The Manning times. [volume] (Manning, Clarendon County, S.C.) 1884-current, 1912-01-03
HITS Us VERY HARD
TURNING OF CRIMINALS LOOSE is
DOING Us HARM.

UClNN po HAHN.
Governor Blease's Wholesale Pardon
ing of Conricts Commented on by
Richmond Paper.
The Richmond, Va, Times-Dispatch
says Gov. Blease Of South Carolina,
celebrated Christmas by pardoning 80
prisoners, establishing a record for
setting lawbreakers at liberty. Elev-
en- Of these prisoners were life prison
ers. Nine were convicted murderers.
One was convicted on the charge Of
burglary and larceny, another on a
charge of arson. Seven were convict
ed on a charge Of nanslaughter, the
sentences ranging from five to twen-
ty-six years.
Samuel Roe was among those par
doned He killed his wife as she lay
sleeping in her bed at home A jury
of his peers said that he should spend
his life in the penitentiary-a SEN
tence none too light-but Blease, in
the heavy rule Of the chief pardoner;;
wills that this man shall go free and
wander about the community, a living
monument to the kindness and po-
liteness shown to wife-murderer il
South Carolina.
Murderers, burglars, incendiaries,
thieves, gunner, drunkards and Sec
ond-story men have been loosed by
Blease to inspire the people of the
State with respect for justice and
order and to encourage them to up
hold the law of the land. Convicted
criminals go back to their communi-
ties to laugh in the faces Of just
judges and conscientious jurymen,
and, incidentally TO vote for Blease.
That was what the governor of the
State of South Carolina did as a
Christmas gift to criminals. IL strik-
ing and significant contrast stands
out the refusal Of Gov. Mann Of this
commonwealth, to pardon any con-
vict on Christmas day. This is a
law-abiding State, wherein the people
believe in the law and choose magis-
trates who will exercise their authori-
ty on the side of justice.
Gov. Blease thinks that il Is the
function of the chief executive to re-
hear and retry cases; Gov. Mann does
not. Extreme Ill health is practically
the only consideration which now
moves Gov. Mann freely to pardon a
man who shot his wife as she lay in
her bed; Gov. Mann refuses to par
don wife-murderers
There is vast chasm between the
/ law as it is administered in South
Carolina and the law as 1t is admin:
istered in Virginia. Judges and ju-
ries here are swifter and more severe
than they are in South Carolina, and
the chief executive Of Virginia. would
never dream of freeing convicts
wholesale as this man Blease has
done.
In South Carolina, criminals OF
whose hands the damned spot" viii
not out, walk abroad with proud car.
riage;' in Virginia, they die in the
chair or spend their lives in cells. In
South Carolina, the pardoning power
is used in such way tnat it is moi
exemplary; in Virginia, it is. Crime
is encouraged in South Carolina Wne1
almost every day Infamous laWbreak
ers are freed, while in Virginia the
minimum use of executive clemen,
cy is a wholesale deterrent to would
be criminals.
| In the final analysis, people alone
are responsible for the administrator
of Justice. The law-abiding people
Of Virginia would not and could MOI
elect a, man to the governors chair
who would abuse the pardoning pow
er, but the people OF South Carolina
are not so careful as, to their choice
Once in South Carolina the law was
a thing sacred-but the times have
Ichanged and the governors Witt
them. The administration OF justice
in South Carolina is a shame ano
reproach upon the South and the
nation, but whether the people o.
that ancient State will destroy TINS
lever-aowing cornucopia Of pardons DJ
their votes next summer seems
doubtful thing.
Justice is swift and terrible IN Vlr'
ginia, and the law is a luminous, llV'
ling thing. It is so, because Vlr'
ginians are a law-abiding and law
fearing people, and because they VII
elect none but hign and honorable
linen as their magistrate. There was
Ia DAY when the righteous were IL
authority in South Carolina, and 1ol
a return Of that era its people may
well and fervently pray.
|