Fort Worth daily gazette. (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1882-1891, 1886-12-30
ExEoUT1YE oLEMENoY

GAEO u IIIE tLEHENC 4,
The blessed Statesman at Austin is ex.
erclsed over the free use OF the pardon
ing power by those who hold the pre-
rogative of exercising c;emency. 1t
doesn't call any names, save an Incidental
and evidently unimportant allusion to the
respite Of Cluverius by Gov. Lee, but in
Inmates that executives in general deal
out clemency with too lavish hand.
There are wild stories floating around at
Austin about how many hundred eve will
not venture to state the numbeT) convicts
Gov. ireland has pardoned during his two
terms. 1t Is said the "dam literary fel-
lows" as old Simon Cameron used TO call
the newspaper reporters, have utterly
failed to find out just how many
men the governor has let free, or
his reasons for pardon, but as we have
said, the number is placed up in the hun
dreds. Perhaps this is an over-estimate,
and 1t Is but fair to give the governor the
benefit Of all the doubts. There can be
no question that in many instances the
pardoning power is not used as wisely as
justice and the best interests OF society
demand. An executive at all given to
tenderness (and most men have vein of
tenderness in their mske-up) win find it
very difficult to resist the daily appeals
to the softer side OF his nature, and sup
ported, too, by an array Of apparent facts
that are calculated to mislead his iudg-
ment, even II his heart cannot be touched.
1t must be assumed, of course, that
clemency Is always, so far as the governor
is able to judge, shown to those who de-
serve IL. He pardons because he is con-
WINGED the convict is unjustly imprisoned
| Qor the Judgment of juries Is not always
infallible) or because he believes the
prisoner has been punished sufficiently,
which would render further imprlson-
ment cruelty. Again, the needs and sui.
ferlngs Of those related by blood or mar
riage to prisoners often explains the issue
of a pardon. ALI these considera-
lions press themselves upon the man who
can grant life or liberty, as the case may
be, and he is cast in a stern mould who
can resist their force and maintain the
golden mean that is expected and de-
manded by the public. 1t is hard to i'm.
agine how the Statesman or anybody
else 10 going to reform the evil and SO
Undue governors with common sense and
spirit OF equitable humanity that they
will always pardon the right man and at
the right time. Several states have expert.
mented rather widely in search OF a rem.
edy, by placing the pardonlng power in
the hands of the legislature, or of a
board, composed OF three or more per.
sons, acting with the executive. But
these experiments do not appear to have
met the emergency any more than under
thesystem we have in Texas. In some states
the boards OF pardon or the legislatures
have proved as open to criticism as the ex.
ecutives were when untrammeled by any
such checks. In more than one state /;
has been found that for too great an ex-
ercise of clemency there succeeded
the other extreme undue rigid.
ity and meroilessness, and then,
OF course, the public was free in its
censure. 1t is good deal like the grand
jury system, which people inysigh against
and declare should be abolished, hu,
when the reformers are asked what they
have TO offer in the stead OF the grand
jury, the question is generally poser
for all the proposed substitutes are open
10 full as many objections as the system
lNis proposed to dispense with. About
the only suggestion THE GAZETTE can
offer the Statesman is that the people, In
choosing governors, should take care to
select men of broad, equable judgment
not sentimentalists nor yet martinets,
and trust 20 their common sense TO dc
what is right and proper when weeping
father, mother, wife or daughter comes
into the executive ofilce, loaded down
with petitions signed by the very hes,
citizens in the county OF conviction, pray,
ing mercy for the convict son, father,
husband or brother.