The San Francisco call., 1901-10-18
MISPLACED SYMPATHY.

THE Warden OF Auburn prison makes the state
ment that several thousand sympathetic letters
have been received there for the assassin
Czolgosz, and large number of express packages
containing presents OF flowers and fruit The War
den says it would be a OF surprise il the names
OF many OF these correspondents and gift-senders
should be made public
The publication OF their action is sufficiently sur
prising to the country No objects to any effort
intended to rehumanize the assassin in his last days
by offering chance to repent through the softenng
processes dictated by religion. But there is a great
distance between this and the sensual satsfactions
implied in the gifts of flowers and dainties known
that such attentions to pervert like this assassin
always misconstrued They are taken as evidence of
his importance in the world and feed that vanity
which exhibits him to himself hero who has
done great deed and made for himself an immortal
fame Instead OF having rehumanizing effect they
produce its opposite and rather than inducing soft
and repentant mood they confirm the murderous dis
position which led to his crime.
We know of instance in which such degen-
crate has been in any way reformed for better life,
prepared in a Christian sense, for the death which
awaited him. bysuch misplaced sympathy. To certain
order of minds crime seems to present itself as a
son for the bestowment of attentions which not
given to the innocent, no matter how suffering
regulated by common Immediately invest the
criminal with glamour of and offer atten
tions which are almost invariably misconstrued 1t
is quite shock that such people have gone to the
extent OF trying to pander to the abnormal self
esteem and Self-approval OF the miserable murderer
of the President, and the country heartily approves
the action of the Auburn Warden in arresting their
misplaced attentions so that they are not bestowed
upon their unworthy object.
In another view of it such exhibitions of addle-
pated sympathy are extremely harmful II they al
fected only the people who indulge them and the in
tended recipient public feeling might stop at
pressions of disapproval and disgust. But they go
far beyond this They appeal to the perverted class
to which this assassin belongs. Every cne who is
like him takes such things as an expression of ap-
proval of the crime he committed and affirmation
of the principles that he attempted to promote by
murder. We do not hesitate to say that the thou
sands of maudn letter writer's and senders of dain-
ties to the assassin have done much thereby to
promote anarchy and murder as all of the open
anarchist propaganda put together. They deserve
exposure. Their names should be published as
proper punishment of their folly and to deter other
fools from repeating the exhibition.
We are aware that sentimentalists may accuse us
OF decrying the carrying of consolation the guilty,
who needs it the in proportion to the great
Tess of his guilt But we understand the plan and
teachings OF religion these 1eshy satsfactons not
listed among the ways that taken to minister to
that spiritual change which religion seeks to work in
the criminal and the guilty These ways may be used
without offense by these who minister them, and
without in any way encouraging in others the Grim
inal tendency which may inict further wrongs upon
society.
1t seems to US that the distinction should be plain
Ito healthy mind and that it is clear to a vast ma
jority of the American people is evidence that the
normal mind the sober mind prevails in this country
and makes up that wholesome public opinion which
condemns assassination and despises those who make