Custer chronicle. [volume] (Custer City, Black Hills, D.T. [S.D.]) 1880-1890, 1888-07-21
Legal Death by Electricity.

DR.. Richardson in "Asciepiad:" While
executions still continue there is nothing
In the present and lolg established plan
Of carrying them out which needs TO be
changed. If the process be considered
ii is not more brutal than the
a,.irit of the act itself, all attempts to re-
fine (which cannot add to its efficacy as IA
detcrrtat of crime. The process OF hang
ing Looks brutal without actually being
SO. Since tae age of Morgagni the qucs
ton now undll. discussion has been con
sidcred; and thoQpinion Of the best in
formed physiolo.istE then and since then,
has always been that 'leath by strangula-
ton, or by suspension. Is practically Il
painless mode Of death Persons WHO
have recovered from the uaCOpsciOusness
produced by ~strangulation have testified
completely on this point, and that rAc cid
aud legal method of death by Suspension,
according to the terms Of the Judicial
sentence, should, at the instance OF aiE
ignorant and common officer who may
&dflN O'AN al, y WV ~
changed for the long drop, or death by
an e|xcruciating and cruel blow, is in.
credible. Some member Of the house of
commons ought to put to the secretary of
state for the home department, who is
charged with with the duty of directing
that the law, be it good or bad. shall be
carried out, the question why the gentle,
though it may seem prolonged, extinction
of life by hanging should not be restored.
While death is the national punishment
for murder, this national mode of vindi-
eating the law is also the most rational.
Making the method cf execution more
scientific. if il be right to degrade science
by so connecting her civilizing powers
with such degrading and ignorant work,
is simply TO put a premium on crime
itself.
Since I set up a lethal chamber for tn,
painless extinction of the lives of the
lower animals | nave more thar once met
persons; not strictly insane. but in morbid
states of mind, who have looked on the
lethal easy death as a prospect of release
from life SO invitingly pleasant that il
such mode of death were to be adopted
as the national plan Of capital murder
they would not hesitate in some of their
worst moods To kill that they might be
killed, since the severest fate that could
happen would be a death brought to the
painlessness of pleasure. Death by the
electric shock would convey to minds OF
this stamp the same anticipation, but
would not necessarily produce the SAME
certain result. In some researches or
the application of the electric discharge
for the painless extinction Of the lives OF
animals TO be used rs food, the details OF
which | recorded in the Medical Times
and Gazette for the year 1869, this mode
of death was anything but certain in Its
effects.
Sheep stricken apparently into instant
and irrevocable death by electricity after
a few minutes showed signs of life. and
if they had not been dispatched in the
ordinary way by the knife would have
been restored to consciousness. The same
facts have been observed in attempts tC
Kill dogs by the electric shock, and | once
published an instance in which "A large
dog, struck into perfect uncOnsciousncss
hy the stroke from a powerful battery,
wiss submitted to a surgical operation
willis. lying, To all appearances, dead, and
was rs yet so little affected as to make an
easy and+sound recovery. 1t need not be
inferred frGn such facts as these that the
electric shock. will not kill at one dis
charge; in mostcases il viii; but, excep-
tionally instead oT>killing outright, it will
simply stun. and nfsy induce the sem
.blance of death instead: of real death.