Lancaster daily intelligencer. [volume] (Lancaster, Pa.) 1864-1928, 1883-03-30
lallcaster fmtellige1lrer.
FRIDAY EVENING. MARCH 80. 1888.
OF fha Track.

FRIDAY EVENING. MARCH 80. 1888.
or the Track.
The editor of the Philadelphia Tunes
Is now sibilantly assailing the General
Assembly for its action in the Dukes
case. The Times got itself into such a
full swing of curse words in its raving
over Dukes, that it seems quite unable
to check up when Dukes is disposed of,
but finds it necessary to switch Oft on
some other object of anathema, and the
very respectable General Assembly is
the unfortunate victim. 1t is not neces'
sary to suppose, under this explanation
of the frothing of the Times, that its
editors brain is softening ; we adopt it
to save that conclusion, which would
otherwise be needed to explain its decla-
ton that the Assembly, in declaring
Dukes seat vacant because he refused
to take it, made record that was ''sinu-
Gus, evasive and substantially untruth-
full" For if that is not arrant nonsense
we are not judges Of the article.
The constitution forfeits the Office of
any one who refuses to take the OATH
and without this constitutional for
feiture, it would be plainly ill.,
herent in the power Of the Assembly
to vacate a seat which is declined
by one who was elected to it. If this
power is not inherent in a Legislature it
would be difficult to find one that is. If
an elected member may decline to quail
ify as member and thus give the body
the power to control his attendance. the
Legislature might he paralyzed by the
refusal of a sufficient numberto take the
oath, unless it had the power to vacate
their seats and order new elections.
But the distress of the Times seems TO
be that the General Assembly vacated
Dukes seat upon constitutional author
ity and we'll established precedent, and
did not strike out for itself into fresh
field and establish new precedent in a
case which was non political and, there
fore, invited non-partisaI judgment.
uc UIllllduC IuCd VI lHC At"''S i" 1h'1'
general infamy" should have Eeen
written down as cause for vacatinG a
seat, said general infamy' having
been developed subsequent to the eiec-
tion and prior to the assembling of the
Legislature. The very beautiful case
which the Times complains that the Leg
islature had on hand to make this law,
and foolishly threw away. was that
of a young lawyer, who had borne up to
the time of his election to the Legis,;l-
ture an irreprcachable character, and
who enjoyed universal esteem in his
community. Then he lost his good name
in i day through the publication, by the
friends of a woman he had injured, of a
brutal letter he had written TO her father.
General infamy, ;is the Times says, de
scended upon him. The meGnberS OF the
Assembly to which he was elected de
sired to avoid association with him.
But, strange as it may seem, he had been
guilty of no crime that the law tock
cogniZance of. He had been tried for
murder and had been acquitted. Tie
Legislature could not lay that crime
against him. There was no effort made
to convict him of seduction, or to hold
=, him for any other crime. The beastli-
ness of his letter stood as The ground OF
his infamy and made him obnoxious to
a fierce public sentiment. The precedent
which the Times urges that the Legisla
ture should have FASTENED to make was
that beastly letters and acts, which lie
law does not take cOgniZance of, should
be made a cause for vacating legislative
seats. 1t would be a dangerous prece
dent to put membership in the Legis
lature at the hazard Of the interpreta
tion of general infamy" by those who
might have the power to punish for it
in periods of excitements, religious
political or social.
Let the Legislature define in times of
calmness what offenses shall make Of
tenders ineligible to its seats and Lei it
by all means, provide that a man not be
made Infamous in the public Judgment
without falling under the harrow os the
law. The most painful thing III his
Dukes case is that Dukes should We
fallen under such general public eN,ora
tion without being held guilty of any
offense by the law. Tie libelous words
and the acts of seduction, cf which he
islheld to be guilty, he is not legally
called to account for, and the law seems
to suffer the reproach of being unable to
lay its hands upon one SO foul that lie is
Stunned as a leper. We do not believe
the law is thus Ineffective but if it is,
the Legislature should see to it that it
is amended. If Dukes is as evil man
as the members of the Legislature show
that they hold him to be, by their efforts
to free themselves from hlm, may they
not properly inquire why he is not in
Jail nor in danger of it
In Bad Way.
The desperate straits Of the Republi-
ran nartv are jllnStr rated I,v thp Srramhln