The New York herald., 1875-10-02
Equal Justice 10 the High and the
Low.

Low.
Some of the comments Of the city press on
the shooting of the so-called giant O'Bald-
win, by Michael Finnell, his partner in
business, were hasty and thoughtless, and
ought to be reconsidered. All large cities
abound with people whose death might, in
one point of view, be deemed q public
benefit If the haunts of thieves and burglars,
or the streets or parts of streets given up to
the lewd uses which make them the peril
and often the ruin of young men, were
blasted by lightning or engulfed by an earth
quake, the moral atmosphere would, no
doubt, be purified; but it by no means fol-
lows that the destruction of the vicious
classes by human agency would be
for the public advantage. The gene
raj interest of the community must
be managed by the community itself
as a collective body acting through its
authorized representatives. 1t will not do
to let every individual be the judge as to
who are useful and who are pernicious men,
bers of society, and to permit every man to
kill at sight such people as he may think
useless or dangerous. Such rule would
establish theTight of free murder and operates
as a dissolution of civil society.
We reprobate all the comments on the
murder of O'Baldwin which imply that it is
a good thing for society that such man is
got rid of The worst thing that could hap
pen to society would be the adoption
of this principle Society must decide
what it will tolerate or disallow
and there could not be more danger
Gus absurdity than a permission to
every low ruffian to decide whether his an
tagonist is fit to live. Even if it were
granted that men like OBaldwin ought to be
outlawed, the question would still remain as
to who should be empowered to pronounce
the sentence against him. 1t is an Office
which properly belongs to impartial courts
of justice, and any line of comment which
implies that Michael Finnell did good SER
vice to the community in usurping the
functions of judge and jury and passing
a sentence of death is the widest kind of
absurdity. 1t is for the Legislature to define
crimes and declare their penalties it is for
courts to determine whether in any specific
case the crime has been committed and the
penalty incurred it is for sheriffs to execute
the sentence of the law. But the newspaper
comments which congratulate the public
that man like O'Baldwin is fortunately
put out of the way are a virtual
concession that every low ruffian may usurp
the joint functions of Legislature, courts and
executioner.
1t is essential that there be but one rule of
punishment for all classes The poorest,
lowest, most friendless and most degraded
individual in the community is entitled to
the same protection and the same impartial
society. There can be no crimes except
those which the law declares to be crimes,
and it would be subversion of all sound
principles for the law to be respecter of
persons O'Baldwin was not killed for the
commission of crime, but in q quarrel.
Even if he had committed crime,
his murderer was neither q grand jury,
nor petit jury, nor court, nor legal exc
cutioner, and it is preposterous to congratu-
late society on q result which undermines
the whole fabric of justice. Men like
O'Baldwin's murderer are not entitled to
have their crimes extenuated on the plea
that they have executed q wild and irregular
justice. The murder of OBaldwin is as
great crime as if it had been perpetrated
against citizen of the highest standing,
and it ought to be punished with the same
unrelenting severity.