The New Orleans crescent. [volume] (New Orleans, La.) 1866-1869, 1869-01-27
THE WILD BEASTS OF SOCIETY.

| So many malefactors nowadays elude the
weak clutches of the law, or escape through
the cruel leniency of courts, that it is seri-
ously to be questioned whether civilized soci-
ETY. should not make war upon the criminal
classes just as it has had to wage conflict in
all time against wild beasts and noxious veg
citation. Suppose the frontiersman were not
allowed, upon his own motion, to strike
blow at the wolf, the panther, the rattlesnake,
the viper. Suppose these animals, when sus-
pected of depreciation or venenation, could
enjoy the benefit of the same laxity and pro-
| lixity of prosecution, and the same chances
of final impunity, which are afforded to The
garroter and assassin. Suppose the agricul-
turist were required not to uproot the weeds
and grasses which threatened to devour his
tender crops, until commission of botan-
lists had spent season in determining the
exact nature and classification of these inya-
ders of his fields. 1t is easy to see that,
under such conditions, the wilderness could
never have been subdued, the earth titled or
civilization extended. Well, these hypotheti-
cal cases are very analogous to that which ac-
tually exists now in relation to the legal deal
ing of society with the criminal element which
preys upon it.
We are satisfied that no penalty denounced
by the law, however heavy, operates to sup
press the criminafpropensity unless its infic-
ton is so swift and certain as to cause it to be
regarded as the inevitable sequence to crime.
We are satisfied that, as a general rule, at
tended with occasional exceptions, punish
ment of the kind called infamous never re-
forms and that the oftener the criminal is
permitted to repeat his offenses the more cal
lous is he to the pain or the disgrace of pun
ishment and the more hopeful of evading it.
For much stronger reason, must those de-
PRAYED and lawless natures who offend and
keep offending without feeling the stroke of
justice, be hardened, stimulated, educated, so
to speak, by such an experience, in life of
cumulative aud aggravated
crime. Yet such creatures run loose by hun
dreds in every large city. Their criminality
is no secret to the police. 1t is we'll known
that they are without the means of honest
livelihood, that they do no honest work, that
they live by fraud, theft and robbery, and that
some of them are as ready to commit murder
as to do any of these. And yet of what bene-
fit is this knowledge to the community? 1t is |
worse than the profoundest ignorance for the |
unwhipt offender knows that he is known, |
and hugs the reflection that the law is, Sc |
cretly, his friend, and the laws agents.
used to be proverb, that murder will
out" But it is dreadful, in these times, to
count up the number of cold-blooded, CHASTITY
murders, which have never been legally |
avenged. The assassination of Mr.. Rogers.
in broad daylight, on one of the streets of
New York, promises to be one of these cases.
The mystery of the Burdell murder has never
been solved-not by the law, at least. The
criminal annals of New York and Philadelphia
alone present a dozen or more of such contra
lictions of the old proverb. And those of
New Orleans, sad to say, are not barren of
'ombre and opprobrious passages of the same
nature. Now, whether the hanging of muir
ierers will serve to suppress the murderous
propensity in others or not, it is certain that
t saves society from the continued criminal
areer of the particular culprits who are
hanged. But what is the use of denouncing
he penalty if it is never to be executed? Its
worse than useless Society is not secured
gainst the repetition of the CRIME. No medi-
alive criminal is deferred by the example of
punishment. The worst passions of the worst
natures are evoked under the confident hope
# impunity. And thousands of innocent per-
ons become victims of crime because they
rust to the false pretense of protection held
ut by the law. Such state of things, if
ong continued, can lead to but one result.
The criminal classes will be at length regarded
n all hands as the wild beasts and yermin of
ociety, and summarily dealt with accordingly.