The Hawaiian gazette. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu, Hawaii]) 1865-1918, 1877-09-12

AAS-'NASbSB
To the Editor Of the HaCaiian Gazette:
SIR.-For some cabalistic reason the editor of the
p. C. Advertiser has become very sympathetic and
exceedingly sOlcitous to the utimatum of a sent.
of capital punishment passed short time since
upon murderer now in Jail. In ways than
does the tone of suppicaton strike me as rather
anomalous in journal protesting to respectablity
Its novelty, and the utter baseles the argu
ments put forward in favor of its proposition are
such as to have lingering suspicion that something
more potent than mere humanity and sentmentalism
have guided the motive to abrOgate (or make excep-
tOnal the applicability Of the blazoned on the
walls of our Courts of Justice.
Had it been said that the nationality and social
condition of the murderer should become factor in
determining the sentence there would have been less
ambiguity, if not more deceney in the asserted claim
of the prisoner upon the Royal cemency. And had
plea been previously made to the jury trying the
upon this or other COUNT. it would certainly
have been more cOnsiderate of the delicate position
occupied by the King relative to the affair." than the
asking Of him to exercise the prerOgatve of the Crown
to negative-without cause.-the legitimate conse-
quenee of crime.
Cases wherein the execution of the law is nterfered
with by the Royal pardon, are almost unexception
ally such powerfully opposed by extenuating
circumstances, as, extreme youth, under influence
etc things which in further extreme would extenu-
ate even in law, but of graduation oscillating
between two definite points, with perhaps the slight
est variation towards one; not however those which
have been marked and broadly overapped. Now
what is the case with this prisoner? He has com
mitted most deliberate and brutal crime, without
provocstion, and therefore without extenuatiop
There is no flaw in the testimony, and no doubt AS
to his criminaity- He is not insane, confesses the
crime, and renders it dOubly heinous by himself ad
hitting so timsy an incentive the advice of an
adulteress. Now, if the sentence of this urerer be
csmmuted, " a precedent will have been established
for the utter abolition of the death penalty ' which
is the law Of the land, and which it is more properly
the province of the Legislature to repeal If
The of Cain has been cited and much stress
laid upon it favoring the sympathies of the Adver
tissr in favor of the condemned but if Scripture
be appealed, shall disagree, for an isolated ca se
wherein God himself became the TEMPORAL Judge the
more general demand for Scripture that murder shall
be atoned for by death" Whose sheddeth mans
blood, by man shall his blood be shed.'' "Au eve
for an eye, tooth for a tooth, hand for hand a
foot for foot" is the teaching of Scripture. No
more lame argument could possibly have been
brought forward than this appeal to Scripture upon
the death penalty, and 1 surprised that an in
telligent man should have used it, since the yery
commands OF God transmitted through Moses are,
oSoeu snAi oe penhity dlVers crimes be-
sides murder, of which infinitely trivial in
comparison. 1t s thus that the Advertiser has kick
ed its own legs from under it and until it can show
something on which to stand, trust that its voice
will not again exceed its proper level, nor he heard
beneath skin whose covering it is unable to dis
guise.
Upon the expediency of this other mode of pun
ishment derived from scientific data, no avowal Is
necessary IN answer to an Argument resting for sup
port upon an appeal to the Bible alone. Like many
Others believe it open question but not so with
the indiscriminate exercise of the Royal pardon A.
recommended by the Advertiser s.a