Waterbury evening Democrat., 1888-01-27
MAGISTERIAL MERCY.

MAGISTERIAL MERCY.
 We have neither desire nor design to constitute ourselves as Court of Appeal in the matter of justice it is admins tered by our justices. It would not be good civism to question the wisdom of our courts; it would impair the effect of example if editors in the privacy of their sanctum were to arraign magistrates for partiality or excessive exercise of their high power; and believing as we do in the honesty of our local judiciary, the general disinclination to act as a tribunal of re- view becomes particular aversion. But there are occasions when a courteous re- monstrance will not be deemed out of order; when magistrates, acting up to the letter of the law in the fullest interpreta- tion, may be asked without offence to give some little thought to the spirit of the en- actment.
 A few weeks ago we took occasion to re- monstrate in this manner in respect of the judicial treatment of tramps. Some of these offenders against 'the statute made and provided" in the State of Connecticut may not deserve the implication of being offenders against moral law. They are without work and they travel in search of employment, and the travelling is placed in the category of tramping; they are tired and footsore and need shelter from the weather inclemency; house doors are shut in their faces; and obeying the natural law of self preservation they stealthily en- ter barn or out-house, and this is called a crime against society, and is 50 punish ed in the prison cell; they are hungry and have to beg for bread and this is an other grave offence also calling for penal consequences; and, as we have seen, the local magistracy metes out the full measure of legal sentence. We do not deny that there are tramps proper-or improper if you will-who are not very scrupulous about the distinctions of ''meum' and ''tuum'-but even in their case the tempering of justice with mercy would in the end do no harm.
 There is another class of offenders who may be regarded as coming within the purview of the Judicial Bench in the tramp category of crime They do not travel in search of employment, for it is ready at their hand; but unhappily temptation is too much for them, and they expend their wages as soon as earned-often in antici- patton. Drink is their disease, and at one bout they will drink away their household comforts, their wives happiness, their children's food and clothing, and their own health, self-respect and safety. How to treat such per- sons has been problem for priests and philanthropists and publicists in all time The consensus of opinion, no matter what lawmakers may say and law administra- tion do, is that drunkenness is disease, and should be so treated; and that to re- gard and punish it, per SC, as a crime is not the way to effect reformation. Often the punishment involves the suffering the wives and children and other depend ents of the offender, who are thus deprived of the earnings of the head of the house. hold, and Society is none the better, for the prison process has not reclaimed
 It is difficult for the magistracy, some times, to decide what is best to be done; but any one can estimate for himself what is worst There was case ill our Police Court yesterday where an unfortunate man was sentenced to accumulative terms of imprisonment for the ''crime" of drunken ness-for though there was the concomi- tant of 'disorderly conduct''--it was the drunkenness still. One term for the one T fo, 4Lo -one, and a long term, for habitual drunk enness-none of these terms concurrent, but one following the expiration of the other-the whole imprisonment amounting to 1S0 days, or just six months, all without appeal or redress of any kind Now we put it, in all respect to our local judiciary, 1 was not this too much for mere con- structive crime There was no injury to person or property-no exhibition of vio- lence or dishonesty coming under the ordi- nary head of lawlessness-nothing but the surrender of the victims soul to a slavish | habit; and yet the law steps in to aggravate the horrors of the disease. Surely their honors might have left that count for hab- itual drunkenness out of the admeasure- ment of guilt and called to mind, what | must have been within their personal if not judicial knowledge, that there are hundreds holding their heads high in the community to-day who offend as habitually as poor Connarty, and escape punishment simply because they are not found out or if found i out, not prosecuted A little magisterial mercy would go great way in the direc- ton of Reform.
 MORE THOUGHTS ON THE TARIFF.
 THE time is rapidly approaching when the Tariff will supersede all other topics