The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1878-04-18
THE WHIPPING r ipb6Jsp.
ANpERsoN. s. G.. Anril II

Aptii II 80 81 teaD-4- SAsAAA ssuN4t cAIOes
of the expensive and biundering manner
in which the State Furnishes her convicts
1t is also timely. Much complaint has
been heard, in our own State, So to the
soft punishment with which the govern.
ment has rewarded villainies in the Pen.
itentiary. If these letters of "Cigis'
sLall have some effect towards makine
crime pay for itself rs we'll as making
its penalties more efficient, STEP towards
very desirable Improvement will have
been attained. E.gT95 ~.
But the "simple, primitive, inexpensive
and powerful corrector" which he prcpo!
ses as q money-saving penalty, to wit,
the whipping post" viii hardly meet
the necessities Of the case. Tho gradual
increase of time punishments over those
in which the State inaicts sharp and
curt penalty, and is done with the often.
der, seems to show an experience of
modarp States in favor Of the former, ss !,
rue, both as more reformatory and less
expensive, because. time gives more hope
y y z n =
of bad man recovering bis sell. control
than the quick But eexacerbating penalty
rwhichfatUncsg gives the victim his liberty
again. Moreover,athes transgressor has
forfeited fhie spsrsohal Liberties % the
State, which gives to it tho right TO
atilize his tice inglabor,, not only, to
ssneet ~thsA expenses Hog his punishment, ,ih
but, as far as possible, to repair the dam.
ages ofShis crime. There can scarcely
be q more economical penalty than con-
vict labor for all ordinary transgressions,
and there gan hardly be one bettertcal-
culated to restore Imam to the State then
scason, longoE or shorter, of industrial
occupation, daily habituating the person
to useful employment. Indeed, we can
not see why the State should impose upon
her orderly citizens the expenses of long
confinement after trial and conviction in
any caaes but those in, which. it would be
inexpedient TO risk an escape. The
graduations of the penalty could be ef.:
fected by the time of work if not by the
kinds'and amount Of it.exactad.
But moro serious difficulty in the
penalty proposed by "Civis" is that it
Furnishes more than the, State intends Oh,
has right tophrisIi:S The sentiment 81
the country has fairly repudiated it, and
the government has silently consented
by not 'nhicting it. The country has
repudiated it not becadse it has any SYM
pathy, for rascals, but because it has an
ignominy which reacts deleteriously on
the moral nature of the victim. Tt
makes a. Wope man pf;hfm. r1e ostra-
cises him for all time from human soci-
ETY.. All penalties are understood to be
ignominious, but there are some, such as
whipping, branding mdtiiating, which
brutaiize the human being, crushing all
valuable qualities, which the State does
not intend to do, and has no right to do.
Tie State has no right to destroy the
soul. The rejection of these penalties Is
not due to the maudlin tenderness of the.
ase, hut because :he Stass .las found i !
better way Of commanding justice, of re-,
pressing crime and, ab55 ali, of eco1no-s
mizing citizen existence.
The penitentiAries and 9jails of sthe
nineteenth century have no doubt been
considerably softened by the beneficiary
institutions ofthe age, asylums, ,aimshouses
and infirnaries, by improvements in pub
Iicbe:!a:ngs and private dwellings,, by ti,e,
relative advance In the comforts Of living
and, not least, by the moral sensibilitiea
OF the generation. 1t was scarcely posi-
bic that all these agencies would not have
relieved the condition of the convict
whose penalty WIS simple confinement.
No civilized State would, or could con.
atruet Roman dlngeon~a hollow globe
of stone masonry beneath the ground,
with only SAN air'hoIeSat the top-7or al
Bastile;Askith acellsf i9a feet beneath the'
surface, or such an awful pit as that
which shot down far into the earth,
nndeqg the syery shadowi of the Vatican
The peoplS would tear down such atruc-
lures or fill up such cavcrns ns soon as
they were made. The French in 1889
tore down their own Bastile, structure
which began to be built in the fourteenth
century. The State cannot contradict
her civilization by remanding her refac-
tory citizen back to the mieeries Of an
absolcte penal CODE And as the State
cannot remand her penitentiaries and
jall4 back f0Ya bytone farchitectnre.