Court Opinion

ID: 9841771
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-22 20:05:19.615027+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:04:43.683575
License: Public Domain

Me. Justice Beewee
(with whom concurred Me. Justice Beadlet) dissenting.
I dissent from the opinion and .judgment as above declared. The substantial punishment imposed by each statute is death by hanging. The differences between the two, as to the manner in which this sentence of death shall be carried into execution, are trifling. What are they f By the old law, execution must be within twenty-five days from the day of sentence. By the new, within twenty-eight days. By the old, confipe*176ment prior to execution was in the county jail. By the new, in the penitentiary. By the old, the sheriff was the hangman. By the new, the warden. .Under the.old, no one had a right of access to the condemned except his counsel, though the sheriff might, in his discretion, permit any one to see him. By the new, his attendants, counsel, physician, spiritual adviser and members of his family have a right of access, and no one else is permitted to see him. Under the old, his confinement might be absolutely solitary, at the discretion of the sheriff, with but a single interruption. Under the new, access is given to .him as a matter of right, to all- who ought to be permitted to! see him. True, access is subject to prison regulations; so, in the jail, the single authorized access of counsel was subject to jail regulations. ■ It is not to be assumed that either regulations would be unreasonable, of operate to prevent access at any proper time. Surely, when all who ought to see the condemned have a right of access, subject to ■ the regulations of the prison, it seenas a misnomer to call this' “solitary confinement,” in the harsh sense in which this phrase is sometimes used. All that is meant is, that a condemned murderer shall not be permitted to hold anything like a public reception-; and that a gaping crowd shall be excluded from his presence.' Again, by the old law, the sheriff fixes the hour within a prescribed day. By the- new, the warden fixes the hour and day within a named week. And these are all the differences which-' the court can find between the two statutes, worthy of mention.
■ Was- there ever a -case in which the,, maxim, “ De mmirms .non curat'lex" had more just and wholesome application? Yet, on account of these differences, a convicted-murderer is to escape the death he deserves' and be turned loose on society.
I' am authorized to' say that. Me. Justice Beadley concurs "in this disseAt.