The gold leaf. [volume] (Henderson, N.C.) 1881-1911, 1908-11-12

IflioCdIIIoSC oi JoStlCc anu the
Natural Consequence Re-
senting Therefrom---Cheap-
ness Of Human Life and
Laxity Of the Law in Deal
ing With Those in High
Positions Of Responsibility
and Trust.
Charlotte Observer
Bank Wrpcker Charles W. Morse
has been convicted in New York CITY
by Il United States Circuit Court
grand Jury and sentenced to fifteen
! years imprisonment. He will hardly
escape altogether the punishment
due him for his frenzied banking.
As a general thing. the men who
commit important offences against
property in this country get their dues
with far grenter frequency than those
mot being negroes or absolutely
moneyless) who take human life. By
| comparison, though hardly other
| wise, the record is excellent. But the
fact remains that the same criminal
! favOring system Of technicalties and
! appeals, together with the same pub
| lie sentiment out OF which alone such
system can have developed. opera tes
scarcely less in one set OF cases than
in the other. With the exceptions
| parentheticallynOted, it is only petty
offences against either person or
property which are reasonably GER
tain Of punishment-these and the
various laws severely restrictive of
ordinary personal liberty. And can
dor cOmpelS us to say that this state
of affairs prevails in the South to a
very much greater degree than in any
| other part of the country. It's nat
ural and inevitable accOmpaniments
are lynching, night-riding, assertion
OF the right to murder for real or
| imaginary injuries, feudism, and
| other uncOnsciOuse expressions of con-
| tempt for laW-enfOrcement which
concerns itself mainly with small
| things. The blue law is greatest; The
law against murder is least. Like
| the scribes and Pharisees that were,
too many well-meaning people pay
tithe of mint, and anise, and cum
min, and have omitted the weightier
matters of the law, Judgment, mercy,
and faith" Those old-time scribes
and Pharisees laid a severe legal tyr
| amy upon the petty affairs and hab-
its of men, but conduct deeply and
| inherently concerned them scarcely
at all. Theirs were the characteristic
virtues and faults of the theOcratic
| ultra a-puritanism-the conception of
life which in this generation has taken
upon the South stronger hold by
far than it enjoys anywhere else in
the world. SO far as that concep-
ton tends to bring awinto contempt
it is having bad effect which can be
offset only by energetic insistence
upon those ''Weightier matters" in
creasingly disregarded through the
influence OF an emphasis misplaced.
The Morse case brings up for un-
favorable comparison the action of a
Jury in trying f. W. OVERLY, former
cashier of the Bank of Mecklenburg,
at BoydtOn, Va, on similar charges
OF bank wrecking. OVERLY had en-
beZzled, falsitied reports, and ended by
wrecking the bank to a finish. The
facts were undeniable and undenied;
OVERLY, indeed, pleaded guilty in
open court of the principal charge
against him. Here, as pointed out
by the State prosecuting attorney,
was man numbering among his vic
tins widows who, left to care for
young children and with small estates,
entrusted their money to his bank
and found themselves ruined; and
fathers who through long years of
patient toll and self-sacritice had ac-
cumulated some provision for wives
and children and who suddenly found
their savings swept quite away. If
those abusing positions of trust are
ever to be punished that the general
level of honesty and fidelity among
men in such positions may not fall
low, here was a case for punishment.
The facts stood out clearly and were
of an aggravated nature: the States
attorney did his duty; the Judge in
structed fairly and according to good
and sufficient law; the Jury was sol
emnlv sworn to return Il verdict ac-
cording to the evidence. limo respect
was the Judicial system at fault.
And yet the iury-doubtless the
same or nearly the same jury which
had without hesitation sent to penal
servitude number ofpetty offenders,
mainly for running up against what
the lawyers term "mala prohibita'
as distinguished from acts evil in
themselves and recognized accord
ingly wherever a human conscience
is awake-brought in q verdic of not
guilty. That jury exemplitied the
effects of one-sided agitation upon
body polite and social. 1t showed,
what intelligent observers have been
increasingly recognizing of late, that
the people are themselves responsible
for the great evil of unpunished crime.
Public sentiment, through a ferment
of agitated emphasis on things unes-
sential except from the standpoint OF
the man who honestly believes per-
sOnal liberty an evil to be done away
Will SJep ny Slep, ndS Soue "lollS'
We select this case for mention, not
because it is at all unusual, but
because something unusual took
place at its close. Judge Barksdale
(all honor to himD sternly rep
rimanded that Jury, as Judges of his
character have always been wont to
do where juries deserved reprimand:
True, juries represent the majesty OF
the people, but the people go wrong
at times, and the world would be a
wretched world to-day if there had
not always been men clear-signted
enough and brave enough to stand
up and tell them so. With all the
special disadvantages under which
public justice works in New York, it
is undoubtedly more efficient than in