Lawrence Hall, HSG
Mhall46184@aol.com
But First There was
President Grant’s Speeding Ticket
I’ve never been arrested, but, hey, I’m still young;
there’s a chance. Some of the nicest
people I know have spent the occasional weekend at the county sheriff’s resort and
spa, some opting for longer stays, so I wonder if I’ve been missing something.
If someday I receive a stainless steel invitation to jail
I can’t imagine that a private jet and a motorcade will be part of the intake
process, or that extra police and the Secret Service will escort me, or that barriers
and blocked-off streets will ease my way inside to the receptionist, concierge,
complimentary cocktails, a fingerprint manicure, souvenir photographs, and all
the other amenities I’ve been reading about with regard to the anticipated
indictment of a former president this week.
I don’t recall any stories about law officers or
attorneys general sending courtesy notes to wanted men to turn themselves in,
pretty please, but then I am behind the times in so many ways. Perhaps soon all
arrests will be prefaced by formal courtesies:
5 April 2023
Dear Mr. Percival “Snake Eyes” Thorpe-Ponsonby,
You are
cordially invited to a reception hosted by
The
Sheriff and the District Attorney
At the
County Courthouse on
17
April 2023
2:00
P.M.
Valet Parking
Dress: Afternoon Business Casual
RSVP
In 1872 William H. West, a D.C. city police officer, did
not send then-President Ulysses Grant an invitation or a ticket-by-mail; he
collared him in the streets of the Capitol for speeding in his one-horse buggy.
Officer West, who was a Civil War veteran and black, is reported to have said
to the President:
"I cautioned you yesterday, Mr. President, about fast
driving, and you said, sir, that it would not occur again…I am very sorry, Mr.
President, to have to do it, for you are the chief of the nation, and I am
nothing but a policeman, but duty is duty, sir, and I will have to place you
under arrest."
-Ulysses
S. Grant Was Arrested 151 Years Before Trump's Indictment (businessinsider.com)
The President did not pull the vulgar “Don’t you know who
I am!?” thing, paid his $20 fine, and was apparently a more careful driver
thereafter.
And that, dear readers, is a wonderful remembrance of one
of those moments when this nation got things just right.
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