|
In March 1907, after three years of delays, attorney
Levy Mayer (1858–1922) successfully defended
Will J. Davis, Iroquois Theater manager.
Mayer's thirteen-hour argument before judge
Ernesis Kimbrough in
Danville, IL, asserted that Chicago's building
ordinances were so vague as to be unenforceable. The
ordinances were applied to classifications of
buildings that were designated by such nonspecific
terms as large audiences and required equipment
and construction conditions without specifying the
responsible entity -- builder, owner, or tenant. The
second point in Mayer's argument was that it didn't
matter how well or poorly the ordinances were
written since Chicago had not been granted authority
by the state of Illinois to write them at all.
According to Illinois state laws for cities and
villages, passed in 1872, Chicago's authority
insofar as fire regulations was limited to
demarcating zones in which wood buildings could not
be built. It had no power to pass ordinances
regulating fire preventive practices or equipment.
Since none of the charges brought in the Iroquois
Theater trial had to do with wood buildings or
zoning, and the ordinances at the basis for the
prosecution's charges were invalid under Illinois
state law, there wasn't a law with which to
prosecute Will Davis.
The jury was recessed during Mayer's lengthy
argument, brought back to deliver a directed
non-guilty verdict, then dismissed. The jury
included eight farmers, one miner, one blacksmith,
two merchants, and zero women. The jurors: Enos
Campbell, Andrew W. Carrington, Jay C. Foreman, Fred
Gibbs, L. Giddings, Douglas Graves, Robert Jaggers,
C.P. Jones, Paris H. Mendenhall, George Miller, and
J. L. Soale.
In delivering his ruling, Judge Kimbrough said that
while Davis might be morally guilty, Chicago's
defective ordinances prevented his being found legally guilty:
"If it were in my
power to bring back those young girls to life by
putting the defendant in this case in the
penitentiary for the rest of his natural life, I
believe I would do it, but I cannot."
|
|
Mayer was born in Virginia to German immigrants
who came to America in 1850 and located in
Chicago around the time of his birth. He
graduated from high school at age sixteen and
from Yale law school before he was old enough to
legally practice law. He worked at a law library
in the Rookery for $4 per week until he was old
enough to take the bar exam. He was admitted to
the bar in 1881 and went to work for Kraus &
Brackett, where he remained throughout his
career through its various partner changes. At
his death, it was named Mayer, Meyer, Austrian &
Platt.
Mayer's reputation and wealth were built on
defending corporations in anti-trust and labor
litigation, as well as counseling the city of
Chicago. He argued seven cases before the U.S.
Supreme Court. He was known for hard work,
Mayer married Rachel Meyer in 1886. Their two
daughters were schooled in Boston, where the
Mayers retained a second home. He was an avid
rare book collector (giving him something in
common with his client,
Will J. Davis,
and firm partner,
Alfred S. Austrian).
|
