The central Presbyterian. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1856-1908, 1880-07-07

al sucn statement.
In forty years we can recall but few
instances of the hanging of white men in
Virginia-and Virginia, we presume, is
as good in this respect as South Carolina
or Texas. In the county in which we
were reared, one of the largest and most
intelligent in the State, no white man
has been hung in fifty years. In Rich
mond, with the exception of four pirates
(tried in the Federal court we think
that only two such cases have occurred
in forty or fifty years There has been
crime enough.
While the execution of negroes in the
State has been of more frequent occur
renee, they have never in our opinion
been so punished unless they deserved it.
There is tendency to shrink from capt.
tol punishment under all circumstances.
In discussing such matters, we do not
discriminate between the North and the
South; we aim merely to give the facts.
We have remarked on previous occa-
sion that the characteristic crime of the
North is stealing, while the characteristic
crime of the South is killing. 1t is al
ways so in commercial and agricultural
communities. Commerce develops crimes
against property in the form of cheating
and stealing; agriculture develops crimes
of violence against the person.
There is a sad laxity in the execution
of the criminal law both in the North
and the South There is much more
sturdy and healthy enforcement of the
laws for the protection of person and pro-
pert in England and Scotland than in
any part of the United States. Human
life is not held here in the same estima-
ton that it is in those countries, and great
criminals who steal their thousands and
tens of thousands go unwhipt of Justice.
1t is, weconceive, the duty of the press,
and especially the religious press, to lend
its influence to the correction of this great
evil; it is sometimes an invidious task to
declare the truth in such cases to unwill-
ing ears, and it is little hard to bear,
when that duty has been performed in
faithfulness, to be admonished at home
for your pains by men of standing and
character.
We often. criticise the social evils and
religious errors of faith at the North.
We do this in no sectional spirit We
often criticise the manifestations of hete-
rodox opinion in other churches than the
Presbyterian, and this we do in no sec
tartan spirit. We try to do it certainly,
In the one case or the other, free from
every thing savoring of either sectional
ism or bigotry. Shall we be silent if it
is the Free Church of Scotland which
proves direlict to its high mission? or if
the Presbyterian Church of the South
shall fall into doctrinal error or unchris-
tian practices? Shall we, if there is any
thing blameworthy in Southern social
life or the administration of the laws,
forget that in every case it is our duty to
declare the whole counsel of God, regard
less of whether the offender be from Yer
mont or Virginia? AS journalists, we
are compelled to comment freely on what
ever seems to demand it in Cincinnati,
New York, or Boston. We do this. as
we have said, from broad, catholic stand
point, and without prejudice, for it gives
us no pleasure to recognize social or
ecclesiastical evils in any quarter :;
we do it in the interests of truth
and justice. Ought we not to do the
same in regard to the South, which
is so dear to us? We shall certainly so
do, and shall not be deferred by unkind
or unjust suggestions. There is dispo-
sition at the North to point out the evils
that exist at the South, and so at the
South to point out evils at the North
We take it that those who pursue this
course are not the best friends of their
respective sections.