The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1904-10-12
LEGAL JUSTICE.

l.
form at least, could not exist Lik'
= every other great rule of organized
society, however. it has been often and
grossly perverted.
Every human being is entitled 20 9
fair and impartial trial. in the ordin-
airy course of justice, and this applies
> to both criminal and civil proceedings
The station of man in life, the in
huence he mas welded, the number OF
his friends. personal feelings in a COM
munity, all extraneous considerations,
are unknown quantities in courts that
are honestly and rightly conducted. In
the criminal law, every man accused
of crime is supposed to be innocent,
until that presumption has been over
come by proof of his guilt, beyond a
reasonable not a conjectural, nor hyp-
otheticaI. doubt. Good reputation also
is an element that, especially where
evidence is conflicting, but substan-
TALLY in all cases, enters into the is
sues under indictments that juries are
4 TeQulTeQ TO OGLeIfIiA4lc
These propositions will be fully con-
ceded, in a broad sense, by every
American citizen, who has a sound
| mind and has the benefit of a COM
mon school education. But, on the
other hand. while the rights of every
man should be rigidly protected and
~, fo-oe5 e,~x,1,,.x,,,,a,,+ ;- aecartio1 r.,
the conservation of society. commun-
tiles and nations, and proved crime
should be punished with reasonable
promptness and with absolute impair
TALLY. All great writer's and thinkers
on criminal Jurisprudence unite in the
declaration that the volume of crime
is reduced, not by the severity but by
the certainty of the vindication of out
ragged law and the infiction of an
adequate penalty.
In this and in the latter half of the
last century, justice has been often
warped and defeated, where money
was plentiful, by legal combinations,
of which brains, experience and de-
termination to force acouittals, were
The controlling elements. Notable illus2S>
trations Of this fact have been fur
nished by the artificial or manufae-
tured obstacles to convictions in pro-
secutions by the Federal Government.
through the Postoffice and Land De-
partments. designed to purify the
public service. Not less conspicuous
in the promotion of crime have been
frequent examples of the failure of
murder trials. The turbulent spirit that
incites communities to suppose that
they can protect themselves by i'm
itating the violence they seek to re-
press, is due to this cause
In cases OF homicide, the plea of in
sanity has been a favorite resort. 1t
is perfectly true that no person, actu-
ally insane at the moment of the COM
mission of an Illegal act, should be
punished, though perhaps it
is equally true that he should be Sc
Guided SO that a repetition of the act
nOQAO OCNOiiC LllpOSSlOlC' DOt. 1t -
not the plea ITSELF which is quite
legitimate. but the manner of its pres
entation, that offends the common
sense of mankind and disturbs the
operation of justice. This defence
greatly enlarges the scope of the evil
dence and enables many facts irrelev-
ant to the main issue, and only re-
motely tending to establish the exist
ence of insanity, to be introduced into
the record. The effect of this latitude
is confusing, when the skill of the adj
vocate is brought to bear upon the
testimony. The varying definitions of
what constitutes the insanity that will
relieve defendant from penal conse-
quences are also seriously misleading.
There is an apparently irreconcilable
conflict on this point between alienists
and jurists. Scientific alienists. like
Msudsley, claim that there is such a
thing as irresistible impulse or mo-
mentary insanity Immediately pre-
ceded and Immediately followed by
mental soundness. Obviously such a
doctrine would empty the prisons and ]
leave the sailows to decay. The jurists,
have sought for a more prac-
teal test, and, in California and in !
other States, it has been settled that
the test of responsibility or irresponsi-
biiity shall be the capacity or the in
capacity of a person who commits an
act that. in a sane person, would be '
punished as crime, to distinguish v
between right and wrong. This defini-
ton also is dangerous. for it is easy .
to simulate insanity in correspondence :.
with that criterion. te
The greatest obstruction to equal and
exact justice, in this connection. is the +
Hypothetical question. which is vir- t
,ral1. l.