Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1886-06-30
LAW VS.. PUBLIC SENTIMENT.


The question is renewed in the crack
of the pistol every now and then in the
hands of some avenger of woman's honor,
whether our laws are sufficient to main
tain the rights Of the weaker vessel? We
remarked a few days ago, in referring to
the case of Mcdonald and Mish, upon the
fact that no man had for many years been
punished for ayenging the outraged honor
of wife, mother or daughter; that there
IS 4 ehivalrous sentiment indwelling in the
hearts of men that refuses to condemn such
infraction of society's laws, and thereby
justilies and advises it, and from this result
of its sentiment society cannot escape.
Since then there has been given new testi-
mony in the direction Of this truth, and
IN our own community sentiment is Just
now manifest of this order, growing out of
Sunday night murder. Society never
can afford to make man or woman the
Judge and trier of his or her own wrong,
or appoint them in their own manner to
right 1t or to mete ont punishment. When
it does that it abandons all order, and del
egates to passion and the avenging spirit
the administration of the most terrible of
criminal laws. The taking of human life,
except as excused by the written laws is
murder, and society can never afford to
otherwise define the killing of human
being. But cases frequently occur in which
society arises in rebellion against It's own
written codes, and practically overthrows
them. Who believes, in the light of the
history of criminal experience in the past
twenty-five or thirty years in America,
that any wronged husband will ever be
punished as the codes direct for taking the
law into his own hands? The laws can be
written to the level of public consent, they
cannot always be written to the level of
public sentiment, or the diseases IF the pub
lie mind. Orperhaps better phrasing would
be that the public sentiment, which may
be 4 disease of the public mind, cannot al
ways be brought to level with the even
and exact justice of the written law, for
there can be no excusing of murder. 1t
remains murder, however successfully NOR
bid or cool public sympathy may inter
vene to prevent Its punishment. Men and
women will admit this; there will be
found not one to deny it, and yet men
and women composing society will deny
their profession day in and day out by
condoning the ofense where the chival-
Tous sentiment interviews to excuse it. 1t
is a sociological study that will continue
TO deeply engage the thought Of the we'll
wishers of the race why this is fact Is it
due TO the conviction that our laws are
inadequate that the law is unequal to
the task of defending the sanctity. OF the
nuptiai couch that the purity and honor
OF woman have not ample safeguards in
the provisions Of the law; that the methods
of administering the law are uncertain.
hating and treaeherous? Is it possible
that here is the point at which society
frankly confesses that it is incapable Of
self-government according TO written codes :?
that here is the point at which it is forced
to the confession that the resort to the
method of the barbarian is all that is left
for it? Whatever the answer we may
give, whatever the reasoning from cause
to effect, whatever the cold logic of the
social syllogisn, it remains that society is
in Just that condition between law and
lawlessness in its sympathy in all cases
where female honor is avenged, that
amounts to an admission of want
of confidence in the law to pro-
tect il. Or shall we rather set
tie upon this statement. that the refine
ment of the social code regarding woman
rises superior to the written law and
records decree of society correspond
ing with the chivalrous sentiment which
invests the outraged avenger of female
honor with the armor of public approval !?
But, under either statement, the fact re-
mains that there is kind of murder
against which society lifts one hand in
punishment and the other to shield the
offender from the blow.