Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1892-07-31

Crack-The Difference Between Dead
Drunk and Leg Drunk - Some IRE
sponsible Mendicants.
rBY CABLE 10 TEE pIsrATcHl
LONDON, July so.-The other day man
charged at a London police court with
being drunk and disorderly vainly urged,
in mitigation of punishment, that ''he was
only dead drunk, " and not s1eg drunk"-a
subtle distinction which the magistrate was
unable to recognize, but at the Stafford
Assizes Thursday Mr. Justice Collins
grappled with the question of the difference
between "sober intention" and drunken
impulse" and in doing so laid down the
law in Q novel manner, calculated to drive
the temperance people into frenzy of in
dignation.
Harry Pugh, a miner, was charged with
the murder of Anna Gill by drowning her.
The couple had been drinking heavily to-
gether, and according to q statement made
by Pugh, they agreed to commit suicide in
company in deep pool, but when they got
into the water the woman "seized him, held
him under and nearly drowned him, but he
got the better of her and drowned her."
Pugh Pulls Out OF a Bad Hole.
The case looked very black indeed against
Pugh until evidence was produced to show
that both be and the woman had been heard
to declare their intention to commit suicide.
Thereupon Justice Collins directed the
fury that before there could be 4 common
purpose, 'the minds of the two persons
must have been in condition sufficiently
clear to enable them to frame an intention
of that kind. Drunkenness, although often
said to be no defense to crime, was a mate
rial factor when q proved intention was a
necessary ingredient for the crime; for q
person might be so drunk as to be incapable
Of forming an intention"
After this luminous. exposition the fury
took only 20 minutes to make up their
minds to scquit the prisoner. People who
don't drink are complaining that the law
was unduly strained in favor of drunken
scoundrel who undeniably killed q woman,
but inebriates have equal ground for pro-
testing against the action of the Islington
Guardians Of the Poor, who want Psrlia-
ment to create q new office at the expense
of men who don't know when they have had
enough.
Queer Kind of Tfppler.
1t seems that there is a creature living in
Islipgton who 'drinks himself into periodi-
cal fits of delirium tremens, and while they
are on is chargeable to the poor rates as
pauper lunatic." The guardians want to
have this man punished 'tfor refusing to
maintain himself" and if the law is power
less to deal with him they want the law
altered
But this Objectionable man does not
actually refuse to maintain himself When
he starts drinking, too, A., is not with the
intention or desire to get to the delirium
tremens stage. He reaches 1t all of sud-
den, before he has time to consider the
question Of his maintenance.
In the bad time that is coming for En-.
glish drunkards, men of the Islington stamp,
wife deserters and the like will be cIassed
as fraudulent state debtors. and will be kept
under lock and key until they have done
enough work to wipe out their indebted
ness. That, at any rate, is the intention of
the temperance reformers, who at this
moment constitute majority of the House
of Commons.