The Vermont watchman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1883-1911, 1883-09-05
MOckery Of Justice.

The Rutland Herald calls public atten-
ton to the facility with which in Vermont
men accused of grave criminal offenses
obtain light bail, skip out to Canada and
remain there till the bonds are called,
paid or compromised and then, when the
prosecuting officer has pigeon-holed the
papers, come back without much danger
of re-arrest. The abuse of the idea and
purpose of bail, it AYERS, amounts practi.
cally to compromising of felony, to buy
ing immunity from all future prosecution.
This is attributed to want of ability, or
fidelity, or back bone, or all combined, on
the part of courts and prosecuting officers,
and especially to the inefficiency and
worthless character of many of the law
yers who are elected to the office of states
attorney. The Herald may be "raising
the old cry for an encouragement" but
there is food for thought in what it says
on this subject:
"Take the case of Batcheder, who a few
years ago swindled the Brandon bank out of
$50, 900. This great rascal escaped conviction
simply because his able defence by the Hon. E.
K. Hard was not matched by anything like
equal energy or ability on the part Of the pros
ecution. Batchelder escaped justice simply
because the state of Vermont is too stingy to
provide capable public prosecutor and pay
him fair wages for his services. This impor-
tant office of states attorney is given generally
either to pot-house lawyers, who have studied
local politics more assiduously than they have
their profession, or 1t is given to some young
fellow, without experience to guide him in an
important trial. IL is all wrong; the state
saves at the spigot and spills at the bunghole
when it lets the office of states attorney go
begging because lawyers Of ability and learn
ing cannot afford to take it. We are not sure
however that the office would be refused by a
good lawyer, il he could be promptly nomi-
mated without being obliged to personally
waste his time in wirepnlling for so petty a
prize We can remember when Hon. L. r.
Hard and Hon. Daniel Roberts served as
states attorney of Chittenden county and as
city attorney of Burlington, and they accepted
these places OF trihing emolument when they
were pressed with the demands OF a large and
valuable general practice. II is essential TO
the Office that 1t be held by sound and honor
able lawyer. Perhaps the creation of the office
OF attorney general would do something to
| stiffen the administration of criminal law in
this state, which in many most important
matters is lamentably weak. This office, with
good salary attached to 1t, would be accepted
| by strong lawyer and in this way the sober
scoundrels of the state might feel the rod as
| surely and as sharply as those who sell rum
and those who swallow 1t. We are getting in
bad way in Vermont; the tone of public
morals is become exceedingly lax and loose on
the subject of the most serious offences against
the security of property and the integrity OF
important financial trusts We do not allow
horse thieves to go unwhipt Of justice, or to
wander at large; but bank robbers and kindred
swindlers seldom feel the laws halter draw in
Vermont. Crimes that railroad a man in New
Jersey or New York to the penitentiary do not
seem to crush man in Vermont. Such state
OF things Is great scandal to the state. Every
child in the state is educated for coed or for
evil by the manner in which public opinion
deals with crime high and low"