Evening star., 1928-12-27

| ton in his city, which wants to return
to legalized wine and beer and other
foods of temperance" alleges, in an
adjoining column, that other parts OF
America are even drunken now than Is
| New York-but, Dr. Butler adds:
"The cure for lawlessneSs is not to
pass more laws, still less to inflict more
| rigid, more severe and more cruel pun
ishments for law violation These can
only be more or less futile and aggra .
waiting eXpedients. The true cure is,
| first, not to enact or promulgate laws
| which the general will does not, or will
not. accept, and then to train that gen.
eral will to a habit of intelligent self
discipline which will make 1t law-abid-
ing and law-conforming when 1t ac-
cepts laws, as just and right"
That Is exactly what the anarchists
are teaching. Anarchy would abolish
enforcement of law, except by the in
dividual acceptance of whatever suits
him.
In a republic, no laws remain on the
statute books unless approved by the
| general will" Legislators who fail to
discover that truiSm are quickly de-
feated for reelection. The will of the
voters is interpreted in the act of their
Sentative-otherwise he ceases to
be representative of the public.
Every attempt to demonstrate that
DR.. Buffers particular bette noir-the
Volstead law-does not express the will
of the people, is rebuked by an in
creased and uncontradictable reasser-
ton by popular vote-as witness the re-
cent national election, in which Gov.
Smith made 1t the outstanding issue.
That law may be "a ass judging from
what it DAD to the governor, but it re-
mains the reiterated will of the people.
1t may bray, but it Is not effectually
"brayed in a mortar" Of scholastic de-
nunciation.
DR.. Buffers main argument for light
ening the penalties of laws Is borne out,
in recent centuries, by the general trend
of enlightened governments.
1t Is today'S condition-not theory
alone. Today, there are no shameful
gratingS behind which languish prison.
ers for debt, exhibited to the public
gaze and In gross humiliation of the
victim. Men are not tortured with
thumbScreWs and racks to force teSti-
mony or confession. Men are innocent
until proved guilty" and are protected
in their rights. Men are not hanged for
stealing sheep, with which to feed
a starving family. Men are not put in
stocks and held in agony while hoo
dlums mock Mems ears are not cut
off for trivial offenses against the noble,
nor tongues slashed for alleged perjury.
Woman victims of SANDER or spite
are not tied to ducking stools, nor are
they hanged or burned as witches.
On the contrary, how are our Grim
inals in jail pampered with modern
mercy and satiated with maudlin SYM
pathy of sentimentaliStSl How few are
punished at all, while their crimes in
crease and multiply and damn the
earth, until this most enlightened, most
charitable, most progressive and prosper
Gus nation in all history Is the great
est shelter of crime in all civilization.
We have more violence and murders
and kidnapping in one city of the United
States than in all of the British Isles.
Except Soviet Russia, America holds
human life more cheaply than does any
other nation of civilized people.
DR.. Buffers own State may have
found the answer in its Baumes law,
which makes obligatory life sentence
for the habitual criminal-upon his
fourth conviction of felony-but, after
scoffing at severe laws against crime,
he declares that "it would be inappropri-
ate to discuess" in his annual report of
his great institution, which is to re
state laws" what should be substituted
fro punitive or reformatory or exem-
plary treatment Of outlaws. Penologists
would have been glad to have had
constructive criticism from the great
| institution of learning.
tCopyright. 1923. by Paul Y. Collins.l