with which Harrison faced the executioner.

  ***

  I SHALL BE very little heard of anybody here; I shall therefore speak a word unto you here; indeed I could hold my peace very well, if I did not think that holding my peace would make some men
think that I did submit to the guilt, as well as to the punishment; but I think it is my duty to God first and then to my country for to clear myself both as an honest man and a good king and a good Christian. I shall begin first with my innocency. In troth I think it not very needful for me to insist long upon this, for all the world knows that I never did begin a war with the two houses of Parliament, and I call God to witness, to whom I must shortly make my account, that I never did intend for to encroach upon their privileges; they began upon me, it is the militia, they began upon, they contest that the militia was mine, but they thought it fit for to have it from me; and to be short, if anybody will look to the dates of the commissions, of their commissions and mine, and likewise to the declarations, will see clearly that they began these unhappy troubles, not I; so that as the guilt of these enormous crimes that are laid against me, I hope in God that God will clear me of it, I will not, I am in charity; God forbid that I should lay it upon the two houses of Parliament; there is no necessity of either, I hope they are free of this guilt, for I do believe that ill instruments between them and me has been the chief cause of all this bloodshed; so that by way of speaking, as I find myself clear of this, I hope (and pray God) that they may too: yet for all this, God forbid that I should be so ill a Christian as not to say that God’s judgments are just upon me: many times he does pay justice by an unjust sentence, that is ordinary; I will only say this, that an unjust sentence that I suffered for to take effect is punished now, by an unjust sentence upon me; that is, so far I have said, to show you that I am an innocent man.

  Now for to show you that I am a good Christian: I hope there is a good man that will bear me witness, that I have forgiven all the world; even those in particular that have been the chief causes of my death; who they are, God knows, I do not desire to know, I pray God forgive them. But this is not all; my charity must go farther, I wish that they may repent, for indeed they have committed a great sin in that particular; I pray God with Saint Stephen that they may take the right way to the peace of the kingdom, for my charity commands me not only to forgive particular men, but my charity commands me to endeavor to the last gasp the peace of the kingdom: so, sirs, I do with all my soul, and I do hope (there is some here will carry it further) that they may endeavor the peace of the kingdom. Now, sirs, I must show you both how you are out of the way and will put you in a way; first, you are out of the way, for certainly all the way you ever had yet as I could find by anything is in the way of conquest; certainly this is an ill way, for conquest, sir, in my opinion is never just, except there be a good just cause, either for the matter of wrong or just title, and then if you go beyond it, the first quarrel that you have to it, that makes it unjust at the end, that was just as first: But if it be only matter of conquest, then it is a great robbery; as a pirate said to Alexander, that he was the great robber, he was but a petty robber; and so, sir, I do think the way that you are in, is much out of the way. Now, sir, for to put you in the way, believe it you will never do right, nor God will never prosper you, until you give God his due, the king his due (that is, my successor), and the people their due; I am as much for them as any of you; you must give God his due by regulating rightly his church according to his Scripture which is now out of order: for to set you in a way particularly now I cannot, but only this, a national synod freely called, freely debating among themselves, must settle this, when that every opinion is freely and clearly heard.