The Brunswick news. [volume] (Brunswick, Ga.) 1906-2016, 1922-06-08
THE ONE WOMAN.

Cora Lou Vinson in the Fulton Su-
perior court to hang for the alleged
murder of her husband, John T. Boif-
outlet, in his column in the Macon
News gives an interesting account of
the execution of Mrs. Susan Eber-
hart, in 1878, more than half a century
ago; the only legal execution of a
white woman in Georgia.
According to the story, as recited
by Mr.. Boifeuillet, Enoch Spann and
Susan Eberhart, on the night Of May
4, 1872, at Spann's house, in Webster
county, killed Spann's wife in order
that they might marry each other. At
a special term of the Webster super
Tor court, Judge James M. Clark, pre-
siding, in the year and month of the
crime, the man and woman were con-
victed and sentenced to hang.
The motion for a new trial was over
ruled by Judge Clark, and Susan Eb-
erhart, by her attorneys, Willis A,
Hawkins and Thomas H. Pickett, ap-
pealed her case to the Supreme Court.
The State was represented by Solic-
itor General Charles F. Crisp, after
ward Speaker of the National House
of Representatives, and Charles T.
Goode. At the January term eighteen
hundred and seventy-three QS73), of
the Supreme Court. Hiram Warner,
Chief Justice. the Judgment of the
Webster Superior Court was affirm
ed, Associate Justice Henry Kent
McCay rendered the decision.
The concluding paragraph of the
Courts opinion, in refusing new
trial for Susan Eberhart, was as fol-
lows:
1T gives us great pain to be com
PEELED by our sense of duty to the
law and to the public, to affirm this
Judgment. We have, however, no SYM
pathy with that sickly sentimentality
that springs into action whenever a
II Aillillal 10 otIf lCiSlu dDOul W SullcI
for crime. 1t may be sign of a ten
der heart, but it is also a sign of one
not under proper regulation. Society
demands that crime shall be punished
and criminals warned and the false
humanity that starts, and shudders
when the axe of justice is ready to
strike, is dangerous element for the
peace, of society We Lave had too
much of this mercy. 1t is not true
mercy. 1t only looks to the criminal.
but we must insist upon mercy to So
ciety, upon justice to the poor woman
whose blood cries out against her MUIR
derers That criminals go unpublished
is disgrace to our civilization and we
have reaped the fruits of it in the fire.
quency with which bloody deeds oc
cur. A stern, unbending, unfiinching
administration of the penal laws. with
out regard to position or sex, as it is
the highest mark of civilization, is
also the surest mode to prevent the
commission of offenses"
In this connection it may be safely
assumed that similar fate will not
be met by Mrs. Vinson. If the motion
for a new trial is overruled in thu Full
ton superior court, her attorneys have
recourse to appeal to the supreme
court of Georgia and the highest court
in the land at Washington. In the
event the last named court is resorted
to the healing influence of time will
have gotten in its work, and the re
suit is easily surmised
1t is a very rare occurrence that a
man is hanged in Georgia, and GER
tainly there is far less probability of
woman paying the extreme penalty
not in Georgia. Mrs. Vinson is not
the least agitated over the sentence
that is now hanging over her. She
knows that it will never be carried
out. But being woman should not
make the Atlanta murderess immune
from the gallows. Don't women clam
or for equal suffrage with the male
of the specie?