The Montgomery advertiser., 1905-02-25
A nRIaHT rnoposrrror.

Mayor Mcclellan of New York has hit on the boss scheme for making New York . model city and ridding 1t of ali it's criminals. According to the newspapers ''he announced his purpose some time ago. The method is to arr rest them and transport them to places outside the city limits One of the saying that he will send all such per- sons brought before him out of the city on trains having no stop within fifty miles, and that he had already shipped ofY several criminals. detectives accom- panying them to the stations to make sure of their departure"
 This. we repeat, Is a bright idea, but like many other brilliant schemes 1t has it's drawbacks, among the most prominent of which is the fact that communities outside of New York may not take kindly to the proposition. Suppose. for example. the Mayor and other ofieials should send all their smallpox cases out to other communi- ties-would 1t not cause Q lively con- dition of affairs Yet in some respects it would be much less unjust to others than sending them it's criminals would be, and would do less harm. If the plan is carried out some of the crimi- nais will land in Connecticut, many :n New Jersey. some will siop over into Pennsylvania, and If the conductors arc not careful some of them will be dumped oft in Delaware and Massachm- setts.
 Is it to be supposed that any of these States will quietly submit to be- ing turned into Botany Bay for the accommodation of New Yorks over plus Of criminality? We hardly think so, and have no doubt but that the au- thorities of such proposed dumping grounds will take such steps as will effectually prevent the unloading of cargoes of criminals on them. Then the railroads will be in trouble. for if these hard eases are loaded on the trains and the conductors are not al- lowed to put them off some of them will get lot of free riding.
 But there Is another feature of the matter that Is not without force, as we see it. Suppose, for example, a bunch of criminals is put off at some town in New Jersey and the authori- ties of that town arrest them and send them back to New York-then what? A criminal in that case would be play ing a sort of shuttlecock game, and we don't know where he would land in the end.
 Then, again, if one of these New York specimens who is put off in an- other State commits some horrible crime in his new home would not New York be liable, and subject to a dam age suit? As The Boston Herald says. there ought to be a law making the city of New York liable in exemplary damages for any crime committed by g. person sent out of that city to another city from which he did not come. |" That is about the size of 1t, and we fail to see how a proposition like that of New York's Mayor can be justified. We have known instances where the Gov ernor of a State pardons a prisoner on condition that he leaves the State and never returns. Such a shifting of re- sponsibility. may be legally right but we doubt that 1t Is morally right, but it Is on the same theory that MT. Me- Clellan proposes to act. We predict that he'll make failure of It. Every city and statS should deal with its own criminals and not dump them cn other places which probably have enough of their own.