San Antonio daily light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1886-1907, 1895-12-23
Tbe Daily Light.
MONDAY, DECEMBER 90, '95
REPRESSION OF CRIME.

The criminal classes who render
every form of society hideous In
many Of its aspects, would soon
die out and be eXtinguished were
it not that they are permitted to
breed new swarms OF human pests
without the slightest restriction.
No sooner have we incarcerated
the sires In vice, after, it may be,
their long and successful career,
than we found the sons continuing
the war upon our persons and
property. The cost of our prisons
and police forms only part of the
insurance we have to provide on &C
count of the savages in our midst,
whose hands are against every
man. Those who deviate from
honesty are few indeed compared
to those who make fraud and theft
life profession; the former may
be reclaid, the latter never, because
it is their nature to war upon So
ciety. Often they are the victims
of heredity, and philosophically
considered, have then, perhaps, as
little responsibility for their &C
tions as the dogs that bite. A
wolf is always wolf, an hereditary
criminal will always commit crime
II he can.
Thefts, frauds and outrages up
to murder, are not the only evils
they infiict on us. They infect the
whole community with immoral
faint. 1t is impossible for our
young to peruse in the daily papers
the records of their wickedness
without being worse for it, to say
nothing Of any stronger influence
they may exercise. Tales OF
ravishing, robbery and murder are
not edifying literature for youthful
minds. At the best, these are
likely to absorb some portion Of
the immortality thus infiltrated
through them.
Effectual means, however, are at
hand to prevent our annual crops
of criminals, could we only be per-
suaded to adopt them. The most
potent, but least palatable, would
be to render them incapable Of pro-
pagating. Another is to make
human breeding a science, and
education another. At present
they both proceed haphazard,
whereas they require profound
study and strict method.
We English are unsurpassed in
the art Of breeding the inferior
animals from a salmon 20 a short
horn, from pigeon to racehorse.
The method is no secret. All I'M
derstand it. Healthy animals only,
with the best points, and free from
hereditary faint, are selected. They
are mated carefully, and the
strains are preserved pure from all
deteriorating blood and damaging
conditions. But in the rearing Of
the highest animals these salutary
maxims are ignored, and many
men of natural affection and intel
ligence bestow more pains on the
mating of their dogs than on that
of their daughters. Our work
houses, prisons, refugees, peniten-
tiaries, and lunatic asylums bear
sad witness to these inequitabl
laws and customs. Into them are
crowded hosts of unhappy women
thousands of them mere girls
victims without redress of mans
brutality and heartlessness; and
they wear out their pitiful and
cherries days to the end too many
of them, alas having been dover
ed with the fatal gift of beauty
Usually it is the ardent girl of
generous disposition, the least
calculating, and the most artless
who is lured to her destruction
Nature is strong in her, and af.
lection dominates. Her embraces
60 with her heart II society and
the law could be compassionate to
any, they should be tender to her,
But both are implacable. She Ii
appalled, by their unrelenting
severity, and in her mad terror il
often impelled to destroy the wit
ness of her wrong doing. Bu'
even should she sdare her limo
cent offspring, the law still pursuei
him. He cannot inherit, except by
will, and if he dies intestate, the
crown seizes all his property.
Owing to their exclusion from
the higher grades Of employment
women of the better classes ar,
given over to useless and frivolou
pursuits. Dress and fashion
amusements and flirtations, main
ly make up the trivial round OF
their occupations, and act as bar
to all solid intellectual work. Yet
who can blame these gilded butter
flies Of society for being what thei
others andl husbands have made
them? A leading London pape
aasures us that "Eyery wear wit