Cline v. State

• Decision Date: 25 June 1915
• Docket Number: (No. 3653.)
• Citation: 178 S.W. 520
• Parties: CLINE v. STATE.
• Court: Texas Court of Criminal Appeals

Page 520

178 S.W. 520

CLINE v. STATE.

(No. 3653.)

Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas.

June 25, 1915.

Appeal from District Court, Bexar County; W. S. Anderson, Judge.

Charles Cline was convicted of murder, and he appeals. Reversed and remanded.

Haltom & Haltom, of San Antonio, for appellant. C. C. McDonald, Asst. Atty. Gen., for the State.

HARPER, J.

This is a companion case to that of Serrato, two Gonzales Cases, and Martinez Case, reported in 171 S. W. beginning on page 1133, and the Vasquez Case, reported in 171 S. W. 1160, and 172 S. W. 225.

In this case appellant was adjudged guilty, and his punishment assessed at imprisonment for life in the penitentiary. Some of the questions raised in those cases are presented in this record, but we do not deem it necessary to discuss them. All the evidence adduced on the trial, in our opinion, was admissible except the book introduced in evidence, which showed that he was a member of the I. W. W. This bill shows:

"The district attorney offered in evidence portions of a book shown to have been in possession of defendant, as follows: On front cover of book: `Gen. No. 6172. [Bearing Stamp.] Industrial Workers of the World. Label. I. W. W. Universal. Name, Chas. Cline. Address, St. Louis, Mo.' The book also having stamped on the inside of front cover, the following: `Industrial Workers of the World. I. W. W. St. Louis Industrial Union No. 84. July 7th, 1905, St. Louis, Mo.' And printed upon the first page of the book: `Industrial Workers of the World — Official Membership Book.' [Stamped.] `Industrial Workers of the World. General I. W. W. Administration. The member is entitled to work in any industry of the organization where employment is obtained when stamps are affixed, showing the member is in good standing. To be in good standing a member must be paid for current month.'

"And printed on the second page the following:

"`Labor is Entitled to All It Produces.

"No money should be received without acknowledgment in this book. Members must see that the financial secretary places a stamp in the book for each month for which dues or assessments are paid.

"Issued by authority of the General Executive Board of the I. W. W. Vincent St. John, General Secretary and Treasurer. 518 Cambridge Bldg., 56 5th Ave. Chicago, Ill.

"And printed on the last page of the book the following:

"`The New Preamble:

"`The working class and the employing class have nothing in common. There can be no peace so long as hunger and want are found among millions of working people and the few, who make up the employing class, have all the good things of life.

"`Between these two classes a struggle must go on until the workers of the world organize as a class, take possession of the earth and the machinery of production, and abolish the wage system.

"`We find that the centering of the management of industries into fewer and fewer hands make the trade unions unable to cope with the ever-growing power of the employing class.

"`The trade unions foster a state of affairs which allows one set of workers to be pitted against another set of workers in the same industry, thereby helping defeat one another in wage wars. Moreover the trade unions aid the employing class to mislead the workers into the belief that the working class have interest in common with their employers.

"`These conditions can be changed and the interest of the working class upheld by an organization formed in such a way that all its members of any one industry, or in all industries, if necessary, cease work whenever a strike or lockout, is on in any department thereof, thus making an injury to one an injury to all.

"`Instead of the conservation motto, "A fair day's wages for a fair day's work," we must inscribe in our banner the revolutionary watchword, "Abolition of the wage system."

"`It is the historic mission of the working class to do away with capitalism. The army of production must be organized, not only for the everyday struggle with capitalists, but also to carry on production when capitalists shall have been overthrown. By organizing industrially we are forming the structure of the new society within the shell of the old.'"

Appellant objected to the introduction of this testimony on the ground that it does not tend to prove a conspiracy, nor that Ortiz was killed...