The Waterbury Democrat., 1935-12-31

law lOVlOg E18l&Ilu u8Vo . uUIuS of reporters waiting to interview the married family the minute 1t lands on the other side. If Colonel Lindbergh iInagineS he will escape publicity annoyances by. getting out of the United States he is in for bitter disillusionment. He has jumped from the frying pan into the fire for the worst of our tab- loids is 8 model of propriety conn pared with such rags as the LoE1- don Mail and Express.
 
 Remedies Galore
 The letter writers to the editors run the gamut of remedies for crime conditions which they say made the Lindbergh excursion an imperative necessity. One demands immediate stopping of immigra- tion: another insists on the de- portation of all aon-citizens who have dark eyes and 8 heavy beard; @ third exposes the root of the whole trouble in the existence of baseball teams among penitentiary prisoners. Most of them clamor for more stringent laws and 8 gem eral roundup of criminals, real or suspected. They all seem to be convinced that our American sys- tenn of law enforcement is esSen- tiaIly wrong which is altogether incorrect. The administration Of justice is not perfect in this coul- try any more than it is in any ether and the operation of our criminal courts leaves at times much to be desired. Leaving out altogether the question of the ill-
 nocence or guilt of the prisoner at the bar, and ignoring the strictly legal treatment of the case, the conduct of the Hauptmann trial was a far dirtier blot on our na- tional escutcheon than any num- Der of Lindbergh flights could possibly be. Instead of 8 court. room atmosphere consonant with the fact a human being was being tried for his life, thanks to scav- enger press, the world was in- vited to a circus side show. No- where in American newspaper history is to be found such an appalling exhibition of journalis- tic sadism. If the Lindbergh self-imposed banishment can bring about a real and permanent correction in American crime con- trol 1t will have placed the na- ton in debt. If 1t can destroy in 8 large section of the American press the present ideal of what constitutes news it will have per- formed 8 miracle. When the miracle comes to pass there will be no further need for individ- uals however prominent to fly the country to escape newspaper crucifixion. Neither will decent newsmen be obliged to apologize for their association with an iE1-. stitution committed to satisfying the public's lust for sensation. At the Top
 It seems to me that one basic weakness in our American sys- tenn of law enforcement is that it starts at the bottom instead of at the top. We catch and fry the minnows but the big fish es- cape both the net and the frying pan. There is an impregnable belief in the American public mind that 1t is impossible to con- vict a million dollars. In other words if the offender is important and rich enough he can avoid punishment. There is no room here to discuss the justification of that viewpoint. Sufficient to say that 1t exists and since it exists cannot but have an inc spring effect on those who are willing to take any sort of crim- inal chance in the hope of get- ting away with 1t because some- one else did the trick. Another fault in our attitude towards crime and criminals is that we are prone to consider nothing really criminal unless it is an set accompanied by physical violence, and that crime nourishes only in what we describe as the under world.
 In Point
 . The farce of the trials held as a result of the Teapot Dome ex- posures seem to me to have given an impetus to the contempt for law which is unpleasantly com mon. One man goes to prison for accepting bribe while the multi millionaire accused of giving 1t is found not guilty. Another multi-millionaire serves not day for his alleged part in the grab but does a short stretch in jail for contempt of court in hiring q private detective to shadow juryman. If judicial travesties such as those mentioned above did not contribute comfort and encouragement to the violently criminal classes nothing could.
 
 Fingerprints
 And if, gentle reader, you ever have the opportunity of visiting the Department of Justice build- ing in Washington you will enjoy more than an architectural treat. You will see millions of finger prints of persons who were til- volved in the noble pastime of bootlegging. But you will hunt without success for the prints of any of the gentry whose financ- ing made the bootlegging business possible and with 1t the subse- quent development into kidnap- ping and mass murder.