A MARTYR'S CROWN 81
after and watched more closely by the police; and that a special
commission be created to study the problem of the poor. Better
educational facilities should be provided, and better instruction in
the meaning of religion and the comforts it can provide for the
unfortunate and the underprivileged.
The prisoner at the bar was defended by a Zurich attorney
named Rüttimann. "Staatsanwalt" Huber, a Liberal, had declined
to take the case, "for health reasons." The chief strategy of the
defense was to attempt to prove that Weitling's work lay wholly
in the realm of theory, and that no evidence had been introduced
to prove a conspiracy against the state. When the prisoner took
the stand, he reviewed the main events of his life. Weitling re
ferred to his lowly origin, reported that his stepfather had died
ten years ago and that he had received his last letter from his
mother a year or two ago. He believed that she was living in
Magdeburg on poor relief. As far as his own activities were con
cerned, Weitling solemnly affirmed that his sole purpose had been
to improve the social order by oral propaganda, not by force.^9
On September 16, 1843, Weitling was found guilty by the
criminal court of Zurich. Two days later his case was appealed,
and final sentence was not passed until November 23, 1843, after
the prisoner had been held in jail for several months. On the oc
casion of his final appearance in the court of appeals, the prisoner
made a dramatic plea for acquittal. His attorney and some of his
friends had tried to dissuade him from addressing the court, and
he was deeply hurt when he learned that they regarded his per
formance as "mere vanity." Weitling's remarks were reported
promptly to Vienna as an attempt "to encourage and give an ex
ample to his followers in and out of Switzerland, rather than to
prove his own innocence."^10
The prisoner at the bar confined his remarks to an attempt to
refute the charge of blasphemy. He denied all intention to under
mine the religious foundations of the state, or to rob the people
(^9) Barnikol, Weitling der Gefangene, 137-45.
(^10) Brügel, Österreichische Sozialdemokratie, I, 33-36.