w Vf7?
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6
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God. DoeH society tako u young prisoner, hand
cuffed tind gtlurdod from a modern penitentiary
of comont, Htono and armor plato tako him ou I
upon tho gallows and hang him until ho is dead
for self-dofonso? To kill a man over-powered
and harmless is not an act of self-defense for
oithor a citlzon or a atato, but is an act of un
restrained power directed by revenge rather
than reason.
What man would be permitted to kill his
noighbor bocauHo bin neighbor was excitable,
high tempered and In tho habit of getting drunk,
on tho theory that his noighbor might kill some
body and possibly tho accused? Such conduct
la not aef defense, but a mero problematical
BUbtorfugo. Jb it logical to voto to death a
prisoner on such a theory of national self de
fense wlion tho guilty one can In kept secure?
Tho pretended excuse that a man might gain
his freedom and kill somo ono, a mero specula
tion, 1b not a solf-dofonso Justification. It would
r, not bo oxtending this peculiar logic to eugago
phrenologists to go out in soarch of children
with doBtructivo tendencies and put them to
doath on tho aamo theory of self defonso or to
hang all drunkards. Tho state is not obliged, in
fact, to kill for solf dofonse (lie stato is too
groat and powerful to bo compelled to resort to
killing for such an excuso in a time of peace
and quiot such as wo are now enjoying.
I can conceive of a case, possibly several
whoro capital punishment by the state for self
defonso is necessary and may bo inflicted. A
bold political criminal; ono who murders to
win; who has tho following of a' Napoleon; who
has tho criminal heart of a Borgia; who, -when
convicted of a murder would be liberated by
his criminal adherents; and who, when liberated
would go on poisoning and killing others. De
ploring capital punishment as wo must, yet as
a principle of solf defense wo may be obliged
to tolerate and use it in such a case if it over
arises.
On tho same principle as Individuals we be
llovo in killing If it Is necessary io prevent be
ing killed. What individual would hesitate to
shoot if a burglar was crawling in his bed room
window with a pistol In oach hand and a knife
in his tooth? This illustration is mentioned as
an oxcoptlon under tho rulo of self preserva
tion. A few years ago I copied from the paper a
raoro hoadlino for comment in this connection:
"Ono Hundred Sovonty-six Peoplo Attempt
Suicido In Omaha During Past Year. Of these
thirty-throo succeeded whilo 142 wore saved and
very glad of it." One hundred forty-two saved
and "glad of it!" If wo should have hung these
142 roscuod or ignominously cursed and tarred
and foatherod and burned them in oil, for cx
amplo, -would that havo kept others from at
tempting suicide? No, when they attempt it
thoy expect to succeed and would adopt surer
methods. Such punishment of suicides involv
ing painful death would suggest and ropeat sug
gestions of destruction and increase suicido from
now rocruits rendered morbid by disappointment
op griof. If moh kill themselves under press
ing distress which sprouts a germ thought of
Buicido for escapo, why would not a greater
number bo drivon to kill others from similar
development of murder and execution talk?
This weaknoss of mind this homicidal mania
would bo stimulated by tho thoughts of mur
der in others. If attomptod suicides were
punished with painful and prolonged death out
of 17 G attempts, it would havo been chronicled
nearer a hundred instead of 33 that succeeded
Lynchings aro fair illustrations of where
public executions causo more murdorB by ex
ample. In countries whore men aro hanged by
tho state, hanging is the usual mothod of tho
lyimliors; thoy follow example. Where behead
ing is tho penalty the stillotto and knlfo is the
weapon of tho mob. Whore shooting is the
penalty tho mob usually is content with tho
bullet. No ono will deny that executions causo
lynchings and more murdors by mero suKtres
tions. This principle is recognized in a mild
way in every household whoro parents Instinc
tively (rogardloss of tho Ladies Homo JourmVn
know bettor than even talk of evil to their cull
dren because the suggestion on a subject of evil
causes deeper thoughts on tho conversation ami
thoughts so fertilized develop actions in them
What is true in most children is bound to effect
some grown people tho samo as children. Men
aro lynched by mobs because states have here
tofore boen teaching that in certain cases in
ought to bo killed Tho mob tlUnks it Sas n
its midst ono of the most aggravated cases for"
audi a penalty. They aro not taught to hi
shocked at taking human life but rather to dn
mand ono occasonally for the good of the coin"
The Commoner
try. Tho pooplo havo not fully outgrown tho
witch hanging days of a few years ago. Lord
Eldon expressed himself In the nineteenth cen
tury with fear of disaster If England repealed
tho death penalty for stealing five shillings.
Executions unquestionably have a tendency
to brutalize tho minds of men and cause them
to put a price upon human life and feel a license
to tako it away. If tho state hires men to
.slaughter human prisoners furnished by juries
loft to Inherited prejudices, what may wo expect
of citizens of such a government? When men
aro burning and bursting with passion or
rage; when nothing but a life, in a country of
cheap estimation of life, stands in tho way of
success, men think of killing because killing is
mado so natural to think of. Picture after pic
ture of vivid executions aro impressed upon tho
mind to suggest themselves at every supposed
emergency, by this great composite hypnotic
operator public opinion. It is thoreforo
natural for these germ thoughts planted by tho
stato's suggestion to burst out and overshadow
other thoughts until a citizen takes a life for a
capital or towering, monumental offense against
himself, a private citizen as ho has seen his
government do with its offenders. An execu
tion is not only of no value to prevent others
from killing, but on tho other hand experience
shows it has the opposite effect. If an execu
tion is ordered to deter others, the public should
know of it not by reading but by seeing it as
they did in olden times. But the awful effect
upon the peoplo has boen so marked that nearly
every stato in the union has compelled execu
tions to bo in private ultra private enclosures.
In this state, as well as many others, executions
aro removed from the county of the crime to the
penitentiary in an enclosure and in the presence
of only half a dozen legal witnesses.
We may perhaps seriously consider the fact
of numerous penitentiary murders being in
fluenced to some extent by the shocking- sug
gestion of concentrated executions of the state
in this institution.
This removal of executions to the penitentiary
to avoid the evil influence upon the general
public is a terrible blow to old Henry VIII and
his death carts; this is the death knell to tho
sentiment of such scenes commemorated in tho
masterpieces of art as beautiful women riding
through tho jeering crowds to the headman's
block. This conduct of the various states proves
to every reasonable man that the state of Ne
braska and many of her sister states have con
cluded that tho example of public executions,
that is the killing of people to deter others
from killing, does not have the effect it was
once thought to have had. It proves that tho
example of public execution is bad for society
instead of good. If it is bad to see, it is not
good to read of. It therefore follows that the
real benefit to society Is not to either see or
read of an execution, and consequently, if pos
sible, not havo one. This condition would pre
vent its publication over the civilized world with
all its damaging details. In the state of Michi
gan, where tho death penalty is absolutely re
pealed, I havo read that murders committed in
numbers aro far below the murders of the states
which havo the arbitrary penalty of death. It
may be that tho state having ceased to play such
a P?rt, aJ,J suggestion of death has made this
marked difference yet tho details of executions
recognizing no restraint in the boundary line of
that state and creeping in from other states
exerts much damaging influence.
On tho question of suggestion as applicable
to kings and rulers the old sultan of Turkey was
somewhat sagacious. He censors the press so
hStiS?nrepI? iS GV,er PublisHed in Turkey of
the killing of a ruler. President McKinley's
death was published there as resulting from in-
thffe ?f v18 benefiC,al t0 suPP-e!s news of
the killing of kings on account of suggestion it
is in the same measure vastly more blneSclaf to
prevent the killing of citizens by their govern
ments for tho same reasons. govern-
Tho other day I clipped from the papers the
following dispatch which Is also in point-
"Paris. July 13.-The prefect ofP police in
Franco has forbidden the moving picture exhiw
tlon of the exploits of the bandit Bonnet and"
nfuband'.?n ffround that " would stimulate
imitators." Comments of this kind aro con
tinually being published. n
For thousands of years executions have been
tried and have failed in restraining crime
Criminals have been hung upon the gibbet and
in iron cages until their bodies havf shriveled
or fallen to pieces or were devoured by caw ion
birds, and the public was welcomed yea in
vited and compelled to witness such executions
VOLUME 13, NUMBER g
and public spectacles to inspire them with awe
and fear, and frighten them into becoming "law
abiding citizens." But the purpose failed, utter
ly failed, because these examples excited the
peoplo and impressed deeds of destruction In the
minds of the Individual, when jealousy, passion,
disease and drunkenness always awaken theso
thoughts of tho nation's .example of public
punishment which they adopt upon impulse as
private punishment.
Henry VIII put to death 72,000 people dur
ing his reign of twenty years, but each year
crime increased. People "were hung for being
witches, beggars, and vagabonds; for stealing
sheep, game or fish and for stealing as low as
35 cents in money; for quitting the king's ser
vice; for discussing how long tho queen would
live; for trying to convert men to tho Roman
Catholic religion and for about a hundred other
offenses.
Some of the mild forms of punishment gradu
ated up to a resulting death were as follows:
Plucking out eyes, cutting off the nose or lips,
boiling and burning for heresy. China's most
terrible slow death was -ten years' imprisonment
without salt. There was the rack, skinning
alive, quartering and disemboweling also the
hitching of horses to the four extremeties and
tearing men apart. If we had such punish
ments now murderers would follow tho example
of tho state and mutilate their victims as did the
bandits of old. However, at the present time the
plain, simple killing of the state satisfies the
modern murderous citizen.
Have not these droadful punishments had
their influenco in private crime and was it not
time for the legislature to open the question of
the death penalty to juries and their reviewing
bodies? Is it not a terrible truth that human
life has been one of -the lightest baubles with
which governments and subjects have ever
played? And yet these horrible penalties havo
failed in the purposo for which they wero in
tended. Possibly while they serve to horrify
some who never contemplate murder the sug
gestion of death remind and set in motion pri
vate motives of revenge in others which causes
more murders than were ever prevented. In the
light of the past will it help the state or nation
to hang this fellow? Will it be another example
of the little consequence of a human life? Will
it continue to teach the false doctrine that death
is a punishment and lead men in frenzies of
anger to think of killing to get even?
The hanging of one man will never stop an
other who. kills in the heat of passion because
he does not take time to think of the gallows.
He is a victim of years of suggestion plus the
inherited memory or tendency from the same
Influences. What is responsible for so many
murders in the heat of passion? These wild
passions resulting in spasmodic murder are the
harvests of wars, desires for abortions and capi
tal punishment. Some impulses are planted by
state sanctioned deaths from the earliest under
standing of children and are watered and
warmed m public schpols, on the public streets,
in business places, and in the sanctity of homes.
Heredity and suggestion on the part of the
state has its influences in every murder and the
more the state hangs and the nation wars the
more the people will think of human destruc
tion and the more murders we will have.
Every year the dead letter office receives
nearly tho same number of misdirected letters.
L eiS percePy- Why do we have
III iLe n,umber of absent-minded moments in
tne lives of men and women who write letters?
Irn,r!0t,kn.!!; neither d0 w know why
tnero are also the same recurring number of
S?nmvnf and S,UicIdal imPes in a given
iSin ?ur?Cie.ty- " way appear that this
of tlem G iS resPnslble 'w many
HoSnnnIeS Ti of tbis generation some
fhl ???- B0Uld, hf mado for the influence of
mlnZ ??& CU8ed ?0Uld be made fr heredity,
?hi SSI influenceT-tue desire of the mother for
as fami vU?il? f her Unborn son- As surely
to tnln ,ftupes are transmitted from father
landed dni ? tuoughts ias and practices
51 L ? t0 sons by ancestors who have
Hke stocTfn TiarS AhaJ have bchered men
studv tWWoSfaUghJ:ering pens Wo should
nto5f cfara.Gtep o a murderer as we do the
SSStSS midiIBeaBS; as we d0 fevers in our
said thPr n? iiUSanlt7 in our asylums. It is
S thSfl ?nr X T r ?rime as wel1 funded
ness birth LSrilH11 ad tides' light an -Let
uh Smiv ? ath en suicide and accident.
nSnlBhmpnWS? man,T,llile be ls Siven civilized
punishment and not follow a false doctrine and
(Continued on Page 10.)
