Clarksville weekly chronicle. (Clarksville, Tenn.) 1873-1890, 1874-02-07
COsrOF cRImiSAL PROSECUTIONS
Discussed by Hon. A. A. Hyde, former
Prosecuting Attorney.
JASPER. TENN. Jan. 10, 1874.
HoS. JSo. B. HoYL,

JASPER, TENS., Jan. 10, 1874.
HoS. JNo. B. HoYL,
My Dear Sir I'm your recent letter
you asked me for suggestions upon th
subject of reducing costs in crimina
prosecutions, theme to be eonsidere'
IN a conference of the Judges at Nash
vile, on the 18th inst, called togethe
by the Comptroller to take the subject
OF costs into consideration.
What alarms the Comptroller, i
merely the costs of felonies paid BY
general levy of taxes upon the peopl
of the State. In fact, a much large
amount is paid every year by taxation
upon the citizens of the counties, Il
liquidate the costs incident to prosecu
tions for misdemeanors. Add thes.
two items together, and an appallin,
sum is produced. A sum beside which
all the other expenses of running tn,
machinery of the State government
sink into insignifcance.
As grievously as these burdens weigl
upon the people, and paralyze theil
industries; unless some means can b
devised to diminish violations of law
no effective remedy will be found fol
the evil. So long as crimes are com.
mitted they should not go unpunished
and those who employ time or money
to bring criminals to justice, should be
reasonably compensated.
To permit crime to run riot, unre-
strained, could not be thought of with
out horror in a civilized community
1t would at once overturn the very
design of governmental association,
Every man srights of property, liberty,
and life would be held by the tenure OF
his individual prowess, subject to be
deprived of either, or all, by stronger
arm, or a more cunning adversary.
Were we to try the experiment of CIV
ing lawlessness its bead, we should
very soon discover that security is
cheap at any per cent. of taxation, If
it cannot otherwise be secured.
To reduce the compensation of those
at whose hands offences against the
law are brought to punishment, would
violate common principle of honesty.
The laborer is worthy of his hire,
and none more so than he who employs
his time, or money, to secure our
homes from sacrilege, our property
from seizure, and our persons and fam
lilies from harm and from the fear of
injury. In proportion as you reduce
the fees and costs incident to the pros
eeution of crimes below fair remun-
Grafton, just in that proportion you
weaken the incentive to energetic pros
ecutions; you lower the grade of pros
ecuting attorneys greater proportion
of the guilty will escape punishment !;
the laws delay and the increasing
chances of acquittal will embolden
crime, and swell the record of criminal
lawlessness and violence. Now fear
ful proportion of the guilty escape
conviction in our courts, by one means
or another, and if this evil is increased,
its effect will be akin to general
license OF violence and blood.
While it is likely that something can
be done to secure the more prompt and
certain punishment of crime, Ga some
thing which would be cheap at any
price y and while it may be possible
that the costs of prosecutions may be
in some particulars readjusted yet it
is apparent to every disinterested mind
that
The licensed sale of intoxicating
liquors causes very large proportion
of all the crimes and misdemeanors
committed within the State.
To those who have been connected
with prosecutions, this proposition
needs no argument to sustain it. Not
less than one thousand persons in
Tennessee are every day rendered in-
capable of exercising caution, judg-
meut, or reason, by the use of liquors,
arrayed before them at every turn, in
all the seductive styles of modern grog-
shop art, and which they are unable
to resist. These victims of temptation
mostly belong to the poorer classes.
Bereft of their natural reason and
prudence, they act upon imagined
grievances, and phrensied impulses,
and the result is that these victims of
licensed madness fill our jails, occupy
the time of our courts, and our tax
payers foot the bill of costs.
On public occasions, and holidays,
our every day one thousand drunken
maniacs swell to ten thousand, ripe for
the commission of any offense, upon
the slightest provocation or impulse,
real or imaginary.
To illustrate the system of robbing
the people to enrich the liquor dealer,
| give recent instance. On the 25tb
of December last, some seventy-fve
colored people, and about twenty-five
whites, assembled in our town to cele-
brate the birth of our Savior. They
had been saving their dimes for the
great occasion, which rapidly found
their way to the till of the liquor dealer
in exchange for whisky. Harmony
and pleasantly were soon exchanged
for drunkenness aud profanity, OBJ
scene language, fight after fight, and
flying missiles, were the order of the
day. One case of severe stabbing oc-
curreed, and one of larceny clearly
traceable to intoxication. Not less
than forty persons subjected themselves
to criminal prosecutions, scarcely a
single one of whom could pay fine or
give bail. If the law is rigidly en-
forced this Christmas frolic will cost
innocent tax-paying citizens of the
county fifteen hundred dollars, and the
State, or the citizens at large two hun
dred dollars. The citizens can only
escape the payment of this seventeen
hundred dollars by suffering the viola
tors of law to go without prosecution,
and thereby invite repetitions of such
Outrages upon the peace, safety, and
good order of society. The licensed
liquor dealer likely realized a profit of
one dollar per head upon each of his
one hundred customers. The offenses
referred to were solely chargeable to
the licensed liquor traffic. Without ii
no such assemblage could have been
brought together, and without it there
would have been no disturbance il
such an assemblage had met.
Now, by what casuistry can it be es-
tablished, that peaceable citizens
should be compelled to pay seventeen
| dollars (Or one cent, in taxes, to enable
dealer to put one dollar in his pocket,
or in default of the payment, he sub
/ jected to the greater penalty of having
unrestrained lawlessness turned loose
upon them. Yet this is the doctrine
Incorporated into our laws, and the
citizens of the State must submit TO
one or the other of these alternatives,
for the benefit Of those Legislative pets,
the liquor dealers.
I Our Legislature has been ready
enough to protect the health and life
of the citizen, when liquor has not
been involved. Among other laws