One Blind, One Coated

"Miller is convicted. Whatever time you gentlemen take on the Daugherty case, I do not anticipate that you will spend over 15 minutes on Miller," said U. S. District Attorney Emory R. Buckner to the jury last week as he summed up the conspiracy charges against two members of the Harding Administration. Mr. Buckner, who is going to retire from office in two months, was no mean prophet.

Three days later, the twelve jurors, with news in their weary eyes, returned to Judge John C. Knox's Federal courtroom in Manhattan. They had decided without much trouble that onetime (1921-25) Alien Property Custodian Thomas Woodnutt Miller was guilty of conspiracy to defraud the U. S. Government. But 70* hours of argument and sleep under lock and key had failed to produce a verdict on onetime (1921-24) Attorney General Harry Micajah Daugherty, who was closely linked with the alien property fraud. The final vote of the jurors was eleven to one for conviction of Mr. Daugherty.

All charges against Mr. Daugherty will be dropped. He was so moved that he made a speech thanking everybody, broke down and wept. He, 67, blind in one eye, prepared to leave for Washington Court House, Ohio, to visit his 90-year-old mother and "make a living at law practice."

Mr. Miller, 40, with his wife at his side, heard the jury's verdict without wincing, without emotion. "I am not through fighting yet," said he. He faces a maximum penalty of two years in prison plus a $10,000 fine. But his attorney, Aaron Sapiro, who is suing Henry Ford for $1,000,000, immediately announced that he would carry Mr. Miller's case to a higher court. "Colonel Miller does not take the attitude of being the 'goat,'" said Mr. Sapiro. "As you know, Colonel Miller did not take the stand or call any witnesses in his defense. This course was decided upon in view of our conviction that the Government haa failed to prove a conspiracy as such, although it proved a great many facts, such as the possession of bonds, not denied by Colonel Miller, but from which inferences good or bad could be drawn."

As Alien Property Custodian, Mr. Miller returned $7,000,000 worth of stock in the American Metal Co., which had been seized by the U. S. during the World War, to the original German owners. This transaction was speeded up with a $441,000 bribe, of which Mr. Miller received $50,000. Mr. Daugherty, John T. King and Jesse W. Smith were supposed to have shared the remaining $391,000. Messrs. King and Smith are now dead; Mr. Daugherty is free. Notwithstanding Lawyer Sapiro, many say that Mr. Miller is the "goat."

*It had taken 66 hours last October for another jury to fail reach a verdict on the Miller-Daugherty case (TiME, Oct. 18).