The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1910-01-17
Killing on Criminals.


his past may have been checkered, his
future is still unspotted. was entitled
| to full faith and credit. But Justice
Amidon, of the United States district
court for North Dakota, would have
! cut him off untimely. Justice Amidon
| of criminals and the insane.
This is not scientific solution. Saw
ages sometimes dispose of the aged.
| weak, and criminal unfortunates
among their members by simply kill
| ing them off. But as civilization adj
vances. the death penalties become
fewer. England of the eighteenth
century boasted $50 offenses punish
able by death; they are now reduced
to four. while the advocates of ahol-
ishing the death penalty wax stronger.
This steady and progressive elimin-
alton of capital offenses is of kind
with the earlier abandonment by So
ciety of the fashion of killing the sick
and the aged. Remedial and preven-
tive measures multiply, more power
full in their influence than deterrent
example, and give promise of benefit
even to the most desperate cases. In
the case of the insane, the alienists
are finding that it is not always here
dity that operates; that toxins in the
blood may produce symptoms of in
sanity once thought incurable, but
which disappear by proper hygienic
and medical treatment. So much is
being learned about mental diseases,
that it is unsafe to say that death is
the only remedy. Not much, it is
true, can be done to reform hardened
criminals. But they have been made
so largely by the outrageous conditions
still existing in most of the jails and
prisons of the country. and when these
are remedied and the influences of
probation and reform shall have eff
fective opportunity, the problem of
the hardened criminal may itself die
by prevention.-New York Times.
Receivers Work Undone.
Southbound traffic in Third avenue
was retarded and almost blocked in the
height Of the rush hour last evening by
a horse which does not understand pro-
fame English as it is spoken by in0ig-
nant motormen. Since Frederick w.
Whitridge became receiver for the
Third Avenue road he has been work
ing for the moral uplift of his men.
First he tried to teach them to be po-
lite. Then he posted Thou Shalt Not
SteaP' signs as an admonition to con-
ductors and the public 1t was not eff
fective with the conductors, and he in
stalled cash fare boxes.
From conductors Whitridge turned
attention to the motormen. He noticed
that under certain conditions they
would swear, and he issued an order
Thou shalt not swear Then this
SoulupOuIQ IOTSe, at the HedQ or a line
of creeping southbound cars. undid all
Whitridge's moral uplift work. Each
car was manned by motorman who
was saying things which would have
burst the drums of Whitridge's ears if
he could have heard them
Get off the track, You blankety blank
blank!' the motornan of the head car
yelled from Eighty-first street to
Seventeenth street. The rig ahead crept
along and paid no heed. Passengers
were as angry as the motorman. Fin
ally the motorman saw Patrolman
Twomey.
Arrest the man in that wagonr' he
shouted. He's been holding us up Is
bIocks!'
Twoiney yelled to the driver to stop.
His order was ignored. That made the
policeman mad. He leaped to the front
of the wagon and looked in. There was
no driver. The horse alone had held up
traffic. Somewhere up the avenue the
driver was running about frantically
looking for his rig, and every one down
the avenue was laughing at Whitridge's
men and the policeman.-New York
Press.