The Dallas weekly herald. [volume] (Dallas, Tex.) 1873-1885, 1882-03-16
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YESTERDAYS SAD WOKk

The fatal renContrc which occurred yes
terday at the county court house between
two attorneys Of this city, is matter to be
much and universally deplored. II was
the elimination OF a feud and antagOni5tic
feelings of long time existence between the
parties engaged. Both were men Of I'M
pulsive feelings, quicllness Of speech and
impetuous action; both had at various
times taken prominent parts IN the seyera!
elections and other, contests, and at the bar
and in events which have transpired
in this city, and they had as often
clashed in their meetings. There had been
for long while q spirit of personal hostil-
ity between them as it appeared to all who
knew them. The smouldering spark re-
quired but slight breeze to beget per-
sonal collision, but the friends of either
were scarcely prepared for the tragic de-
nouement which our local columns this
morning record. Dallas has been unlort-
| innate within the past few months in the
matter of notorety in the crimina. calen-
dar; first we had the Chambers killing, by
Freeman next the shooting dead Of
| the would-be rObber in the st.
George hotel then the Pearson
scandal, and now the sad event ofyesterday.
In one respect she was fortunate, and that is
that there was the purely personal feature
about each difficulty which might have re-
suited elsewhere, and does daily transpire
elsewhere as well as here. There was no
political nor public connections whatever in
any of these homicides, and although the
| fair name of Dallas has by so much been
furnished, the trouble is not of Dallas as a
city or section, as of the unhappy relations
and peculiarities of the parties themselves
| involved. One of the lessons again
taught by this scarlet event is the evil OF
carrying the accursed pistol convenient to
the heated hand bristling with rebellion
and under the mandate of the excited brain
on fire with fiendish anger that few mo-
ments of delayand reflection would cool at
| least to the point Of discussion with discro-
ton. And yet another is the
evil of nursing and inflaming the feelings
against anyone whose opposition pride
and petulance or other things have de-
termined we should subdue or chastse,
even though it be by speeding the murder
Gus lead upon its fearful mission, and
making life the plaything of the passions
| in their blood-red rioting. The late
law of Tennessee makes the importation
and sale of these weapons misdemeanor
with severe penalty, and appears to be
working effectively, as did that against the
"Arkansaw tooth-pick." This strikes at
the fountain head of these tools of slaugh-
ter, and has saved many life from being
plunged with sudden act into death
and judgment, the ruin of one
family and the stained, sad memory
for another. The statute against
the carrying of concealed weapons seems
not to work in this nor the other states, and
some other one had best be tried. The car
rying of the pistol by dangerous characters
begets the necessity of a protective provis-
| ion Of similar kind on the part Of the better
class. Let the weapons be kept beyond the
limits of the state, if the law against Their
being carried on the person cannot be exc
cuted.