X: 1
T:Stokes's Verdict
S:Digital Tradition, stovrdct
B:From Folk Songs out of Wisconsin, Peters
B:Collected George Hankins, Gordon, WI 1923
Z:dt:stovrdct
M:3/4
L:1/8
Q:1/4=100
W:If you'll listen awhile I'II sing you a song
W:About this glorious land of the free,
W:And the difference I'll show twixt the rich and the poor
W:In a trial by jury, you see.
W:
W:If you've plenty ot "stamps" you can hold up your head
W:And walk out from your own prison door.
W:But they'll hang you up high if you've no friends or gold,
W:Let the "rich" go but hang up the poor.
W:
W:In the trials for murder we've had now-a-days
W:The rich ones get off swift and sure.
W:While they've thousands to pay to the jury and judge,
W:You can bet they'll go back on the poor.
W:
W:Let me speak of a man who's now dead in his grave,
W:A good man as ever was born.
W:Jim Fisk he was called and his money he gave
W:To the outcast, the poor and forlorn.
W:
W:We all know he loved both women and wine,
W:But his heart it was right, I am sure.
W:Though he lived like a "prince" in a palace so fine,
W:Yet he never went back on the poor.
W:
W:If a man was in trouble, Fisk helped him along
W:To drive the "grim wolf" from the door.
W:He strove to do right, though he may have done wrong,
W:But he never went back on the poor.
W:
W:Jim Fisk was a man who wore "his heart on his sleeve."
W:No matter what people would say,
W:And he did all his deeds, (both the good and the bad)
W:In the broad open light of the day.
W:
W:With his grand six-in-hand on the beach at Long Branch
W:He cut a "big dash," to be sure.
W:But "Chicago's great fire" showed the world that Jim Fisk
W:With his "wealth" still remembered the poor.
W:
W:When the telegram came that the homeless that night
W:Were starving to death, slow but sure,
W:His "Lightning Express" manned by noble Jim Fisk
W:Flew to feed all her hungry and poor.
W:
W:Now what do you think of this trial of Stokes,
W:Who murdered this friend of the poor?
W:When such men get free, is there anyone safe
W:If they step from outside their own door?
W:
W:Is there one law for the poor and one for the rich?
W:It seems so ---at least so I say---
W:If they hang up the poor, why ---damn it--- the rich
W:Ought to hang up the very same way.
W:
W:Don't show any favor to friend or to foe,
W:The beggar or prince at his door.
W:The big millionaire you must hang up also
W:But never go back on the poor.
W:
W:Oh! Shame on this "land of the free and the brave"
W:When such sights as this meet our eye!
W:The poor in their prisons are treated like slaves
W:While the rich in their cells they live high.
W:
W:A poor devil "crazy with drink" they will hang
W:For a murder he didn't intend,
W:But a wealthy assassin with "political friends"
W:Gets off, for he's money to spend.
W:
W:But if things go on this way we'll stand it no more.
W:The people will rise up in bands.
W:A vigilance committee we'll raise on our shores
W:And take the law in our own hands.
K:F
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