Oxford Democrat. [volume] (Paris, Me.) 1833-1933, 1907-11-12
The Crime of Murder
APPEARS TO BE RAPIDLY BECOMING
OBSOLETE IN THIS COUNTRY.
(Indianapolis News.)

indianapolis News)
We seem to be fast approaching a time
when we shall have to consider whether
it is possible in this country for man
to commit murder. A few days ago two
men we're acquitted by Virginia jury,
though they had deliberately and know
ingly killed, they having acted-so 1t ap-
pears-under the "higher law" A lit
tie later man charged with murder,
and proved to have killed, was acquitted
by a Missouri jury, the unwritten law
again having been invoked.
In Indianapolis, not long ago, another
killer was freed, his plea having been
that he was insane at the time of his
action. 1t is said that the woman In
Chicago who, q few weeks ago, killed
the man with whom she was in love,
will plead insanity. In Nebraska, Frank
Brink, who killed his sweetheart, was
found to be insane by commission of
experts. Thereupon the judge instruct
ed the jury, which brought in verdict
of not guilty. The plea of insanity has
been interposed in behalf of 15-year-old
girl who murdered the baby which she
had been hired to nurse. From Ohio
we get the story of another "brain-
storm" One man simply killed another
in the old-fashioned way, but his friends
aud lawyers insist that he was the VIC
tim of brainstorm, and was suffering
from dementia at the time of the shoot
ing. Finally, we have from Maryland
the interesting story of the acquittal OF
woman who killed her sister "beeause
she was always running after my hus-
band" The theory in this case seems to
have been that the slayer did not even
know what she was doing.
Here are nine cases of killing in which
the slayers were either acquitted or
stand good chance of being acquitted
when brought to trial. And yet in
every one of them killing was done.
And, no doubt, in every one of them the
killer knew what he was about. So we
think that people may well inquire
whether murder is not an obsolete crime
in the United States. And yet to say
that lack of self-control-which is about
all that a brainstorm amounts to-is
such insanity as to be sufficient defense
| is to put premium on violence OF all
kinds. 1t is the business of men to con-
troll themselves, the law expects and de-
mands it of them.
Men who by lawless and disgraceful
courses of living have weakened their
intellectual and moral natures should
not be allowed to plead the weakness
which they themselves have created by
their own vicious habits. Nor should
any more tenderness be shown to those
who by indulgence in unrestrained pas
sion and anger have dethroned their
will. To accept such pleas is to say to
men and women that the law does not
demand that they control themselves;
that there is no legal obligation on them
to do so. Yet at such time as this
men are preaching the doctrine of human
responsibility, denying that the state
has any right to punish for crime, and
are waging war on the social order which
is the growth of ages and which must be
maintained if we are to escape relapse
into barbarism. 1t is time to think rath-
or of the insulted law, the outraged
social order, and the imperiled peace and
safety of American communities,
than of the lawless, the vicious and de-
generate who are at war with all good
and helpful forces.