The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1894-09-11

be altogether abolished for the sans
reason. Nor is it fair to draw the con-
clusion that because the appetite for
blood was whetted with each exhibition
of the CORY guillotine in the political
slaughter of the French Revolution,
the execution of murderer in these
times will produce similar effect.
Facts are dead against such a theory.
If all bloodshedding is barbarism,
what about the killing of animals for
human food? Butchery is barbarsn,
then, is it not? No animal should be
slaughtered, for similar repugnance in,
degree is felt at the first shedding of
animal blood, and that repugnance is
overcome by familiarity with the sight
Now as to the men who may be
called upon to execute the extreme
penalty of the law upon the condemned
murderer. 1t is mistake to place upon
them any stigma. to say that the law
VIII shield" them, or to charge that
there will be anything for their elmer
conscience" or any authority human or
divine to condemn. They will simply
perform duty. No law is required to
shield" them. They will be the law
itself personified and in action Both
divine and earthly governmental au-
thority will support them. There will
be nothing more for conscience to dis
approve than there is in the arrest of a
criminal or the closing upon him of
the prison doors. The satisfactory
reason is the discharge of a lawful
duty.
The officer of the law who legally
executes a criminal condemned to
death need have no ''code of ethics
different from the provisions of the
criminal code. The intimation that
the act is wrong in ITSELF is
an assumption, and is diametri-
cally opposed to both sacred and secu-
lar principles of morality and divine
and human recognized rules for the
government of personal conduct
If some laws are "as bad as they can
be- that is no reason or excuse to an
officer of the law if he fail to enforce
them, nor does their execution entail
upon him any stigma. He is sworn in
their service and upon him rests no
responsibility for their inherent vice or
virtue. Nor need any officer of the law
''revel in barbarous infections
whether called upon to handcuff
culprit or immune him in a cell, or put
him to death as the law may de-
termine
Just as fallacious as our corespon-
dents theories on these points, is the
reasoning that capital punishment is
continued because of the cowardice of
one part of the people and the inert
ness of the other part 1t takes more
courage to enforce the extreme penalty
than to avoid its enforcement. And
the maintenance of the code is the re-
suit of profound conviction that it is
both necessary and right. Whether it
is either is another question; it is the
motive that is now under cons;dera-
ton
Our correspondents substitute for
the death penalty in cases of wilful
murder is solitary imprisonment for
life. Is that civilized? He thinks so.
Is that less barbarous than to END the
life of the guilty wretch? To keep a
fellow creature immured from all asso-
citation with his kind. year after year,
in perpetual and inexpressible misery,
may seem refined, and civilized, and
tender and right to some folks, but to
the majority of people it will not APP
pear as more humane or more salts
factory" than capital punishment.
We have given space to the gentle
mans letter because his views are well
presented and are those of great
many sensible people. We regard his
arguments as inefficient, and we are
not of the opinion that the time has
yet come for the abolition of the death
penalty, imposed by laws framed by
the foremost minds of the leading ma
tons, and enunciated in the divine fiat
ages ago and long before the formation
Of the Mosaic code: Whose sheddeth
mans blood, by man shall his blood be
She'd