The daily exchange. [volume] (Baltimore, Md.) 1858-1861, 1858-11-08
BALTIMORE.
MONDAY, NOVEMBER 8, 1858.

limo and appalling in all the circumstances which
surround and aggravate it, would be but half
considered by this community, were it regarded
only in its relation to the assassins and their VIC
finn. Justice-stern, prompt unhesitating Justice
NAV avcngc the frighdul violation of the laws of
God and man. Pity and sympathy may do their
hest TO assuage the grief and comfort the desola-
tion of the widow and the orphan. But there is
a step beyond, which the people of Baltimore must
take, or innocent blood has gone down into the
earth in vain. 1t is step which every good man
among us owes it to himself and his children,
and to the cause of order and good government
and even of republican institutions, to take, with
out fear favor. 1t is the step of fixing, where it
belongs, the responsibility for social condition,
which has thrown us back upon the license of the
savage state, aggravated, ten-fold, by the vices
of corrupted civilization. Unless the public are
prepared to take this step-unleSs they feel it their
solemn and -hounden duty, boldly to form and
orenlv TO express then honest convictions and give
to them the impulse and dignity of concentrated
and omnpotent public opnon-the lesson of blood
will have been a tale without moral-an awful
experience, bringing no wisdom and suggesting no
cure. In our view of the obligations of the press,
it not and does not deserve to be free if itshrnks
from speaking freely in serious public cause
To our minds, the source of the plague which is
upon us is perfectly obvious, and we propose to
point it out. The catastrophe which has just
stricken the community with horror, seems to us
as palpabe demonstration as could be given, of
the Justice of the conclusions which have forced
themselves upon our judgment.
To those OF our readers who heard or read, with
attention, the testimony in the case of GAMBRILL-
one fact must have addressed itself with peculiar
force and significance. We refer to the obvious
and perfect familiarity and cordially of inter-
course existing between the members of the Police
corps and the gang of outlaws against whom they
were called to exercise their official functions
One Of the very murderers of RIGDoN, while yet
nndctected and standing by the bleeding body of
his victim, had the hardihood to express himself
in regard to the deceased, in terms which al
though obviously used to withdraw suspicion from
himself, yet indicated the familiar relations in
which they had stood towards each other We
of course mean by this, no reflection whatever,
upon the memory of the dead. Mr.. RIGDoN, from
every account was true man and brave
and excellent officer, and he fell a sacrifice,
as the best men always do, to the vices
of a bad system. No effort of his could have
kept him altogether apart from the consequences
of vicious organization which makes the Po-
lice-corps so much nearer in sympathy, feeling and
association, TO the ruflians whom it is their duty
to keep in awe, than to the peaceful and honest
citizens whom it is their paid and sworn obliga-
ton to protect. Now it is very clear-upon the
most obvious principles of human nature-that
it is altogether impossible for men to occupy, at
the same time, towards each other, relations of
personal friendship and official antagonism A
man cannot keep terms of regard with his friend
as an individual, and at the same moment hold
truncheon of the law Nor is it less
clear, that in such strife and opposition,
the duties of the officer are certain in most
cases to give way before the sympathes of the
associate. If there are exceptions-and the cases
of both BENTON and RIGDoN show that there may
be such-what is the result? The exercise of public
authority by the officer loses its force altogether in
the indignation which is excited by what is looked
on as the treachery of the man. The power of the
law, which would perhaps be bowed to- if it came
in It's own guise is rebelled against at once, when
welded by the hand Of companion. Personal
animosity and a sense of confidence betrayed are
added to the natural desire to escape from pun
lshment. 1t is not merely the Policeman who has
arrested the criminal or has testified to the crime
1t is the friend or the associate, who has basely
played false to friendship or association. Hence
nj n1nc tv ~,
and those who enforce it--but personal hatred
comes IN, and the hot blood of private vengeance.
Hence BENTON is murdered as he dares to arrest,
and RIGDoN is shot dead, upon his own hearth
stone, because lie has dared to testify. The very
fact that they were the lest men, was the seal of
their doom-because it made them conspicuous in
the discharge of duty and equally conspicuous in
the hatred which followed it. Had they been
cowardly, or corrupt, or forsworn they would like
Others, have still been among u.s. The very de-
pravity of the system of which they were a part,
made 1t impossible for them, as we have
said, to keep altogether aloof from its
complications, do what they might, and they
were the victims of their own integrity
in rising above their fellows and their organiza-
ton. In our Judgment then, the blood of these
two murdered men is less upon the hands of the
assassins who put them to death, than it is upon
the system which ma de their death the natural
result of its vices. The responsibility of the sys
TEN is neither nor less than the responsibility
before man and Heaven, of those who instituted
and have defended and upheld it.
But this is not all. The outlaws, of whom
few have perpetrated lately these enormous crimes,
are the same outlaws-part Of the same bands of
outaws-wh0 have recently, and within the last two
years, have, over and over again, stricken down,
by violence, at the polls, the sacred and inestma-
bic right of suffrage. They did this great and
fragrant wrong before the eyes of this very same
Police, in the presence and without the interference
OF the same constituted authorities In other words
they were permitted to do it. They had the assent
OF the authorities, practically given, to its being
done. Not one of them has been punished for it.
Not one. Is it then their fault altogether if they
nave inferred license to violate the law on the 9Th
or November, from license to tread the law under
foot on the 18th Of October? Are they alone to
blame, if they regard the same Police who gave
them IMMUNITY on the election day, as bound to
give them the same impunity the day after? Have
they not the right 10 expect the same connivance
OF the same authorities at one season as at another?
rave the Police any right to believe that they
themselves will be safe from the violence which they
nave once let loose upon everybody else? Can the
authorltes imagine that riot and violence can 20
lofth Tree on one day in the year, for their benefit
anu YET De expected to be quiet, for their same bene
Ut al the rest OF the three hundred and sixty-fve
lneSe questions answer themselves and their answer
comes oack TO the same result which we have
ALREADY announced as the inevitable conclusion of
every fearless and impartial judgment-that the
root of the whole evil is the prostitution of the law
and OF the police system, and the RIGHTS of the
community, at the feet of partisan ambition and
party success. 1t is the organization of a Police
force from among the worst men in our midst
from the very bosom of the political clubs where
riot and rapine and murder, are nursed and kept
warm-which Is the source of so much crime, and
sin, and shame 1t is to the immunity with which
for political purposes, such men are permitted, vio-
lently to tread down one set of riobts. that we
owe their reckiessness in trampling upon all
Others Its to the completely of the authorities with
lawessness in one shape, that we owe their utter
impotence when called on to repress if in another.
No water can wash out the stain of the blood al
ready shed. No repentant voice can call hack mast
violence and consummated wrong. But if Mr..
SWAMI really means and desires and ia not afraid
to do his manifest and high duty, let him give