The Press FRIDAY, JULY 23, 1948. Compromise On Murder

Press, Volume LXXXIV, Issue 25554, 23 July 1948, Page 6

The Press FRIDAY, JULY 23, 1948. Compromise On Murder

The compromise by which the British Government sought to extricate itself from its difficulties over the Criminal Justice Bill was thoroughly bad. It could satisfy neither those who want the death penalty retained nor the abolitionists; and it would have led to the kind of anomalies to which Mr Churchill referred in the House of Commons debate. The Government deserves some sympathy, because its difficulties are not all of its own making. The clause suspending the death penalty for murder for an experimental term of five years was inserted in the bill in the Commons on the initiative of a private member, and it was approved by a very narrow majority in a “ free “ vote. The great majority of its supporters were Labour members, but there was also some help from Conservatives and Liberals. The Government advised against the experiment, the Home Secretary (Mr Chuter Ede) claiming that, with crimes of violence on the increase and the police force undermanned, the time was not opportune. Ministers were not given the same voting freedom as private members; they were expected either to support the Government or to abstain. In the event, 28 senior and junior Ministers and Whips voted against the clause and 44 did not vote. It was clear that the Cabinet was deeply and sharply divided. When the House of Lords, as expected, threw out the clause by an overwhelming majority, the Government was greatly embarrassed. Although their Lordships had voted for the very course the Government advised, the Government, having permitted a free vote in the Commons, was now committed to the suspension of the death penalty against its own judgment and the judgment of the House of Lords. More awkward still, the question now became part and parcel of the present constitutional struggle between Lords and Commons.

Desperately the Government cast about for a compromise that would satisfy its supporters in the Commons and prevent another .division in the Cabinet. London political writers were emphatic that another test of loyalty on this subject, which had aroused such deep emotions during the Commons debate, would lead to resignations. The compromise clause which the. Government succeeded in inserting in the bill when it came back to the Commons last week, provided, According to the special correspondent of the New Zealand Press Association, that no murderer will hang unless he has killed a prison officer, killed while engaged in house-breaking, robbery, rape, resisting or escaping arrest, or used poison, or if he has previously been convicted of murder. The change could achieve little. In effect, it did little more than remove the death penalty in that class of cases to which it has long ceased to apply because of the exercise by the Home Secretary of , his prerogative of mercy. A much more serious objection, however, was that it attempted to make legislative distinctions where no precise distinctions are possible. No statute can define degrees of heinousness of different kinds of murder.

As decisively as it dealt with the first proposal, the House of Lords has now rejected the unsatisfactory compromise; and a cablegram yesterday suggested that the Government will not persist with the clause, but will instead bring down separate legislation later. Clearly, the Government will be given no rest by the majority of its Parliamentary followers who want abolition of the death penalty. There is still room for compromise with those who think this is not the right time for the experiment. The “Economist” suggested a simple amendment to the original clause enabling the Home Secretary to bring it into force by Order-in-Council when he thinks fit. Abolitionists would have the satisfaction of seeing abolition of capital punishment on the Statute Book and of knowing that in a few years it would come into force. The Government and a great many of the present opponents of abolition would be relieved that abolition would not be brought into effect in the present period of lawlessness and scanty police forces. “ Only “those who look upon hanging as “ a sacred rite of the State would “ be dissatisfied ”, the journal tedded.