The daily dispatch. [volume] (Richmond [Va.]) 1850-1884, 1852-09-11

cash for the time specified.
PUBLIC ExEcUTroNs.-The propriety of pub
lie executions forms subject which has given
rise to much discussion-one side against and
the other in favor Of them. Nearly all of the
States, through their Legislatures, at some Pc
Rod or other, have considered the subject; and
while some have deemed it prudent to abolish
public executions, others have ihoughtit I'M
wise to 60 SO. The subject was before the
Legislature Of Virginia, at its late session and
after long and animated debate in the,Senate,
in which the question was considered in all its
change in the present law, and order capital
punishment to be made in private. All this
proves what we are willing to admit, that the
question is one which is susceptible Of doubt
with many honest minds, and that there is
room at least for argument, however plain the
question may appear TO others. On one hand,
it is maintained, that public executions are OF
adebasng and demoralising tendency-tbat,n-
stead Of lettering others from the commits sion
ofcrime, they have the opposite efiect-and
being Emade better, come away worse than
when they went. On the other hand, it is ar
gued that public executions have a tendency TO
prevent crime-that the horrors of seeing a
human being, clothed in the frightful hablI-
ments of the grave, taken to the galows, and
there his life forcibly taken, is practical les
son worth more than any that could be derived
from the imagination. 1t is question on
which we do not intend to become partIzans.
But, we must be allowed TO say that we cannot
believe any human being, who has heart,
and who is possessed of the ordinary feelings
of humanity, can look upon the awful specta-
Gle presented at galows, and come away
worse than when he went. We repeat emphati-
cally-we cannot believe it. We have our
selves witnessed more than one execution
and we speak from our own experience land
we can only judge ofthe feelings of others by
our own) when we say that it is impossible for
any human being tu be made worse, or to be
encouraged in the commission of crime, by
witnessing such an awful sight. And we
should like to see that man or that woman who
would come forward and declare tnat it had
no effect upon their feelings, upon their moral
sensibiiities, and that it had made them worse
instead of better. We are aware that there
is a class-comparatively, thank God, a very
small class-of human beings, who are so
abandoned that nothing, that no lesson, no
matter how severe a one, will produce their
reformation. But, even of this class, it is i'm
possible that they can be made worse by wit
Messing the execution Of the awful penalty of
death on the gallows. 1t is not for this small,
this irretrievably lost and abandoned class,
that we are alone to think of in connection
with this or any other subject of public policy.
We are to consider what the effect will be up~
On the community at large, the whole people
and, in regard to the effect upon them, there re-
mains not doubt upon our minds. Such ex-
hibtions have-they cannot but have, bene-
fetal influence upon their moral feelings, and
restraining tendency in regard to the commits
sion of crime.
Is there in existence a human being, so
low and degraded, that his ambition would
prompt him TO become the hero of gallows,
where he is swung up with a rope around his
neck and choked to death, amidst kicks and
struggles, like dog ? Did we desire to teach
our child most instructive lesson on the re-
suits of crime, we would take him to the gall
lows, point him to the coffin, the shroud, the
gibbet, the grave, and TO the degraded, humili-
ated and trembling criminal, swinging between
haavpn in he
such scene would not imprint upon his
youthful heart lesson of profit, then, indeed
should we despair of him. He ould have a
heart as cold and callous as steel, and upon
which nothing could make an impression. 1t
would afford the best evidence that he was on
the highway to a similar wretched end of
crime. Who will believe that if every man,
woman and child in the city of Richmond had
been present yesterday to witness the dread
and awful penalty which has to be paid to
crime, that the moral feelings of the communi.
ty would have been worse to-day? 1t was a
practical lesson which no Imagination of an
execution in private could have taught.
The LoBos lsLANDs.-A letter appears in
the National Intelligencer, addressed by MIR.
Webster to Capt. Jewett, relative to the taking
guano from the Lobos Islands. After recount.
ing the facts that the Peruvian government
claims jurisdiction over these Islands, and that
II had issued DEGREES prohibiting foreign ves-
sells from removing removing guano without
license from that government, &C., &c., Mr..
Webster says: "Under these Giro UNI stances,
1t Is exT ected that the vessels which have pro
coed ed thither under your auspices will not
make use Of the arms, with which it appears
from your letter of the 10th instant they are
provided, for the purpose of forcibly resisting
the Peruvian authorities. You must be aware
that such resistance would be an act of pri.
vate war, which can never receive any counte.
nance from this Government"
The following order from the Secretary of