The Lafayette gazette. [volume] (Lafayette, La.) 1893-1921, 1899-10-14
PARDON/NG OF GRIM
/N1|C


| Iberia, who presides over the
court of the nineteenth Judicial dis
| trict, delivered an able and emf
nently sensible charge to the grand
jury empanneled at term recently
held in Iberia parish. In his charge
Judge Voorhies called the attention
of the grand jurors to several causes
responsible for the commission OF
crime In this country. The greatest
Of these causes, and one which the
Judge dwelt upon with much clear
ness, is the mawklsh sentimentalIty
that shows itself among perhaps
well-meaning but misguided folk
who are always ready to sympathize
with the condemned criminal no
matter how fendish his crime may
be. Whenever crime is com
mitted under peculiarly sensational
circumstances there goes out from
the hearts of these ever-sympathetic
persons an abundance of sympathy
hot for the victim, but for the
criminal. This false, perpicious,
and INSTRUCTED sympathy for
criminals has no doubt been the
cause of large number of culprits
being turned loose upon society.
Speaking on this subject Judge
VOORHEES, well says:
There is another demoralizing cause of
crime to which l will call your attention.
l allude to the morbid sentimentality dis
played for condemned felons. 1 allude to
the readiness with which applications for
their pardons are signed, only by our
best citizens. but by the very jurors who
have convicted the applicant for pardon.
The greater the crime the greater, ii would
seem, the sympathy shown to the felon. |
Does it not strike you, gentlemen, that
pardons of this sort, by The wholesale, dis
credit our courts nd DESTROY the effective
ness of any jury trials Instead of recon-
the pardon of felons who can |
never become good citizens, would not the |
urleS be wiser and more consistent by ac-
quitting them when tried? Does il not |
strike you that these recommendations must
IT necessity cast odum our courts, being
4 travesty of justice in the minds of the
thinking men of the community. 1t were
:ar better that there be no courts, if their
1ecrees are to be reversed by the board of
oardons on the reComme ndation OF the
'ery Juries upon whose ver,iicts those de-
II IL
snown before hand that conviction will
De followed by an immediate pardon, mus,
rot this be an incentive for the commission
If crime by those who are but too willing TO
lont the law, and snap at the sacrednesS of
'ur courts. You, grand jurors, res
oonsibie for these crying abuses and con-
amnating results, but as the representa-
ives of the people, when you Shall make Il
ePort TO the court, ask You 10 scar this
practice with burning words of |
ebuke; l ask you to enter your solemn pro-
est against it, in the name of sociSly which |
endangcrs; in the name of Justice which
travesties; in the name OF the Young gen |
:ration which it oemoralzes, as that mis-
placed clemency brings contempt of the law,
md proclaims immunity from its penalties. |
call your attention to this crying abuse
lot only as the judge of this district. but
With the earnestness of law abiding citi-
EN-. and of father.
The views depressed by Judge
VOORHEES, in the foregoing lines Of
er food for thought. The evil of
which the Judge speaks has doubt
ess done much injury to the cause
If justice and is entitled to the
earnest consid ration of all law