The Motion About The Judge

A lawyer was facing contempt proceedings before a circuit judge after refusing to answer whether he had helped make the defendants in a libel suit unavailable to be served with subpoenas. He filed a motion to disqualify the judge, then a motion for a change of venue, which his own lawyer read aloud in court. The motion said the judge was acting as police officer, chief prosecution witness, grand jury, chief prosecutor and judge all at once, and was intimidating defence counsel. The judge at once declared both lawyers in contempt, calling the motion and the argument contemptuous, and fined each $50 under a state law allowing summary punishment for vile, contemptuous or insulting language addressed to a judge. The lawyers argued they had only asked, in respectful terms, for an unbiased judge, and had not disrupted the court.