The Sun.
London, England, 1848-03-15 00:00:00

SUN, LONDON, WEDNESDAY EVENING,

insensible to the value of measures designed for the re
formation of offenders. But the question of secondary
punishment was like political economy; every man's
hand was directed against his brother. Transportati(
n.
solitary confinement, secret confinement, were ail in turn
applauded and condemned as secondary punishments.
When his Hon Friend the Member for Dumfries pro-
posed to abolish the punishment of death, he ought to
have stated what secondary punishment he proposed to
substitute. His Right Hon. Friend had referred to a
punishment inflicted in Russia, not nominally death,
though practically terminating in death in the generality
of cases. Would his Hon. Friend propose that as a
substitute ? Would he propose perpetual solitude, or
working in gangs in the streets in prison dresses?
Thinking that no sufficient reason had been shown for
the abolition of the punishment of death, he concurred
with her Majesty's Government in resisting the intro-
duction of the measure.
Mr. HUME said that crimes changed with changes of
manners and characters. The Hon. Gentleman who had
just spoken relied chiefly on the Word of God, but he
(Mr. Hume) denied that any text of Scripture could be
quoted giving authority to one man to teke away the
life of another. " I will have mercy and not sacrifice,"
were the words of God himself. He also said, " Thou
shalt not kill," a command which he believed referred to
the taking of life as a punishment as well as to the crime
of murder. He had never seen an execution but once,
and then twenty persons were hanged together, for
crimes which had been subsequently blotted from the
statute-book as punishable by death.—(Heats) He
believed that in all countries where life was held cheap
by the public authority it was held cheap by the people.
—(Hear.) Wherever executions were frequent reckless
assassination and murder became matters of course. He
believed that society had been better conducted under the
amended system of punishment which began with Sir S.
Romilly, and he believed that if he were alive now
he would support the motion of his Hon. Friend. His
representative, the Hon. Member for Devonport, said
that all executions were evil, and yet they were defended
as examples to society. It was well known that murders
had been committed which had originated in the behold-
ing of public executions.—(Hear, hear.) He was opposed
to execution' in private, because they would then be
little short of acts of revenge. He believed that every
execution was an injury to the State, and led to others
of a similar nature. He would, therefore, support the
motion of the Hon. Member for Dumfries.
Mr. WOOD said that he had given a serious and
early attention to the subject before the House, and he
came to the conclusion that it would not be expedient to
abolish the punishment of death for the crime of murder
—a conclusion to which ho would not come if he believed
that the taking away a man's life was unauthorised by
Scripture. The sacredness of human life was the object
they all had in view; but their feelings were likely to
lead them astray as they viewed the subject from one
point of view or the other. He thought that the vin-
dictive element of the punishment of death ought to be
eliminated, but he had not heard a single argument
against the right of the State to take care of all its citi-
zens in the dearest of their privileges, that of life itself.
He thought that no method of preventing the crime of
murder was so effectual as that of the frightful punish-
ment of death. There were two objects in punishment
—the prevention of the crime, and the reformation of
the offender. With regard to the punishment of death,
the latter consideration was out of the question ; but
with regard to the prevention of the crime, they did not
merely prevent it for the sake of the class of persons by
wham it was likely to be committed ; those who from
want of education—and in that respect he feared they
had much to answer for—(Hear,hear)--or from the bad
example of their parents were prone to crime. They
had, then, to consider what mode of punishment was
most likely to deter them from crime. He feared that
those who were disposed to commit the crime of murder
would nut be open to other influences than those of
terror and punishment of death. And it seemed to him
to be perfectly consistent with the most earnest love of
man to deter 'him from the commission of crime to which
an evil disposition might lead him by the prospect of
such a punishment. One of the three greatest poets of
the world, Dante, made one of the condemned souls
say—
"l was created by Almighty power,
The highest wisdom and primeval lore."
He would not say that those who supported the motion
were actuated by a morbid humanity, but he believed
there was amongst a large portion of the community a
revulsion of feeling—the effect of their former severe
criminal code—which now shrunk from what appeared
to him to be a lawful, proper, and consistent mode of
punishment. He believed that an increase of crimes
followed where the punishment was removed. Captain
Maconochie stated, that after twelve executions had taken
place in New South Wales of bushrangers who had com-
mitted crimes attended with murders, those crimes had
ceased, and the remedy had been effectual. It was a re-
markable proof of the efficacy of the punishment also,
that after the late executions in Ireland assassinations
and murder had ceased in that country. There had been
some very alarming instauces recently of public feeling
upon this subject. Persons had been recommended to
the mercy of the Crown whose offences were of a very
heinous character. It would be probably said that the
cause of this was the harsh character of the punishment.
He believed, on the contrary, that it was not the harsh-
ness of the penalty, but the publicity given to the execu-
tion, which raised the sympathy of the public. The
proper course would be for the criminal to be taken from
the bar, and never to be heard of again, save through the
official communication that he had suffered the penalty
of the law in presence of the proper officers. For these
and other reasons ho had come to the conclusion, that it

was impossible to support the Bill ef the Hon. Member,
and he should consequently vote against its introduction,
Mr. BRIGHT thought he was able to discover an in-
creased interest in the discussion on this subject within
thu House, and ho thought he could venture to say that
there was a very greatly increased interest in it out of
doors. They had not been charged on this occasion
with " morbid feelings" and " sickly sentimentalities."
The Hon. Baronet the Member for Oxford congratulated
Mr. Romilly with not having gone further upon this
subject than his father did. He (Mr. Bright) should be
glad to know what ancestor of the Hon. Baronet had
equalled him in his political opinions. It seemed to him
that this punishment of death proceeded on an erroneous
idea of what were the feelings of people likely to com-
mit crimes. The threat of eternal punishment, which
was sounded every week from 20,000 pulpits in this
country, did not deter from the commission of crime:
how much less, then, could the threat of punishment by
deathldeter?—(Hear, hear.) Let the House really ask
themselves what the threat was. If they looked over
newspapers at the time of the assizes they found people
condemned to death for very unequal offences. They
would also find that people were sometimes even ac-
quitted on the ground of the harsh nature of the punish-
ment. There were several cases in proof of his last
position. The case of the two sisters, Seeley, tried at
Taunton, for poisoning their own relatives, was strongly
in point. In another case, that of a man who murdered
his fellow-servant at the Guildhall Coffee-house, sheriffs
and aldermen came forward to intercede for the mur-
derer.
Alderman HUMPHERY—No. No aldermen.
Mr. BRIGHT—There was another case of the mur-
derers of Lord Coventry's gamekeeper; and even at the
last assizes, several murderers were respired, in conse-
quence of the general feeling of the public against
punishment by death. He was not calling in question
the justice of exercising the royal prerogative in these
cases; he looked on every respite that issued from the
Home-office as a further indication of the power of the
people upon the subject. Even with respect to the most
recent case in whieh,the prerogative had been exercised,
he had only that morning received a letter from the
brother in-law of the murdered soldier, who declared
that among the friends of that unhappy man there was
the strongest feeling that the last punishment of the law
ought to be averted from the culprit, and that they were
most ready to sign a petition to the Crown, praying for a
mitigation of the penalty.—(Hear, hear.) Well, then,
it was clear that it was quite impossible for the Govern-
ment to carry out the laws. It was in the power of any
single juror to defeat the law; it was in the power of
any humane individual to arouse so much public feeling
in any particular case as to place any Home Secretary
who carried out the law in an awfully responsible post •
tion. But the argument which weighed with him most
upon this subject was the necessity for strengthening the
public reverence for huma❑ life and its inviolability.
Did capital punishment weaken or strengthen that
feeling of reverence?—(Hear, hear.) lie believed it
was most important that Parliament should abandon
this punishment rather than that juries and the people
should themselves virtually put a termination to the
practice.
Mr. F. O'CONNOR having bad considerable experi-
ence—(Loud laughter)—in the operation of the criminal
law, was desirous to offer a few observations. It was
his conviction, in opposition to what had been just said,
that the public would never tolerate the practice of ac-
quitting murderers clearly convicted upon the evidence of
witnesses, merely because of the punishment to which the I
party might be subjected. As far as the punishment of
death went, it seemed to him that great reforms were
already being made. There was now, in the power to
convict of manslaughter, an opportunity of ending a man
guilty under circumstances of extenuation. But whilst
regarding with sympathy the fate of the murderer, let
them take care they did not render the life of the public
less secure. With regard to what had been said in
favour of secret executions, he hoped the country would
never again hear of such a proposal.
Mr. G. THOMPSON extolled the motives of those
who petitioned this House in favour of the measure now
proposed for their adoption. He contended that no one
not possessed of the infallibility of judgment, solely
vested in omniscience, should dare to wield the sword of
omnipotence.
Mr. DRUMMOND observed that the argument de-
rived from the fallibility of human judgment mi.;ht, to
more or less extent, be directed against the infliction of
any punishment whatever. He contended that there
was no fear so effectual for the repression of great
crimes :as the fear of death. He strongly deprecated the
mawkish sentimentality which had been growing up on
this subject, and which was encouraging jurors to violate
their oaths and to abandon their duty to God and man,
by a preposterous sympathy with all the rogues who
were brought before them.
Mr. NAPIER said that every portion of our law, as
it existed, manifested the tenderest care for the life of
man, the utmost caution that, without the clearest evi-
dence of deadly crime, no life should be sacrificed; but
the existence of such crime being proved to the judg-
ment of those called upon to try offences, there could be
no real doubt that the Divine Word delegated to man
the punishment of crimes committed against man, and
that this punishment might be extended to death in
those eases for which Divine and human law assigned
that last penalty.
Mr. BROTHERTON, who spoke amidst loud cries of
" Divide," protested against the question being argued
.a the ground of expediency. He contended that as