death penalty is too severe even for the crime of
murder. It is largely due to this that murder
trials are constantly becoming more tedious and
less certain to result in the conviction of the
guilty.
But the most serious effect of capital punish
ment is seen in the destruction of the sanctity of
human life, that it should be the duty and purpose
of the State to inculcate and encourage. I be
lieve that among the criminal classes, the thought,
often brought home to them, that human life is of
so little value that organized society can anni
hilate it with so little compunction and apparent
ly without any appreciable apprehension of its
sanctity and inviolability, has a greater tendency
to promote murders and kindred crimes, than fear
of the death penalty can have to restrain from the
same crimes. Mr. Buckley recognizes this fact
when he says: “It is affirmed that the taking of
human life, even by judicial processes after clear
conviction, diminishes- its sacredness and thus
leads to murder. This is an argument against
public executions, nothing more. The conduct
of criminals, the gushing sentimentality with which
they are treated, the crowding of towns with spec
tators of both sexes and all ages, the minuteness
with which the sickening particulars of the pri
soner’s conduct before the execution and upon
the scaffold are published, the publicity given to
his last words, the maudlin devotion of some
women to almost every murderer, and the effemin
ate conduct of most ministers who are brought be
fore the public as spiritual advisers of the con
demned, form a combination of depraving elements,
whose natural tendency is to promote crime. That
the solemn infliction of capital punishment apart
from such scenic accessories would diminish the
sacredness of human life, or lead indirectly to
murdier, is but a gratuitous assumption. ’ ’
To the last remark it is enough to reply that it
is “a gratuitous assumption” that such execution
as the writer favors can be provided; for even
where the hanging can be made private, there is
no lack of sensational newspaper notices, upon
THE FREE LANCE.
which, at present, the majority of people are regal
ed J and the horrors and evil results gain, if any
thing, by the transference to paper through the
vivid imaginations of modern reporters. How
perfectly impossible it is to prevent sensational
publicity of the details (or assumed details, which
are just as demoralizing) may be seen from the ac
counts of the executions by electricity at Auburn
and Sing r Sing, where the law of the State en
forced the utmost privacy and positively prohibit
ed newspaper reports beyond the statement of the
fact that the sentence had been carried out. And
yet lengthy reports of all the horrible details ap
peared in all the large dailies and circulated every
where ; and whether true or false, their pernicious
and demoralizing effects were the same. As far
back as 1844, the Rev. Chas. Spear said of the de
mand for more private executions: “Those who
urge this do in' fact give up the whole ground that
capital punishments do good as an example. If
such spectacles are calculated to strike the mind
favorably or to have a moral influence, why not
have them in the squares of our crowded cities ?
Why not congregate the whole coummunity to
witness the scene? The true answer is that it
tends to harden and brutalize the hearts of men.”
One would expect to find that Robespierre,
the man of blood of the French Revolution, who
caused so many heads to fall for political reasons,
was at least not opposed to capital punishment for
the worst criminal offenses; yet he once resigned
a judgeship to avoid passing the sentence of death
and delivered a speech in which occurred these re
markable words : “The laws should always pre
sent to the people the most perfect model of jus
tice and reason. If in the place of that powerful
severity, of that calm moderation which ought to
characterize them, they substitute anger and ven
geance ; if they cause to flow human blood which
they might spare, and which they have not the
right to shed; if they display before the eyes of
the people scenes of cruelty and corpses murdered
by tortures, they then corrupt in the heart of the
citizen the ideas of the just and unjust ; they cause