Delaware tribune. [volume] (Wilmington, Del.) 1867-1877, 1867-09-26

My DEAR COURIER In the following
slip cut from your leader of Wednesday eve
ming, you say;
|. To our mind one of the most compli-
| mentary things that can be said of New Jer
sey by outsiders is, tshe Furnishes her Grim
inals."
2. The man who opposes capital punish
ment, and prates about the inhumanity of
hanging, at moment when crime is so
| frightfully on the increase all over the coun-
| try, is either knave or a fool, and in either
case we have no patience with him.
3. Not until the opponents of capital pun
lshmcnt shall give us better social guide
book than the Holy Writ itself, will our con
victions be shaken in that divine Injunction
-"Whoso sheddeth mans blood, by man
shall his blood be shed"
There is no disputing of tastes. Whether
it be complimentary or not to say of New
Jersey, "She punishes-that is kiIls-her
criminals" it is to certain extent true.
But she does not enjoy monopoly of this
recommendation to outsiders. France, Rus
sia, Abyssinia, and Ashantee, not to men
ton one or two other nations, do the same,
and without, as far as l know, arrogatlng
any special merit to themselves thereupon.
The test of a penal system is its success in
preventing crime. If 1t answers this pur-
| pose to any considerable extent, it needs no
cncomium: if not, it is to all intents and
purposes failure. If the system adopted
by New Jersey makes life and property safer
within her borders than in New England or
New York, she is to be congratulated upon
it, If not, the less we say in its favor the
etter.
You admit that crime is far from being de-
creased by the means adopted to check it, is
frightfully on the increase,all over the coun-
nv in, nc alc
Criminals are hung here with desperate GER
tainty, and yet crime increases. We can't
do away with murder, but we can put a
fats to murderers, and we do it i; we can't
prevent evil, but we can choke evil doers,
and exult accordingly.
Secondly. The man who opposes, &c,
&c., is knave or fool. Hard words, my
dear COURIER, arc not arguments. Jeremy
Bentham and EdwardLivingston in the past,
Horace Greeley and Victor Hugo in the pre-
sent, were not knaves, but they each and all
advocated the abolition Of capital punish
ment as d preventive Of crime when it was
as friglItfully on the increase as now. The
men who have reformed the English Penal
Code so that man cannot nOw,a as formerly,
be hanged for theft of three shilllngs and
sixpence, met the same denunciation. Were
they right or wrong?
Third. l can't if l wanted to, give you q
Writ" and have no ambition to try. II
suits my wants exactly in that and many
other respects. But when you attempt to
make its penal code, adapted to the necessi-
ties of the world four thousand years ago,
the model for the legislator of the present
time,y you have not fully weighed the matter.
That code denounced the punishment of
death with equal solemnity, on at least u
dozen different offences. Look over the list
and sec if you arc willing to incorporate it
in the law of New Jersey. Murder, shifting
or cursing father or mother, man stealing,
iidolatry, blasphemy, Sabbath breaking,
incest, sodonly, adultery. If you are willing
to inflict capital punishment for all of these,
say so if not, please to tell me why you
take one and reject all the others.
Remember ''Cursed be Canaan" when you
sickle for Holy Writ. God makes laws to
suit the circumstances of the governed. To
people without courts of justice, without
jails, or other means of restraint, ignorant
and barbarous, He gave the only penalty
which could be certainly inflicted ut that
time. AS society has advanced He has per-
mitted and sanctioned one modification after
anothtr, until now Il single remnant of the
original penal code exists. If we have no
right TO modify that, we were wrong in modi-
flying all of the others, and the sooner we
get back to them the better. There is no
dISullcHl aSulllst mus sultn INC LOTu.
But wo to the man who attempts to put that
awful preface to his own conceptions by fit
ting the words of inspiration to circum-
stances and actions for which they were
never intended.
To conclude you in common with the
whole press of New Jersey have stigmatized
the New York reporters for their outrageous
descriptions the execution of Bridget Der
gan. For them l have no sympathy But
reflect you please upon the state of society
which makes such descriptions saleablcr-
upon the popular appetite for the horrible,
which gloats upon the hdeous details of the
trials and executions of murdercrs, until re-
porters find IL profitable to season the too
tame facts, with the abominable fancies of
their own brains, s,-which hunts and harasses
a Sheriff or a jailor, for admission to the
cell of the condemned during the last hours
of existance, or to the Jail yard at the final
scene, which packs our court rooms even,
during criminal trials with masses of human
beings, whose eyes glare upon court and
jury, impatient al the laws delay, and whose
muttered tones demand Vengeance And
having reflected upon these, consider wheth-
er system which admits and fosters such
feelings and appetitcs, is the best and only
preventive of murder? Whether commu-
nifty which becomes so saturated, so to speak,
with murder is not in very fit condition for
its commission Did the guillotine make
life sacred in France, A. 8. NJ.