Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1906-02-05
AGAINST THE LASH
Argument of Opponents of the
Whipping Post.
NOT NEEDED IN DISTRICT
It is Emphatically Rejected as Barba-
rous and Dangerous.
AN INVITATION TO CRIME
Better and More Christian Methods Of
Dealing With Wife


ton to establish in the District of Columbia
whirging post for the punishment OF
wife-beaters. recommendation to that
enect had appeared in the annual message
OF the President submitted in December.
and in accordance with that suggestion
Representative Adams of Pennsylvania had
prepared and introduced a bill which was
referred to the District committee of the
House. While resting there the measure
was debated on all sides, by cIergymen, So
biologists, officials and all classes of ctti.
zens. The Star printed many columns OF
matter to give public expression to these
views and itself undertook to show the
failacy and the danger of the whipping
post theory OF punishment for this afro
elous offense. The bill was not reported
to the House
Although the President did not renew
ms recommendation in the annual message
OF last December 1t is understood that he
mas not changed his view on the subject
ana Representative Adams has retntroduced
ms Dill and has secured from the House
District committee vote favorable tn It's
report 10 the House. where it viii probably
be considered next Monday when the DIS
tricts business will be brought before that
BODY Thus the subject becomes again or
Importance, and it Is necessary to review
ago TO indicate the reasons why this COM
munity objects 20 being selected for the re-
estaclshment OF a mode of punishment
WMch has for many decades fallen into
dlsGSe in all civilized countries
Opponents of the Lash.
Inc discussion of year ago adduced
brought forward a few defenders Of tho
whipping post. The word defenders is used
advisedly. for all who came forward tn ao
Vocate the lash for wIie-beaters were forced
10 acknowledge that the proposition sa
vored of reaction and retrogresston ana
Llaihed tIelr arguments accordingly But
hotWltAsta nding the official prominence mr.
some or these believers In the lash tina
evidence was overwhelming that the ereat
weight or public sentiment Law against n
l ne negative side of the debate was AMY
s uS'aiieu py many individuals, who set
loFth thelr view In interviews and letters
ana other forms of public expression Sey-
eiai OF the clersymen of Washington took
the Adams bill as text for sermons ann-
a. a. ieast one of these pulpit utterances.
that OF Rev. DR.. Bristol of the NefronoII-
tan NJ. e. Church, exerted a powerful in
huence upon the mind of the District.
Or. Bristol put the objections To tbs
lasn upon the ground that 1t was mn
christian and demoralizing and reyar-
sion to the barbarous methods of crnda
cIuel age He deplored the Suggestion
mat such reversion to primitive MN
ishments should be regarded as necessary
In so highly cultivated community %
the capital of the United States. Another
effectiVe opponent of the lash was Mr.
Charies f. Weller. secretary of the Assoc
Grated Charities, who spoke with the au-
thor1ty OF one who has spent years in a
close study Of the class within which Wife
beating and kindred crimes are most prev
alent Mr.. Weller denounced the lash as
an invitation to graVer crimes and as a
mistaken method of correction a confess
sion OF weakness and incapacity to cone
with the ills of the social organization
proposition that the civilized method of
dealing with wffe-beaters is through per-
sistent moral teaching. Still another emf
nent opponent of the Adams bill was Mr..
Samuel Gompers, president of the Ameri-
can Federation of Labor, representing a
great army of citizens and qualified by
his official status to discuss authorita-
lively the alternative remedies proposed
as means OF coping with the evil of wife
beating. Mr.. Gompers urged that far bet
ter than the whipping OF brutal husbands
would be a system of Imprisonment at
remunerative labor, the proceeds to go
toward the support of the family during
the enforced absence of the husband and
father.
Thus not only was the proposition of
the whipping post rejected by intelligent
commentators, from the religious socio-
logical and practical points of view, but
rational substitute was offered. The
evil OF Wife-beating was recognized and
admitted although there was a disposition
on all sides to resent the imputation that
the District Of Columbia is sufficiently de-
moralized, in that it furnishes an excep-
tional degree of marital brutality, to war
rant its selection out of all the American
communities for the restoration of a mode
of punishment which civilization has long
ago abandoned as mistaken, barbarous and
ineffective.