THE PUNITIVE LASH.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIV, Issue 237, 7 October 1933, Page 7 (Supplement)

THE PUNITIVE LASH.

WHERE STILL PERMITTED,

FLOGGING IN" THE PAST

Flogging, one of the oldest forms of punishment, is still permitted in a few countries. A recent dispatch from London announced that "two 20-year-old youths were ' ortlcred flo<rgcd "at Old Bailey for what was said to be the first armed robbery in Great Britain with sawed-off shotguns."

In their discretion English courts may order tho "cat" used in the case of offenders over IC. By Act of Parliament (1912) tho lash was made legal for the punishment of "white slavers." But the "cat," once used liberally in the British Army and Navy, was abolished by those services years ago.

In certain British colonies the lash is used to punish criminals convicted of crimes against women, while persistent youthful offenders under 1G are "stroked" with tlio bircli rod.

Flogging was practised in Russia under tlio Czars; in parts of Africa the whip is still a sharp reminder of misdeeds. But France, Italy, Belgium, Austria, Germany, and the Scandinavian countries all disapprove of this primitive custom.

In tlio United States of America, all States except Delaware have legally abolished flogging, although occasionally tliero are reports of whipping in the prison camps of Mississippi, Florida, and Georgia.

Two years ago the death of a prisoner in a. Florida gaol brought the subject of illegal flogging into the limelight. According to the records, the prisoner was a difficult case. He refused to obey rules, made trouble for his guards, and finally sawed ofT his shackles and jumped into tho river. He was brought back to prison and died there. That he had been whipped with a length of hoso for one of his misdemeanors gave impetus to the story that flogging was one of the causes.