Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1885-09-04
THE CASE OF MR., STEAD.

The English authorities have resolved
to prosecute Mr.. Stead, of the Pal Nal
Gazette. In so doing they simply propose
to make him a martyr to a righteous
cause, and to canonize him in public esti-
nation.
What has Mr.. Stead done? Brought to
light and reformation the greatest infamy
OF the century. But his methods in
volved criminality," we are told If adj
mitted, what of it? How often has GRIM
inal history recorded and justified partici-
patton in criminal acts in order to bring
offenders to justice? Such instances are
countless. The law justifes them. Grim
inal prosecuting officers constantly advise
their agents to partake of the crime, that
the real criminal may be punished and the
offense abated. There is nothing more
common in detective practice.
The intent is the essence of the crime
Mr. Stead's intent was to do no wrong, and
In fact he did no wrong. This is pre-
cisely what he did do, according to his
own statement, and upon which the prose-
eution bases the criminal proceedings
against him: DESTROYS of having incon-
troveruble evidences of the verify of the
alleged traffic in young girls, he procured
the necessary introduction to a firm of pro-
curesses. With them he bargained for
the delivery to him, for supposed Ibid
nous client, of five maids, from II to Is
years of age, certified by medical expert
to be virgins. The firm, at the time ap-
pointed, presented the young girls. Toavoid
all possibility of wrong, Mr. Stead had his
own physician in attendance, and to him
these poor, Ignorant and deluded children
went in for examination. As a result con-
tracts were signed by which those accepted
agreed to answer any summons sent on two
days notice and to sell themselves for 4
miserable pittance. This transaction was
consummated under the immediate supe r
vision of the PROGRESSES, who for not an
instant lost sight of their victims. There
the matter ended. Mr.. Stead questioned
the children, found that poverty and
deceit, not desire, had entrapped them for
their ruin, advised them to flee from the
snare of the human harpies, and SO far as
he could exposed to them the peril in
which they stood. This was the crime of
the courageous journalist. He did only
mat which was necessary TO establish be-
You'd question the fact of the traffic and
the new slavery only that necessary to
put in hand the indisputable evidences of
the criminality of the PROGRESSES, and the
horrible trade in female virtue He, how
ever, also demonstrated that in the iarqer
number of cases of this class, the children
were not aware of the full import of the
contract they made, and were ignorant of
the awfulness of the infamy of which they
were the victims, and that in very many
cases the consummation of it was accom-
plShed only by force, drugging and the
most horrible brutality.
If now English Courts shall hold this
man guilty who has done 50 much for his
race, they will testify to the need of more
such men the subserviency of the Eng
fish law officers to the libertines, aged
roues and titled Turks of England, and the
wretchedness of social system that strikes
down the arm lifted in its defense.