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Acquittal   /əkwˈɪtəl/   Listen
Acquittal

noun
1.
A judgment of not guilty.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Acquittal" Quotes from Famous Books



... consciousness, she had prepared herself rather for another life than for a new lease of this one; and, while seeking to steel her soul to the awful sequel of a conviction, in the other direction she had seldom looked beyond the consummate incident of an acquittal. Life seems a royal road when it is death that stares one in the face; but already Rachel saw the hills and the pitfalls; for indeed they ...
— The Shadow of the Rope • E. W. Hornung

... says Monsieur Foullepointe, "who is that queer man who has been talking about the Court of Assizes before a gentleman whose acquittal lately created such a sensation: he is all the while blundering, like an ox in a bog, against everybody's sore spot. A lady burst into tears at hearing him tell of the death of a child, as she lost ...
— Analytical Studies • Honore de Balzac

... then unfolded the journal, and, holding the volume in his enormous hand with his dirty nails, he disclosed the title to the two young girls: 'Hafner and His Band; Some Reflections on the Scandalous Acquittal. By a Shareholder.' It was a pamphlet, at that date forgotten, but which created much excitement at one time in the financial circles of Paris, of London and of Berlin, having been printed at once in three languages—in French, in German and in English—on the day after the suit of the 'Credit Austro ...
— Cosmopolis, Complete • Paul Bourget

... brought to stand its trial before the bar of public opinion, it is satisfactory to know that the subject has been thoroughly investigated, since a searching investigation alone can excuse a verdict, be it of acquittal or of condemnation. That no man can be twice tried upon the same indictment, is a proud boast of the British constitution. It would be well if the same rule were always applied when mightier interests than those of individuals ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 350, December 1844 • Various

... comedy, he asked for explanations. Licquet attempted to brazen it out, but was scornfully told to hold his peace. Wounded to the quick, he began a campaign of recriminations, raillery and invective against the magistrates of Eure, which was only ended by the unanimous acquittal of the seven innocent persons whom he had delivered over to justice, and whose release the Procurator himself ...
— The House of the Combrays • G. le Notre

... case of conviction, the sentence of the jury was not necessarily final; that the accused had the right of appeal to the king and his judges, and to demand either a new trial, or an acquittal, if the trial or conviction had been against law. So much, therefore, of the legem terrae of Magna Carta, ...
— An Essay on the Trial By Jury • Lysander Spooner

... sessions at the Old Bailey, January 13th, 1804. The jury at first found him guilty of manslaughter; but the crime being deemed murder in the eye of the law, the judge could only receive a verdict of Guilty, or acquittal. He was then found guilty, and received sentence of death, but was afterwards pardoned on condition ...
— Apparitions; or, The Mystery of Ghosts, Hobgoblins, and Haunted Houses Developed • Joseph Taylor

... the jury before the Coroner could have nothing to do; and on these considerations, the jurors with very little delay had come to the conclusion which had so surprised and grieved Father John. Still, however, he looked forward with almost absolute certainty to Thady's acquittal at his trial, and was by far more angry with the young man himself, at his folly in attempting to fly from justice, than he was at the deed which had put him under its power. Now, however, when he saw him pale, fatigued, harassed, and in sorrow at his door, his anger ...
— The Macdermots of Ballycloran • Anthony Trollope

... justly entitled to be regarded under the law, he took the direct opposite stand. He considered all his prisoners as guilty as hell until they had succeeded in proving themselves innocent. Even then he had his doubts. When a jury brought in a verdict of acquittal, he shook his head and growled. He had the greatest contempt for a jury that would acquit and the warmest regard for a jury which convicted. He bullied and maltreated his prisoners because he firmly believed in undermining their moral and physical resistance. ...
— The Third Degree - A Narrative of Metropolitan Life • Charles Klein and Arthur Hornblow

... sympathy. "I well know what that means to you, and I would be first to congratulate you on such a victory, for your own sake; but I needed no public acquittal to convince me of your innocence,—not even," she added, slowly, "when you yourself for some reason, which I hope one day to understand, were unable to assure ...
— That Mainwaring Affair • Maynard Barbour

... hour they returned a verdict of acquittal for the defendants, with some severe strictures on the dignity of marriage, and establishing the precise limitations ...
— Maupassant Original Short Stories (180), Complete • Guy de Maupassant

... busy and a happy time to Jack, for in the morning Mr. Acton came to see him, having heard the story overnight, and promised to keep Bob's secret while giving Jack an acquittal as public as the reprimand had been. Then he asked for the report which Jack had bravely received the day before and put away ...
— Jack and Jill • Louisa May Alcott

... for your wounded arm," replied Edith, laying her hand gently on the scar, "we should have supposed he was under a strong delusion to believe a lie. Appearances were against you, and your condemnation was my brother's palliation, if not acquittal. My mother continued her supplications, mingled with tears and sighs that seemed to rend the life from her bosom; and I, Gabriella, do you think I was silent and passive? I, who would willingly have laid down my life for his? We prevailed,—he yielded,—he left us in ...
— Ernest Linwood - or, The Inner Life of the Author • Caroline Lee Hentz

... was back on important business. Ugly had left the country a decade ago, following his acquittal for petty thieving. In his driftings about, he landed in Las Vegas. There he contacted another former resident in the person of Archie Barrow. Archie was in the money. He was sole proprietor of a big rooming house in a community that was being ...
— David Lannarck, Midget - An Adventure Story • George S. Harney

... it too. Numberless facts had been related by eye-witnesses, called in support of the abolition, so dreadfully atrocious, that they appeared incredible; and seemed rather, to use the expression of Ossian, like "the histories of the days of other times." These procured for the trade a species of acquittal, which it could not have obtained, had the committee been authorised to administer an oath. He apprehended also, in this case, that some other persons would have been rather more guarded in their testimony. ...
— The History of the Rise, Progress and Accomplishment of the Abolition of the African Slave Trade by the British Parliament (1808) • Thomas Clarkson

... he made as much as he could out of the fact that the whole occurrence had been an outgrowth of a friendly birthday celebration. In consideration of all these things, and also because of the irreproachable conduct of the defendant for so many years of active service, he moved for his acquittal. ...
— A Little Garrison - A Realistic Novel of German Army Life of To-day • Fritz von der Kyrburg

... witness box or to call any evidence to show that the girl appeared to him to be over the age of consent. The nature of her clothing, red on her lips, the fact that she is said to smoke and drink, and evidence on other similar matters, enable a verdict of acquittal to be given. ...
— Report of the Special Committee on Moral Delinquency in Children and Adolescents - The Mazengarb Report (1954) • Oswald Chettle Mazengarb et al.

... expectations had been raised in England by the mutilation of his despatches, and of this he indignantly complained in his defence. The tide of feeling, however, turned again; and in 1815, by way of public testimony to his services, and of acquittal of the charge made against him, he was appointed commander of Portsmouth. He died at Holt, near Bishop's Waltham, in Hampshire, on ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 4 - "Bulgaria" to "Calgary" • Various

... important that we should understand the meaning of the term 'justification' as here used. It is an acquittal, on being tried by the law; or a proof that, upon the most penetrating scrutiny, we have, through life, fulfilled and performed all its requirements in word, thought, and deed, without the slightest deviation or taint of error. This is essential to salvation, and must be done, either personally, ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan

... depends on him, as a debtor depends upon his creditor. To that judge is he sent, without a distinct charge, without a prosecutor, and without evidence. The next ships will bring you an account of his honorable acquittal. ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. X. (of 12) • Edmund Burke

... Edward's extravagant and luxurious life had lost him much of his popularity. He had ceased, moreover, to possess the goodwill of the citizens for having allowed the arrest of Sir Thomas Cooke or Coke,(919) an alderman of the city, on a false charge of treason. Notwithstanding his acquittal, Cooke had been committed to prison and only regained his liberty on payment of an extortionate fine to the king and queen.(920) Warwick and Clarence made use of the general discontent that prevailed to further their own designs, and the civil war was renewed. The City ...
— London and the Kingdom - Volume I • Reginald R. Sharpe

... for the present. And we women, who are neighbors, will look after the dear girl in other ways. Don't worry about Lucy a minute! Just keep your mind clear to tell your story exactly as it is, and your acquittal ...
— Joyce's Investments - A Story for Girls • Fannie E. Newberry

... much worse grace than that wherewith he had penned the letter to Bois-Guilbert, the Prior wrote an acquittance, discharging Isaac of York of six hundred crowns, advanced to him in his need for acquittal of his ransom, and faithfully promising to hold true compt with him for ...
— Ivanhoe - A Romance • Walter Scott

... probably anticipated, that the stage companion of John Moseley was the Spanish general, who had just been making those inquiries into the manner of his niece's living which terminated so happily in her acquittal. With that part of her history which relates to the injurious attempts on her before she arrived at Lisbon, he appears to have been ignorant, or his interview with Denbigh might have terminated very differently from the ...
— Precaution • James Fenimore Cooper

... was before the Chamber of Peers to-day. Acquittal. The vote was taken by means of balls, white ones for condemnation, black ones for acquittal. There were 199 votes cast, 65 white, 134 black. In placing my black ball in the urn I remarked: "In blackening him we ...
— The Memoirs of Victor Hugo • Victor Hugo

... responded Captain Wright. "I know something of the witnesses, on whom, it is said, they depended to convict father Herriot; and I would not hang a dog on their testimony. I move, therefore, that we here pronounce a verdict of acquittal. Who says, ay?" ...
— The Rangers - [Subtitle: The Tory's Daughter] • D. P. Thompson

... After this acquittal a friend of his was so kind as to take him down to his house in the country, in hopes of keeping him out of harm's way; and indeed 'tis highly probable that he had totally given over all evil intention of that sort, when he was unfortunately impeached by ...
— Lives Of The Most Remarkable Criminals Who have been Condemned and Executed for Murder, the Highway, Housebreaking, Street Robberies, Coining or other offences • Arthur L. Hayward

... the guilty ever needs must be whom no one dares to accuse, nor any witness hazards to appear against, his acquittal served but to prove his guilt, and the forms thereof the murderous participation of the Queen. Thus, though he was assoilzied in form of law, the libel against him was nevertheless found proven by the universal ...
— Ringan Gilhaize - or The Covenanters • John Galt

... repressed the cheering in favour of Mr. Oscar Wilde with great severity, though Mr. Justice Collins did not attempt to restrain the cheering which filled his court and accompanied the dispersing crowd into the street on the acquittal of Lord Queensberry. ...
— Oscar Wilde, Volume 1 (of 2) - His Life and Confessions • Frank Harris

... London who conducted the defence of Queen Caroline, when the "first gentleman in Europe" tried to get rid of her, and he told me that his misfortunes (forgeries) had deprived him of the honour of sharing with Lord Brougham the credit of her acquittal. ...
— The Book of the Bush • George Dunderdale

... out a terrible shriek, whereupon I hastened from the spot; but these two young men hurried after me and laid hands on me and before thee carried me." Quoth Omar (Almighty Allah accept of him!), "Thou hast confessed what thou committedest, and of acquittal there is no possible occasion; for urgent is the law of retaliation and they cried for mercy but it was not a time to escape."[FN148] the youth answered, "I hear and obey the judgement of the Imam, and I consent to all required by the ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 5 • Richard F. Burton

... plunder of the Begums or dowager-princesses of Oudh; the trial brought forth the greatest orators of the day, Burke, Fox, and Sheridan leading the impeachment, which, after dragging on for nearly eight years, resulted in the acquittal of Hastings on all the charges; his fortune having been consumed by the enormous expenses of the trial, he was awarded a handsome pension by the Company, and thereafter lived ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood

... representation was worn on the breastplate of priest and judge, like the Urim and Thummim of the Hebrews.[2] When the soul appeared in the Hall of Two Truths, for final judgment, it must be able to say, "I have not told a falsehood," or fail of acquittal.[3] Ptah, the creator, a chief god of the Egyptians, was called "Lord of Truth."[4] The Egyptian conception of Deity was: "God is the truth, he lives by truth, he lives upon the truth, he is the king of truth."[5] The Egyptians, like the Zoroastrians, seemed to ...
— A Lie Never Justifiable • H. Clay Trumbull

... more complex as it proceeds, and (strange to say) less sordid; for under cross-examination there gradually emerges the story of a bygone romance so touching that the young squire, on his acquittal of the murder charge, yields the centre of the stage to his ...
— Berry And Co. • Dornford Yates

... character, has now to be branded with the stain of this horrible, this murderous deed, rendered still more odious from the circumstance that a jury of twelve men should have rendered a verdict of acquittal contrary ...
— Diary in America, Series Two • Frederick Marryat (AKA Captain Marryat)

... Giant's Mount Fortress. The countess Marie consented to marry him, because he promised to obtain the acquittal of Ernest de Fridberg, ("the State prisoner"); but ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama, Vol 1 - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook • The Rev. E. Cobham Brewer, LL.D.

... with you who have voted for my acquittal I would gladly hold converse on what has now taken place, while the magistrates are busy, and I am not yet carried to the place where I must die. Stay with me, then, so long, O Athenians! for nothing hinders our conversing with each other, while we are permitted ...
— Apology, Crito, and Phaedo of Socrates • Plato

... away, her step determined and her head high, and Viner, pondering many matters, went downstairs to entertain his visitors, the unlucky Hyde's sisters, with stories of the morning's proceedings and hopes of their brother's speedy acquittal. The poor ladies were of that temperament which makes its possessors clutch eagerly at any straw of hope floating on the sea of trouble, and they listened eagerly to all that their ...
— The Middle of Things • J. S. Fletcher

... Nothing would please the Jews and their leaders better than to have some chance of impeaching him before his jealous master at Rome, on the charge of leniency to treason. Pilate quails before the terrible possibility. In face of it he simply dares not pronounce a verdict of acquittal. Yet he means to do all he can to effect the escape of his Prisoner. His inbred instinct for justice prompts him to this; for the Romans cherished reverence for law, and even so corrupt a ruler ...
— Men of the Bible; Some Lesser-Known Characters • George Milligan, J. G. Greenhough, Alfred Rowland, Walter F.

... the pressure of the universal feeling, the Court of Queen's Bench has revised the affair of the negro Anderson, to deliver into the strong hands of the metropolis a question before which the judicial authority of Canada hesitated, and to pronounce at length a verdict of acquittal. ...
— The Uprising of a Great People • Count Agenor de Gasparin

... alluding to the then recent acquittal from the charge of perjury, by the petty jury, of Mr Philip Carteret Webb, solicitor to the Treasury, who had sworn ...
— Poetical Works • Charles Churchill

... that would commend itself to the chivalry and nobility of Berlin! And besides, how could his political career survive a new scandal? He was already sufficiently hampered by his old connection with the Countess, and not even a public acquittal and twenty years had sufficed to lay that accusation of instigating the stealing of a casket of papers from her husband's mistress, which was perhaps the worst legacy of the great Hatzfeldt case. No, he must win his bride ...
— Dreamers of the Ghetto • I. Zangwill

... committal of a crime at the thought of which human nature revolts, was a fact the belief of which was hardly credible. He himself remained not unmoved by the vast concourse of spectators; he thought he could read in the pitying glance of each an acquittal. An acquittal at the bar of public opinion always has and always will be esteemed of more value than one handed in by a jury of twelve; yet by that jury of twelve men he was to be tried,—he must look to them for his release, if he was to obtain it. Their decision ...
— Town and Country, or, Life at Home and Abroad • John S. Adams

... conscience of every prisoner, of every exile, of every man proscribed, a tribunal, and that that tribunal is beginning his prosecution; he trembles, the executioner feels a secret dread of his victim; and, under pretext of a pardon accorded by him to that victim, he forces his judges to sign his acquittal. ...
— Napoleon the Little • Victor Hugo

... should we account by the same cause for that audacity which startles us in criminals on a colossal scale, which blinds them to the risks of detection, and often at the bar of justice, while the evidences that ensure condemnation are thickening round them, with the persuasion of acquittal or escape. Hope is thus alike the sublime inspirer or the arch corrupter; it is the foe of terror, the defier of consequences, the buoyant gamester which at every loss doubles the stakes, with a firm hand rattles the dice, and, invoking ruin, cries within itself, ...
— Pausanias, the Spartan - The Haunted and the Haunters, An Unfinished Historical Romance • Lord Lytton

... which had been sullied with the suspicion of a bribe (for, remember, he was one of the proudest among the sons of men)—nevertheless, he would not turn away from this crushed fellow-mortal whose aid he had used, and make a pitiful effort to get acquittal for himself by howling against another. "I shall do as I think right, and explain to nobody. They will try to starve me out, but—" he was going on with an obstinate resolve, but he was getting near home, and ...
— Middlemarch • George Eliot

... been censured for want of unity; the murder of the sister and the acquittal of the victorious Roman is said to be a second action, independent of the combat of the Horatii and Curiatii. Corneille himself was talked into a belief of it. He appears, however, to me fully justified in what he has done. If the murder of Camilla had ...
— Lectures on Dramatic Art - and Literature • August Wilhelm Schlegel trans John Black

... make short work of the outlaws;[479] and in October he issued a circular to all the governors in the colonies, directing the most stringent enforcement of the laws, "a practice having grown up of bringing pirates to trial before the evidence was ready, and of using other evasions to insure their acquittal."[480] On the following 20th January another proclamation was issued by James to insure the co-operation of the governors with Sir Robert Holmes and his agents.[481] The problem, however, was more difficult than the king had ...
— The Buccaneers in the West Indies in the XVII Century • Clarence Henry Haring

... is never far to seek. To do him justice, his anxiety was not for himself, or the consequences to himself, which at the worst were not likely to exceed a nominal verdict of manslaughter, and at the best would be an acquittal; the former had been Lord Byron's lot, the latter Mr. Brown's, and each had killed his man. Sir George had more savoir faire than to trouble himself about this; but about his opponent and his fate he felt a haunting—and, as Lord Almeric would have said, a low—concern that would ...
— The Castle Inn • Stanley John Weyman

... beasts of prey! Melancholy as the above recital is, it is to be considered rather as an episode in this narration, than as the proper subject of it. Had my morning's adventure finished with this disgraceful acquittal, the reader would not have been troubled with the perusal of these pages. My vexation would have been confined to my own breast, and I should have nourished my discontent in silence. The scene which immediately followed the dismissal of the murderer, is that to which I have chiefly to beg ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 54, No. 335, September 1843 • Various

... punishments is most partial and incomplete, absurdly inadequate, utterly worldly, and we wish to continue it into the next world. Into that next and awful world we strive to pursue men, and send after them our impotent party verdicts of condemnation or acquittal. We set up our paltry little rods to measure Heaven immeasurable, as if, in comparison to that, Newton's mind or Pascal's or Shakspeare's was any loftier than mine; as if the ray which travels from the sun would reach me sooner than the man who blacks my boots. Measured by that ...
— The History of Pendennis • William Makepeace Thackeray

... uncle, Prince Amedee de Broglie, his right to a peerage had been recognized; and to his own great surprise he received, in June 1814, a summons from Louis XVIII. to the Chamber of Peers. There, after the Hundred Days, he distinguished himself by his courageous defence of Marshal Ney, for whose acquittal he, alone of all the peers, both spoke and voted. After this defiant act of opposition it was perhaps fortunate that his impending marriage gave him an excuse for leaving the country. On the 15th of February 1816, he was married at Leghorn to the daughter of Madame de Stael. ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 3 - "Brescia" to "Bulgaria" • Various

... knows that a case is really a necessitous one. He has no animus against any person he arrests. His duty is merely to place in safe custody the person he believes to be responsible for a breach of the law. Conviction or acquittal matters nothing to him after that. He ...
— Scotland Yard - The methods and organisation of the Metropolitan Police • George Dilnot

... into negotiations with his lawyer, with the local magistrate, with his witnesses, even with the police. He distrusts justice itself, and only gives himself up or faces the tribunal when he has made sure of acquittal or such a sentence as his pride may swallow. Which details of justice as understood in a province of France at the beginning of the century may be read at the Assize terms in those great newspapers, Le Petit Bastiais or Le Paoli Pascal, by any ...
— The Isle of Unrest • Henry Seton Merriman

... of the controversy was a duel on February 16th between Scott and Lockhart's intimate friend, Jonathan Henry Christie. Scott was mortally wounded, and died within a fortnight; the verdict of wilful murder brought against Christie and his second at the inquest resulted in their trial and acquittal at the old Bailey two months later. It would have been well for the London Magazine and for literature in general if that unfortunate duel could have been prevented or at least diverted into such a ludicrous affair as the meeting between Jeffrey ...
— Early Reviews of English Poets • John Louis Haney

... forbearing towards any other class of offenders; and whether they would allow these offenders to justify the wickedness of their hands, by pleading the purity of their hearts. Suppose that I stand in court confessedly guilty of the crime of passing counterfeit money; and that I ask for my acquittal on the ground, that, notwithstanding I am practically wrong, I am, nevertheless, theoretically right. "Believe me," I say, in tones of deep and unfeigned pathos, and with a corresponding pressure of my hand upon my heart, "that ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society

... any hope of an acquittal. On the contrary, he knew he would be condemned; but his punishment could not be severe. He called to memory all the similar cases that he had known. They had almost always resulted in less than a year of imprisonment. It was true that in none of these had there been ...
— 'Jena' or 'Sedan'? • Franz Beyerlein

... letter from the tzarina, Catherine II., framed and glazed, is carefully preserved. It is addressed to the father of Peter Grineff, and contains, with the acquittal of his son, many praises of the intelligence and good heart of the daughter ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol VII • Various

... disappointed spite towards me as he heard this, and walked away. I was again a free man. My first act, after returning thanks to Heaven from the bottom of my heart for my merciful deliverance, was to obtain a sheet of paper, and write an account of what had happened and my happy acquittal to Uncle Kelson, and beg him to break the matter to my wife, for I was afraid that she would be overmuch agitated ...
— Will Weatherhelm - The Yarn of an Old Sailor • W.H.G. Kingston

... When the Government case closed, the counsel asked the court to rule that as the funds were never entrusted to the possession of Wyman he could not be convicted of embezzlement. The court so held and directed an acquittal. This is another instance, not unusual in trials in court, of the truth of the old rhyme, with which the readers of ...
— Autobiography of Seventy Years, Vol. 1-2 • George Hoar

... under cloud of dusk, 'amid a great affluence of people,' who did not harm him; he marches, with faint-growing tread, down the left bank of the Seine, all night,—towards infinite space. Resummoned shall Besenval himself be; for trial, for difficult acquittal. His King's-troops, his Royal Allemand, are gone ...
— The French Revolution • Thomas Carlyle

... They easily discovered that the degree of their industry and discernment was estimated, by the Imperial court, according to the number of executions that were furnished from the respective tribunals. It was not without extreme reluctance that they pronounced a sentence of acquittal; but they eagerly admitted such evidence as was stained with perjury, or procured by torture, to prove the most improbable charges against the most respectable characters. The progress of the inquiry ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 2 • Edward Gibbon

... Sam's acquittal nothing of especial interest occurred. Bill was getting along as well as could have been expected; but both he and his partners were decidedly dejected as to the result of Mr. ...
— Down the Slope • James Otis

... the Lord."[210] (d) There must be also humble, earnest resolution to be obedient to the will of God. The forgiveness secured by the death of Jesus is more than mere deliverance from the penalty of sin or the acquittal of the sinner. It is the remission of sins, the putting away of the sin. With pardon there is a renewal of the inner man. Return to holiness is secured, and the lost image of God is restored to man, so that he dies to sin and lives unto holiness. ...
— Exposition of the Apostles Creed • James Dodds

... clear notion this time as to what he wanted. Driscoll marveled, and enjoyed it. Pigheadedness had made Don Anastasio guilty, why shouldn't perjury make him innocent? And it did. The mountain of suspicion and some few pebbles of evidence melted away as lard in a skillet. The verdict was acquittal. ...
— The Missourian • Eugene P. (Eugene Percy) Lyle

... Wentworth, who after his acquittal had drifted down to Cowes for rest and refreshment before the advent of the crowd. He had not seen Lady Violet before his departure, she having gone out of town for a few days immediately after the trial. But he took the very next train back to London as soon as he had seen ...
— The Odds - And Other Stories • Ethel M. Dell

... them came a long train of brilliant equipages, of relatives and friends. The passers-by stopped to see the brilliant procession move before them, and to ask what it meant. Some had recognized the viscountess, and they told to others of the sufferings and of the acquittal of the poor young woman; and the people, easily affected and sympathizing, rejoiced in the decision of the Parliament, and with shouts and applause followed the carriage of ...
— The Empress Josephine • Louise Muhlbach

... marvelous speech, and his appeal to his "saint in heaven"; but we comprehend the whole transaction much better when we learn from Mr. Baillie, the eye-witness, that people ate nuts and apples, and talked, and laughed, and betted on the great question of acquittal and condemnation. Nor is it difficult to understand why this should be so. It seems to be a law of the imagination, at least in most men, that it will not bear concentration. It is essentially a glancing faculty. It goes and comes, and ...
— Harvard Classics Volume 28 - Essays English and American • Various

... debt, and had much money besides. But I have found by experience since then that, although in appearance he stirred up affairs, in fact the expense was greater than the gain. For most of the settlements of which he made a parade are in litigation, and are being nullified by the acquittal of the parties [in the suit], while others in the Audiencia are even abandoned; and few reach the point of collecting [the amounts due]. Some of the new ordinances that he left suffered the same misfortune, because he did not dictate them or draw ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, Volume XXIV, 1630-34 • Various

... in any formal volume.[220] It is a discussion of the judicial proceedings in connection with two authors of the Essays and Reviews. His theme permits a wide range, and he therefore dwells at length upon the whole question of ministerial teaching. He considers the final acquittal of the essayists one of the most gratifying events of the day. According to him, the questions raised by the work are, with few exceptions, of a kind altogether beside and beyond the range over which the formularies of the Church extend. No passage ...
— History of Rationalism Embracing a Survey of the Present State of Protestant Theology • John F. Hurst

... the acquittal of a horse-stealer, the thief, in the ecstasy of his gratitude, cried out, "Och, counsellor, I've no way here to thank your honor; but I wish't I saw you knocked down in me own parish,—wouldn't I bring a faction to ...
— The Jest Book - The Choicest Anecdotes and Sayings • Mark Lemon

... called—opened in June, 1806, and witness after witness, from the Douglases to Robert Bidgood, a groom, gave evidence which more or less supported the charges of infidelity and concealment. The result of the investigation, however, was a verdict of acquittal, the Commissioners reporting that the Princess, although innocent, had been guilty of very indiscreet conduct—and this verdict ...
— Love affairs of the Courts of Europe • Thornton Hall

... never be exhibited in the sacred arena of the halls of justice, animosities which give the defence the character of a party conflict, and which cause a conviction to be looked upon as a political defeat, and an acquittal to be regarded as a party triumph—all these circumstances, in their combined and concentrated force, must also be take into consideration. In such a case every step is fought with stern and dogged resolution; even mere delay is valuable, for when all other ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXXIX. January, 1844. Vol. LV. • Various

... rencontres that take place in the south, especially those proving fatal, we will find that the perpetrator, if he be a rich man, invariably receives an "honourable acquittal." Again, when the man of position shoots down his victim in the streets of a city, he is esteemed brave; but a singular reversion takes place if the rencontre be between poor men. It is then a diabolical act, a murder, which nothing short of the gallows can serve for ...
— Our World, or, The Slaveholders Daughter • F. Colburn Adams

... agreed to accept one year's rent in full acquittal, and so good a landlord was he, that the neighbours of the debtor offered to make up the amount to ...
— The Reminiscences of an Irish Land Agent • S.M. Hussey

... The moment Lafayette's acquittal is announced, the galleries, usually so vociferous, maintain "gloomy silence."[2657] The word of command for them is to keep themselves in reserve for the streets. One by one the deputies who voted for Lafayette are pointed out to the mob at the doors, and a shout is raised, ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 3 (of 6) - The French Revolution, Volume 2 (of 3) • Hippolyte A. Taine

... has received divers interpretations. In ancient trials, the votes of the judges were given by white and black pebbles. The former signified acquittal, and the latter condemnation. Conquerors in public games sometimes received a white stone with their name inscribed on it, which entitled them, during the remainder of their life, to be maintained at the public expense. Persons were sometimes invited to feasts ...
— A Brief Commentary on the Apocalypse • Sylvester Bliss

... gradually in on her, obscuring the sky and cutting off the air, till she felt herself shut up among the decaying bodies of her starved hopes. A sense of having been decoyed by some world-old conspiracy into this bondage of body and soul filled her with despair. If marriage was the slow life-long acquittal of a debt contracted in ignorance, then marriage was a crime against human nature. She, for one, would have no share in maintaining the pretence of which she had been a victim: the pretence that a man and a woman, forced into the narrowest ...
— The Early Short Fiction of Edith Wharton, Part 2 (of 10) • Edith Wharton

... was not in any sense due to remissness on the part of the officers who tried me. It was due to the fact that, for the reason named by Lady Gordon, I deliberately refrained from producing evidence which would have resulted in my own acquittal and the conviction of the actual culprit; and thus the members of the court martial were, in the course of their duty, compelled to find me guilty and to pass upon me sentence ...
— Under the Ensign of the Rising Sun - A Story of the Russo-Japanese War • Harry Collingwood

... attempted by either Charles the First or Charles the Second in regard to the same colony; for when charges were brought, in 1632, against the Massachusetts authorities, for having violated the Charter, Charles the First appointed a commission, gave the accused a trial, which resulted in their acquittal and promised support by the King; and when they were accused again in 1634, the King did not forthwith cancel their Charter, but issued a second commission, which, however, never reported, in consequence of the commencement of the civil ...
— The Loyalists of America and Their Times, Vol. 1 of 2 - From 1620-1816 • Egerton Ryerson

... instruct them to disregard your plea. There is a higher law, sir, than justice—a law of mercy—That I myself shall exercise." The old Judge had sat straight up on his bench when he said it, his face cast-iron, his eyes burning. The jury brought in an acquittal without leaving their seats. There was an outbreak, of course, but the man went free. This young offshoot was from the same old stock, that was all; same sap in his veins, same twist to his branch; same bud, same blossom ...
— Peter - A Novel of Which He is Not the Hero • F. Hopkinson Smith

... Yes, I avow that from the moment I read the summons I never had a doubt as to my fate. I knew that prosecutions for Blasphemy had invariably succeeded. How, indeed, could they possibly fail? I might by skill or luck get one jury to disagree, but acquittal was hopeless; and the prosecution could go on trying me until they found a jury sufficiently orthodox to ensure a verdict of guilty. It was a foregone conclusion. The prosecution played, "Heads I win, tails ...
— Prisoner for Blasphemy • G. W. [George William] Foote

... continues to be a part of the constitution, grand juries in courts of the United States can not be dispensed with. It is quite proper, as is provided in this article, that, after a fair and impartial trial and an acquittal, a person should not be tried a second time. The provisions of the next article (6th) are also necessary to secure the same object—the rights of liberty ...
— The Government Class Book • Andrew W. Young

... very badly at the house in Bakuracho[u]. The disaster of the arrest fell like a thunderbolt on the wretched little household. Day after day, hoping for the acquittal and release, one article after another went to the pawn shop. Reduced to absolute misery the house owner and the neighbours came to the rescue with a small sum raised among them. The long continued official suspicion affected even these toward the "Honest Zeisuke," and their support ...
— Bakemono Yashiki (The Haunted House) - Tales of the Tokugawa, Volume 2 (of 2) • James S. De Benneville

... which these wonderful memories arouse, as they flood back into my mind, is leading me to dwell upon too many details, and I must sum up in fewer words the story of the events which immediately followed our acquittal, although it involves some of the most astonishing discoveries that we made in ...
— A Columbus of Space • Garrett P. Serviss

... Lancaster himself seems to give up his charge, tho' not his ill will; for upon Falstaff's asking leave to pass through Glostershire, and artfully desiring that, upon Lancaster's return to Court, he might stand well in his report, Lancaster seems in his answer to mingle malice and acquittal. "Fare ye well, Falstaff, I in my condition shall better speak of you than you deserve." "I would," says Falstaff, who is left behind in the scene, "You had but the wit; 'twere better than your Dukedom." He continues on the stage ...
— Eighteenth Century Essays on Shakespeare • D. Nichol Smith

... pity of thee by reason of thy innocence; wherefore, if in reverent submission to Him thou wilt grant me a slight favour that I shall ask of thee, without fail, before to-morrow at even, thou shalt, in lieu of the doom of death that thou awaitest, hear thy acquittal pronounced." "Worthy man," replied Aldobrandino, "I know thee not, nor mind I ever to have seen thee; wherefore, as thou shewest thyself solicitous for my safety, my friend indeed thou must needs be, even as thou sayst. And in sooth the crime, ...
— The Decameron, Volume I • Giovanni Boccaccio

... the village of —— is still shown the autograph letter of Catherine II., framed and glazed. It is addressed to the father of Petr' Andrejitch, and contains, with the acquittal of his son, praises of the intellect and good heart of the ...
— The Daughter of the Commandant • Aleksandr Sergeevich Pushkin

... of justice had been served by Butler's acquittal. But in the light of after events, it is perhaps unfortunate that the jury did not stretch a point and so save the life of Mr. Munday of Toowong. Butler underwent his term of imprisonment in Littleton Jail. There his reputation ...
— A Book of Remarkable Criminals • H. B. Irving

... their great humiliation. Such I call the ransom of Manilla, and the demand on France for the East India prisoners. But these powers put a just confidence in their resource of the double cabinet. These demands (one of them at least) are hastening fast towards an acquittal by prescription. Oblivion begins to spread her cobwebs over all our spirited remonstrances. Some of the most valuable branches of our trade are also on the point of perishing from the same cause. I do not mean those branches which bear without the hand of the vine-dresser; ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. I. (of 12) • Edmund Burke

... verdict of 'Guilty of perjury, but not wilful and corrupt.' This was an acquittal, but, the Recorder refusing the verdict, they did what they were desired to do, and sentence was passed. Two jurors made affidavit that they never intended a conviction. The whole point had turned, in the minds of the jury, ...
— Historical Mysteries • Andrew Lang

... fever-pitch. "My arrest, my condemnation, my death, will be of vast deal more importance to you than that of a young and innocent girl against whom unlikely charges would have to be tricked up, and whose acquittal mayhap public feeling might demand. As for me, I shall be an easy prey; my known counter-revolutionary principles, my ...
— El Dorado • Baroness Orczy

... unbeliever as Servetus. The Catholic Church, which in our day accuses Calvin of having participated in his condemnation, much more would have accused him, in the sixteenth century, with having solicited his acquittal.] ...
— Henry IV, Makers of History • John S. C. Abbott

... a fool with no wit of his own to make him accountable for what he did, and that out of folly he had gone astray. Upon those grounds she besought me to forgive him and let him go. When I told her that he must stand his trial, and that I could offer her but little hope of his acquittal, she told me things about myself, which in my conceit, and thanks to you flatterers who have surrounded ...
— Bardelys the Magnificent • Rafael Sabatini

... as translated in the Revised Version, says, 'Clear Thou me from secret faults.' And there is present in that word, if not exclusively, at least predominantly, the idea of a judicial acquittal, so that the thought of the first clause of this verse seems rather to be that of pronouncing guiltless, or forgiving, than that of delivering from the power of. But both, no doubt, are included in the idea, as both, ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren

... Jefferson and convict him of this crime? No one could tell what provocation he may have had. Why not let matters take their course? There was nothing but circumstantial evidence against Radnor. Surely no jury would convict him on that. I could work up a sufficient case against Mose to assure his acquittal. He would be released with a blot on his name, he would be regarded for the rest of his life with suspicion; but in any event there seemed to be no outcome which would not involve the family in endless trouble and disgrace. And besides, if he himself elected to be silent, had I any ...
— The Four Pools Mystery • Jean Webster

... has at no time been brought before the English public less than at the present day. Fenianism in the seventies and the various agrarian agitations in the eighties served to keep it constantly before the English eyes, and after the acquittal of Mr. Parnell and his colleagues of the charges brought against them by the Times much educative work was done for a short time by Irish Members of Parliament on ...
— Ireland and the Home Rule Movement • Michael F. J. McDonnell

... of this case are recorded in the archives of the Criminal Court at Naples. We have changed nothing in the age or position of the persons who appear in this narrative. One of the most celebrated advocates at the Neapolitan bar secured the acquittal ...
— Quotes and Images From "Celebrated Crimes" • Alexander Dumas, Pere

... to deprive the unhappy prisoner of all those excuses which, though legally of no value, yet tended to diminish the moral guilt of the crime, and which, therefore, though they could not justify the peers in pronouncing an acquittal, might incline the Queen to grant a pardon. The Earl urged as a palliation of his frantic acts that he was surrounded by powerful and inveterate enemies, that they had ruined his fortunes, that they ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 2 • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... others accused the judges of the Supreme Court wept scalding tears. Bernard told of Belton's noble life, his unassuming ways, his pure Christianity. The decision of the lower court was reversed, a change of venue granted, a new trial held and an acquittal secured. ...
— Imperium in Imperio: A Study Of The Negro Race Problem - A Novel • Sutton E. Griggs

... [Sidenote: Reynard's acquittal.] The king pronounced Reynard guiltless of all charges, and made him one of his privy councilors. But the fox, after thanking the king for his favors, humbly besought permission to return home, where his wife was awaiting him, and departed, ...
— Legends of the Middle Ages - Narrated with Special Reference to Literature and Art • H.A. Guerber

... drawn battles, and the result of this action produced a general uproar. Keppel threw the blame on the tardiness of Sir Hugh Palliser, the second in command. Palliser retorted, and the result was a court-martial on the commander of the fleet; which, however, ended in a triumphant acquittal. It was not generally known that Keppel's defence, which was admired as a model of intelligence, and even of eloquence, was drawn up by Captain Jervis. The transaction, though so long passed away, is not yet beyond discussion; and there is still some interest in knowing ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLII. Vol. LV. April, 1844 • Various

... of a long succession of lovers. The book is a powerful plea for a sane, wholesome, and natural education in matters of sex. It was, however, prosecuted at Bruges, in 1901, though the trial finally ended in acquittal. Such a verdict is in harmony with the general tendency of feeling at the ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 6 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis

... this sort applies to any tyranny, and the power the politicians have and exercise of refusing to prosecute, however clear an act of treason or other grossly unpopular act might be, is equivalent to a power of acquittal. ...
— The Free Press • Hilaire Belloc

... equalization which appraised all real estate every ten years. There followed a great decrease in the valuation of some of the choicest holdings in the city. In 1884 there were riots in Cincinnati. After the acquittal of two brutes who had murdered a man for a trifling sum of money, exasperated citizens burned the criminal court house. The barter in justice stopped, but the barter in offices and in votes continued. The Blaine campaign then in progress was ...
— The Boss and the Machine • Samuel P. Orth

... himself above his neighbor, judging the latter's sins with harsh severity, as though he himself were a just man. Hence Augustine says (De Serm. Dom. in Monte ii, 19): "To reprove the faults of others is the duty of good and kindly men: when a wicked man rebukes anyone, his rebuke is the latter's acquittal." And so, as Augustine says (De Serm. Dom. in Monte ii, 19): "When we have to find fault with anyone, we should think whether we were never guilty of his sin; and then we must remember that we are men, and might have been guilty of it; or that ...
— Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) • Thomas Aquinas

... public profession of rhetoric; for on that Atlantic tour of yours which included Gaul, you found me numbered among those teachers who could command high fees. Now, my friend, you have my defence; I am exceedingly busy, but could not be indifferent to securing your vote of acquittal; as for others, let them all denounce me with one voice if they will; on them I shall waste no more ...
— Works, V2 • Lucian of Samosata

... the innocence of the three defendants, and the falsity of Elizabeth Canning's story in every particular;' whereas, without a trial, all would be virtually lost to the accused, who, instead of obtaining a triumphant acquittal, might be suspected of having agreed to ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 450 - Volume 18, New Series, August 14, 1852 • Various

... rare event in Branson County. Every well-informed citizen could tell the number of homicides committed in the county for fifty years back, and whether the slayer, in any given instance, had escaped, either by flight or acquittal, or had suffered the penalty of the law. So, when it became known in Troy early one Friday morning in summer, about ten years after the war, that old Captain Walker, who had served in Mexico under Scott, and had left an arm on the field of Gettysburg, had been foully murdered during the night, ...
— The Wife of his Youth and Other Stories of the Color Line, and - Selected Essays • Charles Waddell Chesnutt

... troublesome enemy. This oration, in the revised form in which it has come down to us, is ranked as among the finest specimens of the art of the orator, though in its original form it failed to secure Milo's acquittal. Meantime, Cicero was also devoting much time to literary composition, and his letters show great dejection over the political situation, and a somewhat wavering attitude towards the various parties in ...
— Treatises on Friendship and Old Age • Marcus Tullius Cicero

... been so many years in outlawry, many thought that the sentence should be annulled; and it was deemed certain that he would be pardoned in the next ensuing summer; but they who had owned the island were exceedingly discontented at the prospect of his acquittal, and urged Angle either to give back the island or slay Grettir. Now Angle had a foster-mother, Thurid; she was old and cunning in witchcraft, which she had learnt in her youth; for though Christianity had now been established in the island, yet there remained still many traces of heathendom. ...
— The Book of Romance • Various

... him with all possible despatch through the red tape necessary to secure his acquittal, and then led him out by a side ...
— The Seventh Noon • Frederick Orin Bartlett

... the army, and 'society' at their backs, the Committee of Public Safety began to be a force in the country, and really represented the producing classes. It began to improve immensely in the days which followed on the acquittal of its members. Its old members had little administrative capacity, though with the exception of a few self-seekers and traitors, they were honest, courageous men, and many of them were endowed with considerable ...
— News from Nowhere - or An Epoch of Rest, being some chapters from A Utopian Romance • William Morris

... Epistle are more or less common to all St. Paul's works. They are concerned with the guilt and the power of sin, the eternal purpose which God has for man, the meaning of Christ's death and the effect of His resurrection, the nature of our acquittal by God and our ...
— The Books of the New Testament • Leighton Pullan

... alms and pity and a tale of fall. Nay, grant the worst—grant that Waife had suffered in repute as well as fortune—grant that his character had been tarnished by some plausible circumstantial evidences which he could not explain away to the satisfaction of friends or the acquittal of a short-sighted world—had there not been, were there not always, many innocent men similarly afflicted? And who could hear Waife talk, or look on his arch smile, and not feel that he was innocent? So, at ...
— What Will He Do With It, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... Mouchy was managing the trial with great skill. The prisoners of no account—the scrivener's clerk, the poor shopkeeper, the small mercer—got the benefit of plea and quibble! God knows, I did not grudge them that! But each acquittal, pronounced loudly in the name of the King's mercy, with high-flown words about the love of the King for his people, led step by step to the real object for which the infamous triangle worked. Already the gossips were beginning ...
— Orrain - A Romance • S. Levett-Yeats

... the arrest of a person in that city should be executed until it had received the mayor's approval, anyone violating this ordinance to be liable to imprisonment for life, with no power of pardon in the governor without the mayor's consent! The acquittal of O. P. Rockwell on the charge of the attempted assassination of Governor Boggs caused great delight among the Mormons, and their organ declared on January 1, 1844, that "throughout the whole region of country around us those bitter and acrimonious feelings, which have so long been ...
— The Story of the Mormons: • William Alexander Linn

... anything but subservient. The judges were accustomed to see prisoners who were brought before them crushed with awe and a sense of impending doom. Conscious of the baselessness of the charges against him, the accused seemed to take his acquittal as certain; and he stood so little in awe of his judges that he announced his intention of appealing over their heads to the members of the Supreme Inquisition.[84] Timidity was not among his failings. ...
— Fray Luis de Leon - A Biographical Fragment • James Fitzmaurice-Kelly

... the presence of the French passes at the trial for piracy would have brought about Kidd's acquittal may be doubted, courts of justice being what they were; at all events Kidd, though he clamored for them from the day of his arrival in the Downs (Portland MSS., VIII. 78) till the day he was sentenced, was never ...
— Privateering and Piracy in the Colonial Period - Illustrative Documents • Various

... sorcery. Geirrida was accordingly cited to the popular assembly and accused of witchcraft. But twelve witnesses, or compurgators, having asserted upon their oath the innocence of the accused party, Geirrida was honourably freed from the accusation brought against her. Her acquittal did not terminate the rivalry between the two sorceresses, for, Geirrida belonging to the family of Kiliakan, and Katla to that of the pontiff Snorro, the animosity which still subsisted between these septs became ...
— Folk-Lore and Legends; Scandinavian • Various

... touching the treaty between King James and the last King of Denmark concerning the Orcades, with his humble opinion what was fit to be done in that business, upon the comprehension of the Dane in the Dutch treaty, yet nothing was done therein; however, Whitelocke was satisfied in the acquittal of himself to have ...
— A Journal of the Swedish Embassy in the Years 1653 and 1654, Vol II. • Bulstrode Whitelocke

... English readers may be reminded that in France the verdict of a majority of the jury suffices for conviction or acquittal. If the jury is evenly ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola

... to avoid the sentence that would have followed an acquittal on the ground of insanity, which would have entailed perhaps lifelong imprisonment, I took upon myself to depart from the usual course, and ask the jury whether, without being insane in the ordinary sense, the woman might not have been at the time of committing the ...
— The Reminiscences Of Sir Henry Hawkins (Baron Brampton) • Henry Hawkins Brampton

... represented that the slave-population has little respect for the lives or property of their masters, less loyalty towards them and very little dread of punishment. Your alleged murder of poor Falco is held up as a flagrant example of the latter condition, your acquittal as an even more flagrant instance of the degradation of ...
— Andivius Hedulio • Edward Lucas White

... legal proceedings that followed on these deeds of bloodshed, the Genoese judges found their profit. Condemnation was often followed by confiscation of the criminal's estates; acquittal had often been preceded by a heavy bribe to the judge. Multitudes were condemned to the galleys on frivolous charges in the hope that they would purchase their freedom at a high price. The law was even worse ...
— Boswell's Correspondence with the Honourable Andrew Erskine, and His Journal of a Tour to Corsica • James Boswell

... law-officer for the prosecution, though exciting the deepest anxiety, was listened to in the most respectful silence. The case was strong, and was ably dealt with by the attorney-general. The evidence was clear and complete, and the hope of an acquittal seemed to be gradually abandoned in the expressive gloom of the spectators. The prisoner at the bar, too, seemed more dejected than I had presumed from his former intrepidity; and the few glances which I could suffer myself to give to a being ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 57, No. 356, June, 1845 • Various

... example, there is not a word in the Gazette about the important parliamentary proceedings of November, 1685, or about the trial and acquittal ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 1 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... denied by Pilate they resolved to petition that Jesus should be brought to trial before the Sanhedrim, by whom they did not doubt his acquittal—which was ardently desired by ...
— The Unknown Life of Jesus Christ - The Original Text of Nicolas Notovitch's 1887 Discovery • Nicolas Notovitch

... apparently somewhat from sickness, they beheld Master Gresham himself. He rose to welcome Sir John, and to thank him for the favour which he had done him. It was no less, indeed, than having procured his acquittal from the charges which Lord Winchester and others had brought against him. Not only this, but the Queen's Council, finding their affairs in the Netherlands greatly disordered, and it being necessary to raise further loans, had looked about for a fit person to fill the post of Royal agent, ...
— The Golden Grasshopper - A story of the days of Sir Thomas Gresham • W.H.G. Kingston

... departments of the south, and more than six weeks before M. d'Argenson spoke of them in the Chamber of Deputies, a royal proclamation, countersigned by M. Pasquier, vehemently denounced them, and called upon the magistrates for their suppression. After the scandalous acquittal, by the Court of Assize at Nismes, of the assassin of General Lagarde, who had protected the free worship of the Protestants, M. Pasquier demanded and obtained, from the Court of Appeal, the annulment of this sentence, in the name of the law, and as a last protestation of ...
— Memoirs To Illustrate The History Of My Time - Volume 1 • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot

... by which God declares a man just, but an act by which He actually makes him inherently just and righteous; that it is not an imputation of a righteousness existing outside of man, but an actual infusion of a righteousness dwelling in man; that it is not a mere acquittal from sin and guilt, but regeneration, renewal, sanctification and internal, physical cleansing from sin that it is not a forensic or judicial act outside of man or a declaration concerning man's standing before God and his relation to Him but a sort of medicinal ...
— Historical Introductions to the Symbolical Books of the Evangelical Lutheran Church • Friedrich Bente

... Lord Derby had attempted to govern with a majority against him in the House of Commons. The first task of the new Ministry was to patch up the quarrel with France, and, thanks to the good sense and dignity of the Emperor, it was managed in spite of the scandalous acquittal by an English jury of the Frenchman, Dr. Bernard, who had manufactured Orsini's bombs. The Duc de Malakoff, whose conduct in the Crimea made him a popular hero in England, replaced M. Persigny at the French Embassy. His presence helped to remind Englishmen that it was not many years since ...
— Lady John Russell • Desmond MacCarthy and Agatha Russell

... for cut-throat, and the weakest must go to the wall; I will help him; &c., &c.'" Blake electrified the court by calling out "False!" in the midst of the military evidence, the invented character of which was, however, so obvious that an acquittal resulted. "In defiance of all decency," the spectators cheered, and Hayley carried off the sturdy Republican (as he was at heart) to Mid Lavant, ...
— Highways & Byways in Sussex • E.V. Lucas

... should have been planted upright in the fields, the St, Denis Road" - Montfaucon being on the way to St. Denis. An appeal to Parliament, as we saw in the case of Colin de Cayeux, did not necessarily lead to an acquittal or a commutation; and while the matter was pending, our poet had ample opportunity to reflect on his position. Hanging is a sharp argument, and to swing with many others on the gibbet adds a horrible corollary for the imagination. With the aspect of Montfaucon he was well acquainted; indeed, ...
— Familiar Studies of Men & Books • Robert Louis Stevenson

... nobility had taken a part, and among the rest Corso Donati, to whom, as the most forward of the party, the death was attributed. He was, therefore, taken by the captain of the people, and whether he was really innocent of the crime or the Capitano was afraid of condemning him, he was acquitted. This acquittal displeased the people so much, that, seizing their arms, they ran to the house of Giano della Bella, to beg that he would compel the execution of those laws which he had himself made. Giano, who wished Corso to be punished, did not insist upon their laying down their ...
— History Of Florence And Of The Affairs Of Italy - From The Earliest Times To The Death Of Lorenzo The Magnificent • Niccolo Machiavelli

... of turning suspicion against themselves? They must feel very certain that the "evidence" they would produce would convict; or, they never would have dared to have chanced accusing them of the crime; for their acquittal would be almost sure to turn suspicion in their own direction. True, there was the skin map, and, possibly, the accusation was some scheme to get the map into their possession; but, how could their hanging bring this about? If they were hanged, the map and its meaning ...
— The Cave of Gold - A Tale of California in '49 • Everett McNeil

... court-martial had been held to investigate the action of Captain Sir Edward Belcher. 'The solemn silence,' wrote Captain M'Clure afterwards, 'with which the venerable president of the court returned Captain Belcher his sword, with a bare acquittal, best conveyed the painful feelings which wrung the hearts of all professional men upon that occasion; and all felt that there was no hope of the mystery of Franklin's fate being cleared up in our time ...
— Adventurers of the Far North - A Chronicle of the Frozen Seas • Stephen Leacock

... and at Venice suspicion is good evidence. Neither the interest of the Doge, his father, nor the intrepidity of conscious innocence, which he exhibited in the dungeon and on the rack, could procure his acquittal. He was banished to the island of Candia ...
— Poems • Samuel Rogers

... the offense of accepting rebates. The Circuit Court of Appeals ultimately determined that the fine was improperly large, since it had been based on the untenable theory that each shipment on which a rebate was paid constituted a separate offense. At the second trial the presiding judge ordered an acquittal. In spite, however, of the failure of this particular case, with its spectacular features, the net result of the rebate prosecutions was that the rebate evil was eliminated for good and all from American railway ...
— Theodore Roosevelt and His Times - A Chronicle of the Progressive Movement; Volume 47 in The - Chronicles Of America Series • Harold Howland

... a friend of Victor Noir he was called as a witness in the process against Peter Bonaparte; and that as administrator of the Comedie Francaise he directed, in 1899, an open letter to the "President and Members of the Court Martial trying Captain Dreyfus" at Rennes, advocating the latter's acquittal. So much about Claretie ...
— Prince Zilah, Complete • Jules Claretie

... was, however, acquitted by a majority of three only. The greatest exertions were made to screen him. Lord Stanhope, the son of the Earl of Chesterfield, went round to the wavering members, using all the eloquence he was possessed of to induce them either to vote for the acquittal, or to absent themselves from the House. Many weak-headed country gentlemen were led astray by his persuasions, and the result was as already stated. The acquittal caused the greatest discontent throughout the country. Mobs of a menacing character ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds • Charles Mackay

... Duties, except that on tea, repealed.... Circular letter of the earl of Hillsborough.... New York recedes from the non-importation agreement in part.... Her example followed.... Riot in Boston.... Trial and acquittal of Captain Preston. ...
— The Life of George Washington, Vol. 1 (of 5) • John Marshall

... penalty of his sin, until he shall have exhibited signs of submission, of sorrow, and of obedience. I may pity him, and cherish toward him the spirit of forgiveness; but for his own sake, for the order of the household, and on account of my innate sense of justice, I must not pronounce his acquittal, nor declare the controversy ended, until he shall have satisfied my governmental authority, and the sentiment of justice which both his own conscience and mine, constitutionally, and therefore by necessity, cherish. And I do ...
— Government and Rebellion • E. E. Adams

... replied Keith. King stared. "But in this case I assure you the law will do its duty. It is an absolutely open and shut case. Acquittal is impossible. Why, I myself was ...
— The Gray Dawn • Stewart Edward White

... my fortunes; but, I bless God, that my mind is not sunk with my fortunes. It is, on the contrary, raised above fortune, and above you; and for half a word they shall have the estate they envied me for, and an acquittal from me of all the expectations from my family that ...
— Clarissa, Volume 5 (of 9) • Samuel Richardson

... won for it this recognition. A necessary condition here, however, is that free discussion should not be prevented, either by the ferocity of reviewers or the arm of the law; otherwise, as I said before, the work of social preparation cannot go on. On this count, then, I claim acquittal, being for the moment on the ...
— Fragments of science, V. 1-2 • John Tyndall

... was one of many thousands that were going about the country at that time, huzzahing for the acquittal of the seven bishops who had been tried just then, and about whom little Harry Esmond at that time knew scarce anything. It was Assizes at Hexton, and there was a great meeting of the gentry at the "Bell;" and my lord's people had their new liveries on, and Harry a little suit of blue ...
— The History of Henry Esmond, Esq. • W. M. Thackeray

... from the first, no hope of acquittal. Staunton, who was acting for the Crown, was convinced that the prisoner would receive the maximum sentence allowed by law. And even O'Hara acknowledged privately to his solicitor that the best he could hope for was a life sentence. "And, by gad! he ...
— The Foreigner • Ralph Connor

... a few stormy months, the rebellion was quelled: all the prisoners taken up were severally disposed of by hanging, transportation, or acquittal, according to the nature and amount of the evidence brought against them; and the country became as peaceful as it is in the volcanic nature of our Irish soil ever ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 2, July, 1850. • Various

... of his eloquence to secure a conviction. In vain. The prisoner conducted his own defence, and so clearly exposed the flimsiness of the indictment that the prosecution utterly failed. A second arrest on a similar charge resulted in another acquittal at Brockville. It was by this time manifest that no jury could be found subservient enough to become blind instruments of oppression. The alleged libel consisted of two paragraphs in a petition to the Prince Regent, drafted by Mr. Gourlay, approved of, printed and published by sixteen residents of ...
— The Story of the Upper Canada Rebellion, Volume 1 • John Charles Dent

... sheen, With silver and with gold no little, She gave the counts of handsome mien Who swore the oath was her acquittal. ...
— Axel Thordson and Fair Valborg - a ballad • Thomas J. Wise

... justification, the system of faith, which was confirmed and exemplified to us in his death and resurrection. Secondly, "the righteousness of God," which is here said to be "pointed out" by Christ's death, denotes simply, in Professor Stuart's words, "God's pardoning mercy," or "acquittal," or "gratuitous justification," "in which sense," he says truly, "it is almost always used in Paul's epistles."15 It signifies neither more nor less than God's method of salvation by freely forgiving sins and treating ...
— The Destiny of the Soul - A Critical History of the Doctrine of a Future Life • William Rounseville Alger

... reader. Smelfungus indignantly calls it an immorality and a dishonor, "a playing with loaded dice;" which in good part it surely was. Nor can even Friedrich, who has many pleas for himself, obtain spoken acquittal; unspoken, accompanied with regrets and pity, is all even Friedrich can aspire to. My own impression is, Smelfungus, if candid, would on clearer information and consideration have revoked much of what he says here in ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XIII. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle

... respects, entitle her to the benefit of our doubts as to her assent to the death of Andrew. Many circumstances seem to me to favour those doubts, and the opinion of Petrarch is on the side of her acquittal. ...
— The Sonnets, Triumphs, and Other Poems of Petrarch • Petrarch

... gained a formidable reputation by his successful handling of cases from the lowest strata of society to the highest. Indeed it was a byword that his appearance in court indicated two things—the guilt of the accused and a verdict of acquittal. ...
— The War Terror • Arthur B. Reeve

... the father and, that rarer form, with respect to the mother, the fratricidal case known as the Childs Murder and rendered memorable by the impassioned plea of Mr Advocate Bushe which secured the acquittal of the wrongfully accused, the rights of primogeniture and king's bounty touching twins and triplets, miscarriages and infanticides, simulated or dissimulated, the acardiac foetus in foetu and aprosopia due to a congestion, ...
— Ulysses • James Joyce

... puts th' vardict iv acquittal in th' shape iv th' pop'lar song 'F'r he's a jolly good fellow' an' adds a ricommindation that Harvard colledge is gettin' ...
— Observations by Mr. Dooley • Finley Peter Dunne

... spite of the acquittal of Hincks, there were cases of complicated corruption, and a multitude of little squalid sins. Men like Sir Allan MacNab, who had been bred in a system of preferments and petty political gains, found it difficult to avoid small jobbery. "He has ...
— British Supremacy & Canadian Self-Government - 1839-1854 • J. L. Morison

... washerwomen had sold the linen for drink themselves; or, if there had been robbery, there had not been housebreaking." But obviously, he said just what was wanted, as his speech moved the jury and the audience, and was very much liked. When they gave a verdict of acquittal, Yulia nodded to Kostya, and ...
— The Darling and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov

... jury is going to take enough expert testimony to outweigh the tragedy of a beautiful woman? Do? Why, they can ruin me, even if I get a verdict of acquittal. They can leave me with a reputation for carelessness that no mere court decision can ...
— Master Tales of Mystery, Volume 3 • Collected and Arranged by Francis J. Reynolds

... in the Greek debate of 1850, which involved the censure or acquittal of Lord Palmerston, that I first meddled in speech with foreign affairs, to which I had heretofore paid the slightest possible attention. Lord Palmerston's speech was a marvel for physical strength, for ...
— The Life of William Ewart Gladstone, Vol. 1 (of 3) - 1809-1859 • John Morley

... being in the negative, every hope of acquittal was annihilated for Balmerino. He gave up every further defence, and apologised with his usual blunt courtesy for giving their Lordships so much trouble: he said that his objections had been the result of advice given by Mr. Ross, his solicitor, who had laid the case before counsel. ...
— Memoirs of the Jacobites of 1715 and 1745 - Volume III. • Mrs. Thomson

... process when the Prophet is permitted to see. We do not hear the pleadings on either side, but the sentence is solemnly recorded. The accusations are dismissed, their bringer rebuked, and in token of acquittal, the filthy garments which the accused had worn are changed for the full festal attire ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Ezekiel, Daniel, and the Minor Prophets. St Matthew Chapters I to VIII • Alexander Maclaren

... impeachment of a Cabinet officer, General Belknap, Secretary of War. The trial occurred before the Senate, sitting as a court of impeachment during the closing weeks of the session, and resulted in his acquittal, less than two-thirds of the Senators voting for conviction. General Belknap was represented by an able array of counsel, chief of whom were Judge Black of Pennsylvania and the Hon. Matthew H. Carpenter of Wisconsin. Mr. Knott of Kentucky, Mr. Hoar of ...
— Something of Men I Have Known - With Some Papers of a General Nature, Political, Historical, and Retrospective • Adlai E. Stevenson

... was trained—the law—presents another line of temptations. The court-room is a soul's market where many barter away their ideals in the hope of winning wealth or fame. Lawyers sometimes boast of the number of men whose acquittal they have secured when they knew them to be guilty, and of advantages won which they knew their clients did not deserve. I do not understand how a lawyer can so boast, for he is an officer of the court and, as such, is sworn to assist in the administration of justice. When a lawyer ...
— In His Image • William Jennings Bryan

... churches, to the poor, To the village!—me who had already given much. And think you not I did not know That the pipe-organ, which I gave to the church, Played its christening songs when Deacon Rhodes, Who broke and all but ruined me, Worshipped for the first time after his acquittal? ...
— Spoon River Anthology • Edgar Lee Masters

... prompters of his prompters; his policy was almost exactly what mine would have been, and I was in a position to defend it. I wrote and published a manifesto in the Review, in which I took the very highest ground in his behalf, claiming for him not mere acquittal, but praise and honour. Instantly a number of other writers took up the tone: I believe there was a portion of truth in what Lord Durham, soon after, with polite exaggeration, said to me—that to this article might be ascribed the almost triumphal reception which he met with on ...
— Autobiography • John Stuart Mill

... down the wrath of the governor because of some sharp attacks on his conduct. Copies of the newspaper were burned before the pillory, Zenger was put in jail, and what began as a trial for libel ended in a great struggle for liberty of the press; Zenger's acquittal was the cause of great public ...
— A Brief History of the United States • John Bach McMaster

... that the famous miner Haywood, just after his acquittal from the charge of murder in connection with the Idaho labour troubles, visited Chicago, and spent most of his time at the Salon with Terry and Marie and several of their friends. The Salon was temporarily revived, like the flash in the pan, under Haywood's stimulating ...
— An Anarchist Woman • Hutchins Hapgood



Words linked to "Acquittal" :   final judgment, acquit, law, jurisprudence, final decision, conviction



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