The New Orleans daily Democrat. [volume] (New Orleans, La.) 1877-1880, 1879-07-12
ences which go to the very foundations Of

society
OF all the startling crimes which have re-
Gently occurred In New York, the Manhattan
Bank bu re larry and the Stewart grave robbery
are the only two that were the deliberate work
Of professionals, who live on the fruits OF their
crime Chastine Cox, the murderer Of Mrs.
Hull, was not of that class, or had not been
prior to the preparation Of this crime. The
evidence Is that the assassination OF Seymour
was an unpremeditated act, and was not
prompted by any of the motives which
actuate what Is called the criminal classes.
| Take the more recent murders, and they
all 90 to Indicate widespread and universal
depravity, for which society Is itself far more
responsible than the law or the police. They
| Indicate laxity OF morals and care
| lessness Of human life which permeates
society from it's very top to Its mud
! stills, and for which the courts of
! Justice can never furnish corrective until
public sentiment has first been appealed to,
and has inaugurated thorough reform OF
public morals.
| In It's issue of the seventh instant, the
Tribune speaks of the criminal record OF the
three preceding days as Exceptional In Its
ghastliness' An examination Of the char
acter and provocation OF the crimes 1t men,
tions, sustains In every instance our theory.
It first mentions the assassination of Mr.. Sey-
mour, to which we have already alluded
Next on the list is the murder Of isk by Raw
linson on Staten Island, which was provoked
by Sisk's firing his pistol ia celebration OF
the Fourth Of July, which disturbed the
slumbers OF Rawlinson, who was night
watchman; the next was the murder OF
| O'Connell by Nichols, at Nyack, resulting
| from quarrel over cigar, though there
was an old feud between the men; Brown, q
Canadian, beat his wife to death because she
would not get his supper; another young
man, twenty-three years Of age, shot his
young wife to death because she would not
stop her work and sit on his lap. These
crimes were all committed in and about New
York. At Plttsburg we have another
wife murder. Joseph Atkins murdered
his wife, with whom he had lived more than
forty years, in quarrel over the title to
their farm; and at Buffalo Bernhardt Helms
brutality murdered his wife In drunken
rage. None Of these crimes were perpetrated
by persons who belonged to the criminal
classes; indeed In every instance they were
perpetrated by people who had never been
guilty OF criminality before, certainly with
whom 1t was not habitual. 1t Is impossible
to escape the conclusion we have enunciated.
It Is society that is at fault, not the police,
and it is society that must furnish the cure.
| What qualification 1t is to note, in the
good order and universal regard for the law
which extends throughout the Southern
States, the striking contrast that is presented
to this carnival OF crime which Is sweeping
like pestilence throughout the North. God
forbid, though, that we should feel anything
but compassion for the people Of the North In
abiding to this circumstance. The causes
which have brought about these hor-
rible crimes at the North have never
existed in Southern society. This is
only our good fortune, and we
can merely express our gratitude that such is
the case. We shall not challenge compare
son OF the respective civilizations Of the two
sections-ther record upon the one side Is too
CHASTITY; nor shall we pour out our vitupera-
ton on society at large, as has too often been
done towards us by certain class of Northern
moralists, who are beneath our contempt.