The New Orleans crescent. [volume] (New Orleans, La.) 1866-1869, 1868-12-08

worse when the victim was woman, ana tnne INC
evil effects attending the death penalty were so
great as to cal! for its speedy abolition.
The first speaker was Mrs. Kirk. one OF the
committee appointed by the association TO go TO
Philadelphia, see Hester Vaughn, and OBTAIN
what influence they could in her favor. She said
that this unfortunate young woman coud not
have been a great criminal. No one could look
at her grlish figure. frank, open face, and clear,
hazel eyes, and believe that she had deliberately
been guilty of fhe fearful thing Of which Jury
hsd i0und her guilty. Mrs. Kirk referred TO the
heartbresking struggle for existence that Hester
Vaughn had had TO fight, to be betrayed ana
deserted by man whom she had loved not wisely
but too well, and to that supreme and fnal agony
when she brought into the world the child that
twice imperilled her own life. " Innocent as |
am" said Mrs. Kirk, a" of the crime OF intanti-
eide and am sure never killed baby-l be-
lieve that girl. Hester Vaughn, as innocent as
myself today"
Mrs. Lozier, lady who has been regularly ad-
miited as practising physician, followed Mrs.
Kirk. She had been another member OF the CON-
mittee. Her efforts to arrive at the truth In the
matter had been conducted to some extent profess
sionally, and che declared 1t as her solemn convc
ton that il Hester Vaughn did kill her infant It
was under the distraction Of puerperal mania, and
that she could not in any event be held accounta-
BILE. The subject was a delicate one. but Mrs. Lo-
Z'er said enough to suggest the idea, whether 10
cases like this, female physicians who have them
selves borne offspring, should not be called in to
testify as experts.
Other speeches were made by Parker Pillsbury
and Mrs. Stanton. The main point OF what Mr.
Pillsbury said was that infantcide was practsed
every day and every hour that wives, with hus-
bands conseDting, were continually guilty OF the
crime that Dewspapers-even 30. called religious
papers-adver;ised the thing openly, and that If
IT came TO trying poor Hester Vaughn before the
public of the day, he would like to know who dare
cast the first stone al her.
The demand of Miss Anthony and her
associates that woman should be tried by
her peers" rests, we fear, on a sad fallacy.
In all past history, the fintiest judges of
women, the swiftest to condemn, the last to
forgive, have been women. The wild desire
to escape social death under the decree of
these judges has led many an Z" erring sister "
to add deliberate murder to a false step. Are
they likely to show more favor to the woman
accused of staying her infant to conceal her
departure from virtue, than they would have
shown to her if detected in the latter trans
erosion? The truth is, there is bnt one way
to rid the civilized world of the accommodating
horrors of infanticide. That is to remove the
conditions and the temptations out of which
they grow. AS long as women who become
mothers outside of conventional pale are to
see before them social prescription, deadly
and memorable, for the rest of their lives,
some will be driven by despair to kill them
selves, and some by terror to kill their
infants. And, moreover, as long as there are
social conditions of such nature as to canse
the birth of children, even in wedlock, to be
regarded as an infelicitous event, some OF
those respectable families " who take this
view of family enlargement, will, depend
upon it, in order to keep within the proper
limitations resort to the practices alluded to
by Parker Pillsbury when he said that
"wives, with husbands consenting, were con-
tinually guilty of the crime" of infanticide.
Mr.. Pillsbury speaks, no doubt, with refer,
ence to the highly civilized people among
whom he lives; to this extent he may be
accepted as good authority, and his testimony
forms an appropriate addendum to that Of
| Gen. Butler, who he states, upon statistical
data, that the charity of Massachusetts, kills
more than one-half of the children, and even
of the adults, whom it takes under its pro-
tecting wings