The Montgomery advertiser., 1903-09-27

WHtCAA 0iS0 away as tu8 BeCOua uax Wo8 broken loose, and the awful promptness and seriousness of the business going for ward in the little brick house under its tin roof forced itself upon them. The four victims on that day were Har- ris A. Sniler. James J. Slocum. Joseph Wood and Sherbrick JugEio, Japanese, all convicted of murder in the first de- gree.
 Since then thirty-four men have sat in that chair. and in the condemned cells in room adjoining 1t seven prisoners un- der sentence now await its final offices. The opening day in its history has not been repeated with respect to the number of victims.
 On April g, 1sss, 1t had double task
 to perform, and again on July a, lsso. by killing on the first named date Lewis Hartman and Charles Pustolka and on the second Lewis Puiierson and Michael Mcdonald
 One of its victims was a woman. Martha Place, Brooklyn murderess. It has in every case done it's work well. There has been no serious nishap, and, in supplanting the gallows and the rope 1t has justified It's adoption and by the method of it's use deprived capital punish ment of some of its revolting features without weakening thereby the position held by those who oppose the death pen- atty upon other grounds.
 
 1891 were not, however, the first victims of the execution chamber. The horse was first sacrificed to test the machinery and to gather data upon which to base the voltage and Amperage neces- sary to kill a human being. They have the further distinction of be- ing the only subjects for whom any sort of plea of innocence could be made. They were old inmates of the prison, and had labored long on the farm SO that their | usefulness was nearly, If not quite. ex- hausted.
 Both were clain with less than 2,ooo | volts of electricity. the dynamo being re-
 enforced by other machines. wherefore | the standard voltage to slay man was fixed at 1,70O. which is the measure of the current applied ever since. Other tests. however. are applied before | each execution.
 | Although electricians profess to be able
 to measure their currents up to s7 or 9S
 per cent, the fact Is that under varying | untrustworthy and mysterious potentiali- l ties assert themselves. In an execution at Columbus, O., the | voltage was registered at 1,700 but when | the dead man was carried to the dfssect- | ing table it was found that a current of
 much higher power had been passed
 through him.
 | this State, the current is tested upon raw meat a short time before 1t Is applied to | human victim.
 | As soon as the meat has been taken off I the chair a new connection is made with a group of sixteen-candle-power incan- descent lamps which rests on board placed on the chair. The witnesses of an execution on entering the death cnamber | find these lamps lighted. | They testify that the big dynamo, sit uated across the prison grounds and dis 1 tant about 200 yards, Is all ready to do | its fatal work.
 | AS the condemned man enters the room | these test lights are turned om and whisked away. Tn twenty seconds he is | seated in his place and the current of electricity resumes its way, bringing dark l ness instead of light
 The legislation that provided for infiict- l ing the death penalty by electricity In
 this State was enacted in 1SSs 't. l A bill looking to that end had been be-
 fore the House at three previous sessions. Twice 1t had been lost in committee and
 once defeated on its second reading in
 the Senate, largely through the efforts of
 Senator, now Judge, John B. Smith of
 Madison County.
 But 1t was the day of the electric craze.
 Everything previously done by steam and
 gas was to be done by electricity. We | | by it, and so it's adaptation to the ex- treme penalty was inevitable. l The electrical promoters willingly lent their support, as the adoption of the method was in a sense an indorsement of | their assertions of the omnipotence Of the
 new energy as applied to all schemes, | commercial and social. | Notwithstanding their support by testi-
 mony of the feasibility of the scheme,
 however, the manufacturers of dynamos | and their necessary apparatus were loath
 to furnish the machinery. ] They based their disInclination upon the
 high grounds of conscientious scruplues at
 being a party even indirectly to taking
 human life, although 1t should be done | legally.
 | As a matter of fact, they were appre-
 hensive that their machinery would not
 do It's work decently. for although they
 were confident that 1t would infilct death they did not know what further 1t might
 do to the victim-perhaps rend him, or | reduce him to a cinder | After the first machinery was bought
 from the Westinghouse people the sellers by accident. they declared-shipped it
 away, in fact, to Europe, whence they, were later on required by order of the
 court. suit having been entered by the Superintendent of Prisons, to bring 1t and | make delivery. In recent years this com l electric supply companies compete sharply
 for the business of promoting the death dealing machinery required by the State. l The law as finally passed has much to | commend it. Executions by hanging were | conducted by the sheriffs of the counties
 and were deprived of their impressiveness l either by the bungling method with which
 they were performed or by being degraded
 into shows to gratify morbid curiosity. i They acted as a malign influence upon
 the public mind. As for electricity, 1t
 was urged that it was painless-afthough | this belief has no assurance except that 1 1t is certainly quick-that 1t was humane,
 could be operated decently and with the
 dignity that befitted the highest decree of
 human law.
 The bill that was finally passed in 1888, | however, was as imperative as if the en-
 acting clause had been left out, for 1t neg l lected to provide money for dynamos and other apparatus. the idea of the Legis-
 fature being. apparently. that 1t was only
 necessary to make a short circuit on q l telegraph or other wire and touch the vic- | tim with the loose end. | These conditions were finally corrected
 in 1889 and the law became operative on
 the first of that year.
 Stumped by Official Latin.