The Columbia herald. [volume] (Columbia, Tenn.) 18??-1935, 1892-08-02
JUSTICE MIsUAkRIEs.

Messrs. Gale and Turner are re-
turning to Nashville. These perfumed
gentlemen have made themselves
famous by their thievery. They have
gotten their pictures in the papers;
their photos will be transferred to the
rOgue's gallery, no doubt, and the
dudes themselves should be sent to
the penitentiary; but they will not.
Why? Because they are not COM
mon thieves; they stole too much and
are too we'll connected; if they had
been poor and friendless, and had
stolen a shoulder of meat and a sack
of flour to stay the cravings OF hunger,
or had appropriated aDother's extra
overcoat to protect themselves frc M
the cold winds of winter, they would
D OF have been given the distiu guished
compliment of much newspaper noto-
riety, but would have gone along to
work in stripes with the common
herd behind prison bars.
1t is such rs this that makes the
laboring millions chafe and fret. They
do not mind so much the toll and
sweat Of the day. This is the portion
they are born and used to. But when
they, or one of theirs fall from the
path of honesty or of virtue, and they
see the severe frown of the world and
the heavy hand of the law fall upon
and crush them, they look about
them and see men and women who
have sinned more than they, and then
it is that they rebel and say, ut is
not my transgression but my station
in life that you punish"
We take this objective case because
| these thieves are known to COlumbis
society. Mr.. Gale is a good looking
fine-mannered, graceful dancer, whose
form had grown familiar at our ger
mans. Mr.. Turner was the swell
who played the part of the Ounce
the recent "Old Deestrick Skule" Ell
tertainment. 1t develops, however
that he was more knave than fool
Both Of them, favored by good breed
ing and good raising, and allowed t.
move in polite and refined society
should be held to strict account foi
their utter abandonment.
But no! Through sympathy ant
respect for their families they viii
be allowed to go. Rich relatives an
friends will make up the shortage
and there will be no prosecution.
So far as the right and wrong c
this is concerned, we will not sto
to argue. There is not, perhaps,
single reader who would undertake
to say that it is right, either in la'
or morals, to punish the thief who's
friends will not pay him out, an
condone the same offense in anothe
whose family or friends are MOI
able. There is not a man living i
} this democratic country, under th1
Republican form of government, VIII
! would dare defend so partial Law
3 and yet the practice is tolerate
.. every day. Somewhere IN this broa
l land, every day, justice is melted oil
: to some friendless, mOneyless GRIN
) inaI, while his richer brother got
free. The law, or system of law
I, that will tolerate such injustice an
t partiality, must be changed an
J strengthened ever to command Re
/ spect. ThereishOuld be public pro
D ecutor for all such cases.
: Society is as much to blame as til
p law. Society should purge itself Z
Il
t its laws are loose and CROWN
? Iooser. 1t is strange how SON
; people ever get there, and it
! stranger still how others are above
n to remain. We are told that in olde
e times birth and education fixed IL
: standard, and that later on none
It was added. Now it seems none
e these are requisite, for at the swell