The Portland daily press., 1872-10-30
Too Sentimental to bs Ju.t.

Too Sentimental to be Just.
civilian II. Seward never took case against q
womau."-ErchGnge.
The above item, has been going the rounds
of the American newspapers ever since tho
death of the distinguished man to whom it
refers, sometimes las above) merely state
ment, and sometimes with commendatory
comment; but, in either case, with the more
or less obvious implication that the fact (J it
be one) was oreditable to the able statesman
and lawyer so lately deceased. At almost any
other time we should have allowed it to pass
without further notice, but just now,-whle
the country-is ringing with the objurgations
so universally showered upon the jury which
acquitted Mrs. Fair,-and az it affects one
phase Of ''the woman question" now loom
ing up in such magnificent proportions upon
our horizon, we think it requires q little at
tention at our hands, that the fallacy and dam
gerous tendency of the doctrine it either
teaches or suggests, may be exposed; especial
ly as our bare mention of the circumstance
might otherwise be misconstrued into an ap-
proval of it. To us it seems that the senti-
ment-not to say sentimentaHty-upon which
liberately chosen, must be based is as unjust
to the one sex as to the other; and that
it sets at defiance all correct ideas of alb
stract justice and duty, upon which our law.
and their administration ought to be found
ed. 1t either implies that woman like the
King) can do no wrong; or else that she has
the dangerous privilege of doing
it without being legally accountable,
thus chasing her with idiots and the insane;
or, at the very least, that any person who
take, part in holding her amenable to the law
for any violation of it is justly obnoxious to
hostile criticism and public censure, while he
who stands alosf or defends her Irrespective
OF che merits Of her cause, in ANY particular
instance) is entitled to popular approval and
applause for this course. Il not this the very
theory which, carried to its inevitable and
logical results upon the trial of Mrs. Fair
and of other recent feminine criminals, has
led TO many verdicts which have violated all
the deductions of reason, shocked the COM
mon sense Of the people, awakened serious
apprehensions, and outraged all our natural
instincts for equal and exact justice before
the law? Was it any more improper for the
Ignorant, iiterate, California jury to say (prac-
tically) that, regardless of every other con-
sideration, they would not bring in verdict
against woman, than it was for the New
York lawyer-a man of conspicuous position,
amir al; ifuo ,~J
ing before the affairs of justice as one of its
priests and sworn defenders, to determine, as
aprinciple governing his professional action,
that he would never, under any circum-
stances, aid in bringing female before its
bar9 Ordinarily, no man would wish to
prosecute against a woman unless driven to
it by the strong compulsion of duty; but
whenever justice demands this sac
rifce of personal feeling at his hands
it should be made unhesitatingly and
without other apology than the nature of the
cause; and whoever, by pursuing the course
to which Gov. Seward held, or by approval
of it, renders the discharge of this necessary
though unpleasant duty more difficult and
dangerous is derelict to the obligations i'm
posed upon him by the terms, spirit and pur-
port of the oath he took upon his admission
to the bar. Counsellors are part of the
machinery by which the operations of justice
are performed; as necessary part, in their
place and function, as the judge who admin
listers it upon the bench or the ministerial
officers who record or carry into execution
its DEGREES they all exist only that those
operations may be properly performed In
those tribunals, established for the protection
of all and of the rights of all, the advocate,
as we'll as the judge, should know neither
high nor low, rich nor poor, man nor Uonaan
blind to everything else, he should regard
only ''the trepidations of the balance" The
motto which Garrison adopted for his Liber-
dtor tersely expressed this idea fright is
OF no ser; truth is of no color; God is the
father of us all, and all men are equal"
We have said that the actuating motive of
Gov. Stewards discrimination (if he really
made any, is as unjust to the one sex as to
the other. That it is unjust toward his own
is too obvious for argument. 1t is plainly
not right, inherent in the female to with
hold from its male owner any property, real
or personal, nor wrongfully to take it from
him by the forms of law or otherwise: nor
ought he to hold life by the uncertain tenure
of her good pleasure and capricious will. 1t
is an insult so to act as to imply that woman
desires such treatment at our hands. What
she does ask is equality; and the whole ami
IF Gov SAruar1,s A..
of inequality. She claims rights; he showed
tdrors; and where favors are granted rights
are apt to be denied. Under the guise of
courtesy he Offers an insult 1t is renewal,
in modern form and under changed circum-
stances, of the spirit of that chivalry of the
middle ages, when the belted knight, who
ventured life and limb to win the smiles or
defend the charms of the high-born damsel,
put the spurred heel Of violence into the I'M
protected couch OF the lowly peasant girl with
impunity.
In the administration of Justice tbers
should be no favoritism of any kind; and he |
who attempts to introduce it seeks to poison
the founts of justice at their source.
No true woman asks the favor of doing
wrong unreproved or unpublished; or to hold
her rights otherwise than under the ordinary
sanctions of general and equal laws. Such
privilege would be dangerous to her as well
to man; for by the eternal law OF compensa-
zion, which regulates the world, we may be
sure that to possess the power of doing wrong
in one particular necessitates the liability to
suffer wrong in many other particulars.
We fully appreciate the spirit Of the char |
liable Roman maxim, that requires us to say |
nothing of the dead but good yet, in the dis
cussion of question of public concern. we
feel free to add that " hat was really defect in
Gov. Stewards moral constitution has been
extolled by his friends as merit.
1t is impossible, properly and logically. to
hold that Gov. Seward was right and the
Jury which acquitted Mrs. Fair, wrong.