"Clarence Darrow [was] perhaps the most effective courtroom opponent of cant, bigotry, and special privilege that our country has produced. All of Darrow's most celebrated pleas are herein defense of Leopold and Loeb (1924), of Lieutenant Massie (1932), of Big Bill Haywood (1907), of Thomas Scopes (1925), and of himself for attempted bribery."The New Yorker

Arthur Weinberg was the Lloyd Lewis Fellow in American History at the Newberry Library in Chicago at the time of his death in 1989. He was the coauthor, with Lila Weinberg, of The Muckrackers, Verdicts Out of Court, and Clarence Darrow: A Sentimental Rebel, among other books.

Foreword by Justice William O. Douglas

Introduction by Arthur Weinberg

Part One - Against Vengeance

Crime and Criminals

Address, Chicago, 1902: Inmates of County Jail in Chicago get a lecture on revolutionary theories of crime.

The Crime of Compulsion

Leopold and Loeb, Chicago, 1924: Teen-age sons of two millionaires attempt the perfect crimekidnaping and murder

Is Capital Punishment a Wise Policy?

Debate, New York, 1924: Darrow debates Judge Talley who challenged Darrow's views on crime and capital punishment.

The "Unwritten Law"

The Massie Case, Honolulu, 1932: A strange and puzzling case, a study of psychology; kidnaping and murder because of honor

Part Two - Against Prejudice

Freedom Knows No Limits

The Communist Trial, Chicago, 1920: Twenty members of the Communist Labor party are charged with "conspiracy to advocate the overthrow of the government by force."

You Can't Teach That!

The Scopes Evolution Case, Dayton, Tennessee, 1925: Darrow meets William Jennings Bryan in the famous "Monkey Trial."

You Can't Live There!

The Sweet Case, Detroit, 1926: A Negro family moves into a white neighborhood. A mob attempts to get them to move. One of the mob is killed. Dr. Sweet and friends are indicted for murder.

Part Three - Against Privilege

Somewhere There Is a Conspiracy

The Kidd Case, Oshkosh, Wisconsin, 1898: Kidd, a union organizer, is charged with conspiracy, growing out of a strike in the large sash-and-door factory in Oshkosh

Strike, Arbitration

Anthracite Miners,, Scranton and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, 1903: Darrow represents the United Mine Workers' union before President Theodore Roosevelt's Anthracite Miner Commission, investigating conditions in the mines.

A Governor Is Murdered

Steve Adams, Wallace, Idaho, 1907; Haywood, Moyer and Pettibone, Boise, Idaho, 1907: Steve Adams, the prologue to the Haywood case. Haywood, first of three union leaders tried for the murder of ex-Governor Steunenberg; the confession of Harry Orchard and his story.

Part Four - For Justice

They Tried to Get Me

Darrow in his Own Defense, Los Angeles, 1912: Darrow is indicted and tried for attemped bribe of a juror in the McNamara case. He accuses his enemies as conspirators against his freedom.

John Brown 1800-1859

"One of the most purest and bravest and highest-minded patriots of any age."

John Peter Altgeld 1847-1902

"A lover of his fellow-men."

Sources

Selected Bibliography

Index