Blue-grass blade., 1895-01-06
.EmascuIation as a Punishment
for Criminals.


inals, stated recently that would write
an article under that head.
Judge Denny said he had read nothing
on the subject, and the idea was, so far
as he was aware, an original suggestion
with him. But the idea has been advo-
Gated by some journals, and was suggest
ed in an editorial Of the New York Voice
on the Pollard -Breckinridge trial, the
Voice using the term disqualification"
The idea was first suggested to me by
editor w. II. Polk Of this city. I, at first,
regarded 1t as joke, but my attention
having been further called to il by ar
ticles that ! have read, have thought
over 1t seriously, and have concluded,
that for that large class of crimes for
which confinement in the penitentiary
IS now the punishment, emasculation
would be far better mode of punish
ment; nor am certian that IL would not
be better as the punishment for what are
now capital crimes.
In being examined for capital jury SER
vice / have always answered that had
no scruples against capital punishment
in some cases, but that did not think
1t the best made Of punishment. If we
regard it merely as a matter of public
economy 1t is waste of practical value
to destroy the life of an able bodied
man. Such man who has, by crime,
forfeited his right to liberty should be
made to labor for the public good, in or
der that, as far as possible, he might
make restitution for the damage he had
done.
Many crimes are committed as the di-
rect consequence of inordinate sexual
appetite, and by men, who, apart from
this, would probably be valuable citi-
zens. The propriety of remedying the
evil by removing the cause, in those
cases, will at once suggest itself to any
competent intelligence.
1t is no argument against this mode of
punishment for that class of crimes to
say that men are born with extraordinary
instances of this passion, any more than
would hold against any other punish
ment for any other crime, for all crimes
are the result of heredity and environ
ment.
The principal argument for emascula-
tion, as punishment, is that it prevents
the transmission to posterity of the same
disposition for which the present crimi-
nal is to be punished, without depriving
the criminal of his life or liberty, and
therefore of any opportunity, or of his
best opportunity. to be valuable to him
self and the public.
All persons Of intelligence are familiar
with what good has been accomplished
by judicious breeding of domestic ami
mails, and one of the demands of this
age seems to be some practical plan to
do, by breeding. for the human race,
something similar to what has been done
for the domestic animal race. The horse,
for instance, has been bred until the
story of Pegasus IS not nearly so myth
cal as when first heard it; for horses
now 60 as fast as the average birds fly.
The emasculation of persons of we'll de-
fined and extraordinary criminal dispos-
ition is the first grand step, if not the
complete solution of the problem of hu-
man breeding; and this is the way-by
the emasculation of the unfttest to
the domestic animals
are improved from generation to gener-
alton.
Of course care should be taken in the
selection of judges and juries to inflict
this punishment, as should be in the in
Fiction of all other punishments but the
proper precautions having been secured,
It should be the policy of the law to ap-
ply this punishment whenever it Justly
can do it, instead of furnishing only
when it must do it, as it now the common
sentiment of law.
What is now merely punishment, in
the current sense, could actually be made
a blessing and kindness to the crimi-
nal, by forcibly removing from him
to evil.
Much of the value OF the morals of
Jesus of Nazareth is lost by the exager-
ated or hyperbolic style in which they
are announced, and would not want to
say anything that would tend to estab-
lish the precedent of going to the Bible |
for instruction Ill morals but the injunc-
ton to cut off and cast away the offend
ing right hand, and other offending
members of the body, seems to have |
been understood by the early church as |
to the remedy of emasculation |
for the sexual sin; and, that some of the |
early Christians resorted to this expe-
lient, we find from Mathew 49,, IL.
Another advantage of this mode of
l believe is, that the fear of |
t would more deter the viciously dis
posed from the commission of crime,
than the fear of jails, or penitentiaries,
Or possibly the fear of death.
1t is well known that many criminals |
not only have no fear of jails and peni-
tentiaries, but actually want to be con-
lined in them, and among the vicious
classes there is no fear of any disgrace
that attaches to having been prisoner
n these; but emasculation would put
stigma upon the victim that would be
dreaded as the mosiihorrible of all posi-
oilities, by those that it is most desirable
10 influence by the fear of punishment.
The crime of drunkenness is the one,
ior which, above all others, man should
De emasculated. If no idiot should be
allowed to become father of children
much more should no drunkard be al
owed to be The child of a drunkard
zones into the world with predictions
hat are almost certain to make a rimi-
ial of him, and the State should have a
light to protect itselfagainst the coming
nto its domain of such prenatally dis
'osed people, as it has to protect itself
lgainst the immigration of criminals.
AS farmers and gardeners rely as much
lpon the quality of seed they plant as
hey do upon the cultivation of the
,lant, so the best governments will,
ome day, assume to say to drunkard
hat he shall not propagate his species
ust as they will now in some places
'unish farmers for letting weeds gr W
IN their own farms, the seeds of which