The Vancouver independent. (Vancouver, W.T. [Wash.]) 1875-1910, 1878-02-21
Crime in England.

The Black Book of Liverpool contains
facts so startling that they cannot fail to
produce an impression upon the mind of
every thoughtful person. What, then, is
the first fact that meets our view2 1t is
that during the year 1915, As, 900 persons
were judicially punished IN Liverpool
that is to say, about one in ten of the
population. We know that the Mayor
has endeavored to blunt the edge of this
statement by pleading that large num-
Der of these $4,000 cases had merely
arisen from contravention of the Passen-
ger Act, and of other by laws of the town.
We do not perceive the force of relevance
of this criticism. CONFIRMATION of any
laws, whether bylaws or not, surely
shows the operation of lawless spirit
and if it could be alleged that one-tenth
of the population of London had, in the
course of single twelvemonth, com
mitted offences which called for judicial
punishment, we think that such an ex
PLANTATION as the Mayor of Liverpool has
offered would be simply laughed out of
court The expense which the existence
of this vicious population entails upon
the borough is very large; police magis-
trates and jails costing last year a sum OF
upwards or elS0,000, or at the rate OF
1894 per thousand inhabitants. The
charge tor police alone has risen from
e61 900 in 1865 tn G112,O00 in 1864
ratio of increase far in access of the
growth of population. One of the chief
causes of the mass of crime existing in
Liverpool is the overcrowding which takes
place in the neighborhood Of the docks,
where, according to Mr.. r. w. Pitcher,
two hundred thousand human beings are
huddled together in a space lamentahly
in, utiicient for their accommodation.
The misery of these unhappy people
especially of the aged and very young OF
both sexes-is simply appalling. In the
fearful battle of existence against vitiated
air and other foul impurities, the death
rate of infants has in n single year
reached the proportion of 292 per 1000.
Happy the little ones who died, in com
parisOn with the survivors, destined to
become the drunkards, the prostitutes,
and the jail-birds of the next generation
Father Nugent's dreadful picture of the
prevalence of crime among the female
portion of the community is fully borne
out by statistics which have just been
published, for it appears that out of
SAB Roman Catholic prisoners, 4,571
were women. We refuse to enuorse the
argument of contemporary that the
large amount of crime which is laid at
the door OF the Roman Catholics Is al
tributable to their belonging to that
faith. We fear that if they were to turn
Protestants tomorrow, neither the char
acter nor the position of the Irish poor
would be sensibly improved. Unfortu-
nately, in Liverpool, as in other places,
they belong for the most part to
squalid and thriftless class; and when
they are crowded into narrow and moi
some dens, and at the same time tempted
to acquire taste for the gin bottle, their
moral degradation is rapidly completed.
Yet, so far as the poor people are COM
PEELED to herd together like rabbits, We
have no right to rail against them for
their love of drink. 1t is only natural
that they should prefer the gin palace to
the wretched homes in which they are
forced to live, aud that in endeavoring to
find relief in the maddening cup they
should qualify themselves for the prison
and the Ss.-The Noncoaform,st.