The Salt Lake tribune. [volume] (Salt Lake City, Utah) 1890-current, 1911-05-29
FREAK COURT JUDGMENTS

Freak findings delivered by Judges
from the bench are exempli6ed not
alone in the case where Judge Lands
fined the Standard Oil Compand 500,
100000, by means of detsching items
in bills of ladjng. The courts afford in
stances from time to time that will H.
| lustrate the vagaries Of the human
mind, even when the possessor of that
mind occupies such station as would
naturally require levelheadedness at all
times. But this leveheade dedness is sad
| ly wanting on occasion.
A judge in Chicago was recently re.
ported as sentencing a young man to
| service In the U. S. Navy. A remon-
STRANGE was promptly made by officers
of the navy, who very Justly claimed
| that the navy was not penal institu.
ton, nor was the presence of criminals
therein desired. OF course, there was
no law for any such sentence as that,
nor did the judge have the slightest au-
thorlty for passing such sentence.
Another freak sentence is thus re-
ported and commented upon by the Bos.
ton Traveller, under the headline, "Sen-
fenced to an Honest Life"
man of twenty one embezzed $4,000
from theatcr in Los Angeles and spent
1t in flying high He confessed in
court. The Judge might have put him In
prison FOR the period covering the flower
of his manhood. Instead, the court pro-
nounced this sentence:
You shall stay at home nights You
shall remain within the limits of this
county. You shall not play billiards or
ing liquor. and you shall go Immediately
10 work and keep at it until you have
paid back every dollar you stole. Vio-
late these terms. and you go to prison"
Was not that sentence just, wise and
humane? Was ii not equally so to those
who had suffered by the crime. to society
in general, and TO the young man HIM
Did not Judge Mccormick in dealing
with the case in this way. raise a big
question-the question whether, after all
men cannot be reformed out OF prison
better than In it?
Is 1t not sometimes better TO sentence
a man To honesty and usefulness than
TO term behind the bars. and everlast-
Ing disgrace?
Now il is doubtless true that the
Judge bad the most benevolent inten-
tions, ard it is possible, though hardly
probable, that his freak sentence,
though wholly un.justifed by law and
imperative as a matter Of fact, might
possibly redeem this young man It is
altogether more likely. however. that
as soon as the young fellow departed
from the court room he made haste TO
get out Of the jurisdiction of the court,
so that he could live his life in his own
way, irrespective Of that sentence, For
he. would recognize at once that it was
no sentence at all, and that the court
had neither authority to deliver it nor
power TO enforce it.
More recently a Georgia Judge is re-
ported TO have sentenced n man to kiss
his wife at least once a day. The rec
ord in that case should carry por.
trait Of the wife. so that he who reads
could form some idea Of the severity of
the sentence.
Sentences like these discrcdit the
whole judiciary, and add to the grow
ing discomfort of the people with the
procedure i'll our courts, which is so
universally dilatory. unsatisfactory. aud
annoy ihs in its uncertainty and incon-