Memphis daily appeal. [volume] (Memphis, Tenn.) 1847-1886, 1883-01-24
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tried, convicted, and hustled into the peni.
Tertiary, and the ease and certainty By
which the great robbers escape punishment
by lavish expenditure of their stolen
wealth, is a disgrace to our civil cation.
No wonder the colored people complain Of
race prejudices, and no wonder the poor are
arrayed against the rich, for the law as now
administered is intended only for the pun
ishnent of "niggers" and poor ghites.
Three years ago Judge James A. Anderson,
public administrator for Shelby county, de-
faulted. He did not rob the county treasury,
the taxpaying people who could have en-
dured his theft without any great suffering
or inconvenience, but he committed the still
greater crime of robbing the widows and
orphans of Shelby county. He stole from
them nearly 1O0,000-sent women and
children hungry and naked into the world
His villainy caused untold suffering. His
victims, who had been amply provided by a
provident father, are scattered over the
country eking out miserable existence and
bufeting with the poverty brought upon
them by the crime of this great criminal.
Anderson was arrested and tried. Hisetolen
money enabled him to employ tbs ablest
counsel, and he is now living somewhere in
luxury on the fruits OF his villainy; and his
victims are still here crying for bread. This
lsl-a-w-this is Justice! Since the COM
mission of this great crime by Anderson
negro chicken.thieves and white robbers of
a hat-rack have been arrested, tried, con-
victed and served out their time in the peni-
Tertiary. Every part of the country fur
nishes similar examples of tbs. injustice and
the mockery of law. A yeaTago William
Pendergrast was sentenced 10 the Albany, N
T., penitentiary, not for stealing thousands
or hundreds Of thousands OF dollars; not for
robbing the widows and orphans OF their
substance as Anderson did; but for passing
as charged counterfeit silver dollar. He
was poor, his swaE was not large enough to
employ defense and, as matter of course
be was sent 10 the penitentiary. 1t now turns
out that the dollar was genuine, pure silver,
sad President Arthur has pardoned poor
Pendergrast. Parties claiming a reward for
making the arrest sent the coin, together
with the testimony, to Washington, and there
the coin was pronounced genuine beyond any
doubt. We are glad that the unjustly con-
yicted man has regained his liberty. An
expert had decided the coin bad, and grave
United States court convicted an innocent
No an and disgraced him by sending him to
prison, from which he is only enabled to get
out honorably by an accident. What ought
to be said OF q court that will permit the
conviction Of prisoner for passing single
coin unintentionally, even if it were bad.
When man is clearly proven to be in what
is known as "the queer" business, he might
be justly and properly sentenced even for the
passing OF a single coin. But in this case
the stupid expert was fully paralleled by the
incompetent judge. Here, in Tennessee, we
have striking example of law and
justice as now administered, and The
disposition Of the public to excuse and e1-
culpate great criminals, while filling the
penitentiary with petty thieves. Marsh 7.
Polk, the colossal defaulter of the age, is not
only to be liberated on bail, but he is already
regarded as prosecuted innocent, whose
pure character has been traduced and whose
noble heart has been broken by the cruel
defamation of the lying public. The SYM
patty lavished upon this gigantic robber is
shameful, scandalous, disgraceful. There il
nothing so well calculated to foster the spirit
Of communism, and to array the poor against
the rich. as the ease with which great crimI-
mails escape punishment by the use of money
and The responsibility of their kin. Law
and Justice are both liars, for they profess no
discrimination, to be no respecter of persons;
bet both are memorable in Furnishing the
petty thieves of the slums, and in acquit-
ting The big rogues high in society. Ander-
son, after the mockery OF trial, was permit
ted 10 depar. in peace; and after the same
sort Of farce Polk will Engage in operat.
ing his mines purchased with the peoples
money. BE has assured the public
that be intends to pay every dollar he has
stolen, and that settles it. If the impecu.
nious prisoner in Jail asks immunity for
his crime by declaring upon homer he intends
TO restore the loaf of bread, every crumb of
IL, his marvellous impudence excites contempt
and derisioD; but when great defaulter
promises restitution he is given the oppor.
tunity. The certainty of punishment is
what gives terror 10 the law. This certainty
is terror 10 the petty thieves, for when de-
tected Of crime they enter the criminals'
dock, leaving hope behind, and submit them
selves to the harpies of the law as unresist-
ingiy as flock of sheep submit their ihroats
to the dsvoaring wolves; but the respectable,
noneyed thief breaks through the meshes of
he law and p rison doors. He knows that |
mot guilty" and triumphant acquittal are |
acre questions Of time, and he fights On. ]