Bismarck weekly tribune., 1889-01-04
PUNISHMENT OF CRIME.

fUNlDHME EN i VI CHlME.
AN REGULARITY WHICH is THE
SEED OF INJUSTICE.
Should Not the Criminal and His Prop.
erty he Held Responsible for the Undo
ing of the Wrong7- in the
Criminal Courts.
The first object of the civil law is the main
tenance of the rights Of individuals. The
fact that the smallest personal right is at
tackled, or even threatened, is enough to give
jurisdiction to some engine of the law; and
the laws work is not done effectuaily until
the right, if it proves to be veritable right,
ID established and secured 1t is not enough
that the attempting wrong doer be stopped
at5the point which he has reached, be pre-
vented from going further. OF even be pun
tshed for the past; he ami his property are
held responsible for the undoing of any
wrong that has been done, and for the re-
establishment of the violated right in all its
original vigor and security. All this is
summed up in the convenient word dam.
ages" Human imperfections very often
prevent law from reaching the full consum-
nation of its object, but any such result is
always felt to be reason for the law itself to
be discontented with Its failure.
When we turn to criminal law we seem to
nave fallen upon an entirely different atmos-
phere. Criminal offenses are primarily
against the state; and yet, with the excep-
ton OF such few general crimes as treason
and rebellion, each of them involves some
violation Of an individuals rights The
murderer is hanged because he has violated
the command OF the state to refrain from
committing murder; but the crime has
wrongtuily extinguished some individuals
right to life, as well as the right of his wife.
children or other dependents to support
YET our criminal law, except in few minor
orenses, makes no effort whatever to vindi-
cate the violated personal rights or to make
damages" to the victim component mart
of the offenders sentence.
The one object of our criminal svstam
seems to be the punishment of the wrong
ooer; ana It seems to consider the restoration
OF satisfaction of individual rights as mere
incident, which may or may not occur. with.
out aHectlng the success Of its legitimate
WORK. Under such system it is perhans
fortunate that the conventional and conveni-
Gnu Dhndness OF Justice prevents her from
seeing the full measure of the wrongs which
ner present theory passes complacentlv bv
from DAY to day. She draws her sword
against the merchant or banker who. having
been plundered by forger or burglar. ven,
lures TO compound the felony in order to pat
back part of his property; but she does not not
Precend TO conceal from the victim her be-
nef that the recovery Of the property in anv
more iegltlmate fashion is really no particu-
lar affair of hers The barns and outbn;ld.
ings OF an owner are fired again and again
Dy concealed enemy, until even insurance
becomes impossible; the criminal NAV at last
be caught, indicted and imprisoned bnt tho
injured mans lost property is not brought
oacK sc 10 nim by such a punishment of crime.
Inc CIVIL law will see to it that the railwav
company whose servants, by carelessness.
XII OF MAIN passenger shall satisfy the
tost rlgnts OF life or locomotion by a money
payment TO the injured person or his repre-
senIatlves; out, II the criminal lakv can
catcn ana punish the rutfian who has killed
tne father OF family, it seems to care moth
ing TOT tne children of the murdered man.
VINO are starving or impoverished by the loss
oL tnelr bread winner Criminal courts.
wnlcn are meant to be splaces wherein ius,
tice Is JudlciaLy administered" }" do in such
ways become very commonly, as the scoffers
lnslst, places where injustice is judicially
administered.
Why should it be necessary that such an
anomalous feature should mar the fair out
llnes OF human lawa Why should justice ie-
more IN criminal law that which is her con-
trolilng motive in civil law-the wrongs of
skvyQ f. - go
MAKE the very punishment of the criminal
nearly as close an approximation to satis-
faction for the violated individual rights as
is usually obtained by the civil law Il NAV
be that such change Of the point of view
would alter some points of the theory of law.
but would not the change be for the bettera
Very many persons believe intensely and
honestly that 'tthe worst use you can put a
man to is to hang him - would not the friends
and opponents of capital punishment unite
much more readily on life imprisonment
at hard labor for murder, with restrictions
on the pardoning power, if the proceeds of
the hard labor were to go to the murdered
persons representatives. For, after all. the
essential injustice of capital punishment is
not that it takes away the criminals forfeited
right to life, but that it does SO in a wav
which extinguishes forever the source from
which the murdered mans dependents had a
moral right to look for recompense for the
rights which had been taken from them. In
such cases the law, blind, furious and un-
reasoning, destroys the life of the guilty
without stopping to consider that it thereby
makes the injury to the innocent hopeless,
irremedial, permanent injury Electricity
may OF may not be a good substitute for the
rope; perhaps common ! sense and even
handed justice might find better substitute
for both.
It seems hardly necessary to supplement- or
REINFORCE the case of murder; if the point
be well taken there, any number Of criminal
offelses will suggest themselves to the reader
in which the proceeds of the criminals hard
labor could be fairly, justly and well ar
signed by the sentencing court to the satis-
faction Of the personal rights which had been
injtred or destroyed by the crime Thus the