Sequachee Valley news. (Sequachee [Sequatchie], Tenn.) 1896-1952, 1915-01-07
CAPITAL PUNISH
MENT OUR DEBT
TO CIVILIZATION
By W. NJ. CONNOLLY.

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Most men are prompt and pune
tilous in the payment of their debts,
which they look upon, one and all, as
debts of houor They also pay with
a little less promptitude the debts
which they owe to society. They
will take time to go to the polls and
vote, they will serve on juries, they
will fill public offices or perform any
other duty that citizenship imposes
upon them. Probably because of its
larger aspect, they do not pay the
debts which they owe to their own
asthetic development, or what we may
cal civilization, Conspicuously are
they delinquent and mendicant in
those finer graces and sentiments
which are in constant protest against
cruelty, and which are ignored and
trampled under foot in the taking of
life, under our barbarous practice of
capital punishment. This savage Gus
tom is unwise, I'M Christianlike and
unnecessary, and is at war with what
we have done in other ways. With
pride and qualification we can look
about us and see that our unselfish
labors in other directions are wholly
away from and opposed to the idea of
malevolence. We have cheerfully
taxed ourselves to build and maintain
splendid and commodious institutions,
where the hungry are fed, where the
naked are clothed, where the suffer
ing are assuaged, where ailing are
medicined back to health and we try
by the skill of our scientist to make
the blind see the lame walk, the deaf
hear and even the mentally oblique
sane and sound. Here we find all
sympathy and conservation, with no
suggestion of vengeance. of punish
ment or extirpation. We but follow
in his steps. A manhood gave His
life for men, and there are many God
like men who are willing to do, to
suffer and even to die for others
There are Gethsemanes, Calvaries and
crucitixions in our day. where men
give up life for their fellow men, and
and yet they tolerate the taking of
human life, which is the most valuable
and precious asset of civilization,
merely because King Custom hath
wllled it so and lowered US with it
as a common heritage. We are con.
'tantly agitating and instltuting pris-
IN reform, and have gone so far in
some places as to do away with the
cruelty of separate cells and solitary
confinement. Except 10 extreme and
Unavoidable cases, we have gravitat-
ID far away the darkness, the dudgeon
md the gives, chains and manacles
# former times. The tendency is to
1--WE to prisoners during their incar.
'eration cheerful surroundings and
he benefits and pleasures of com
nunity life. We are getting away
rom the idea of punishment and are
ubstitutng education and reform and
haracter building. The unfortunate
gastrel who was left incomplete and
Inefficient and without inherent force
o resist temptation or triumph over |
diversity, we strive to strengthen
nd make fit, while we ruthlessly {
waste, destroy and extirpate those
pom whom the law pronounces capt. {
ii sentence, instances of which un-
er our advancing civilization are !
,ercifully few. And in these few
Instances, the enlightened and subli- !
rated consciences of courts and ju-
es are in protest and refuse to car !
? out the law. They cannot resist 9
he wall that comes to them from the !
risoner Of Reading Gaol:
But this / know, that every Law
That men have made for Man, I
Ince FIRST Man took his brothers life,
And this sad world began, Il
ut straws the wheat and saves the
sts' chat
With . most evil fam"