| 319 witnesses, he could have disproved everything that was against him; but the court suffered them to be intimidated- some of them in the presence of the court, and they were driven also, and hunted, and some of them entirely driven out of the State. And thus he was not able to have a fair trial; that the spirit of the court was tyrannical and overbearing, and the whole transaction of his treatment during the examination was calculated to convince your petitioners that it was a religious persecution, proscribing him in the liberty of conscience, which is guaranteed to him by the Constitution of the United States and the State of Missouri; that a long catalogue of garbled testimony was permitted by the court, purporting to be the religious sentiment of the said Joseph Smith, Jr., which testimony was false, and your petitioners know that it was false; because the witnesses testified that those sentiments were promulgated on certain days, and in the presence of large congregations; and your petitioners can prove by those congregations that the said Joseph Smith, Jr., did not promulge such ridiculous and absurd sentiments for his religion, as was testified of and admitted before the Honorable Austin A. King; and, at the same time, those things had no bearing on the case that the said Joseph Smith, Jr., was pretended to be charged with; and after the examination the said prisoner was committed to the jail for treason against the State of Missouri; whereas, the said Joseph Smith, Jr., did not levy war against the State of Missouri, neither did he commit any covert acts; neither did he aid or abet an enemy against the State of Missouri during the time that he is charged with having done so; and, further, your petitioners have yet to learn that the State has an enemy; neither is the proof evident nor the presumption great, in its most indignant form, upon the face of the testimony on the part of the State, ex parte as it is in its nature, that the said prisoner has committed the slightest degree of treason or any other act of transgression against the laws of the State of Missouri; and yet said prisoner has been committed to Liberty jail, Clay County (Missouri), for treason.
"He has continually offered bail to any amount that could
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