THE The New Zealand Herald. SPECTEMUR AGENDO. TUESDAY, JANUARY 7, 1873.

New Zealand Herald, Volume X, Issue 2790, 7 January 1873, Page 2

THE The New Zealand Herald. SPECTEMUR AGENDO. TUESDAY, JANUARY 7, 1873.

Thh United States of A merica present strange social and political phenomena. Extremes meet, and oppositee run into each other. A perusal of American newspapers to hand by the last mail would be sufficient to satisfy any' rational man that Democratic institutions are running to seed in that country, and that manhood suffrage and the ballotdonot check thespreadof corruption and general demoralisation. In almost every city of the Union scores of murderers are detained. —many awaiting their trial, or new trials on some technical plea, or speculating on their chance of immediate releaie, —while red-handed murder stalks abroad, and men and women are stricken down in the face of day, without any pretence of concealment, or " lying-in-wait" characteristic of capital offences in England. J\ T ew York, at present, appears to be the place where murder is most common. The newspapers head one or more of their columns daily with the line, " The Beign of Murder," in large type ; and detail with shocking minuteness circumstance in connection with the crime and the antecedents of the criminal. Doubtless the newspapers, in their editorial columns, deplore the prevalence of crime, and call upon the authorities to put down ruffianism and give guarantees for the protection of life and property; but the prominence they give in their news columns, by sensational headings and yet more sensational narratives, to the crimes and criminals they denounce, more than effaces thu good effect which might be produced by their moral essays. Where one person reads the editorial article, five thousand read the sensational story by the reporter, and become familiarised with crime in its most attractive garb. While, therefore, the writers in the American Press are doing good service by con- ! demning the criminal aspects of! American society, the newspaper ■ proprietors are rendering crime popular by the publication of exaggerated reports, and personal gossip, tending to make the criminals more or less | objects of public fame. If, therefore,' the American newspapers would repress crime, their criminal records should be dressed in a much less attractive form than they are. Two murders (amongst many others) were committed in New York last November, which have created a great deal of public indignation. It appears that a witness in a divorce suit, named O'Neill, was shot dead by the man King, against whom he gave evidence for cruelly ill-treating his wife. O'Neill left the Judge's chamber with his own wife and the other witnesses, followed by King, who shot him twice as he was descending the stairs. King returned to the Judge's chamber, and handed the weapon to the Judge, and he is now in prison awaiting his trial, his victim having died almost instantly! These parties were in easy circumstanceß. King is a lawyer, and had been a partner in the law firm with which the notorious English barrister, Edwin James, became connected when he went to America. No malice is alleged, beyond the fact that O'Neill gave evidence, on summons, of cruelty by King towards his wife. The style of writing in which this cold-blooded atrocity is detailed is, however, only calculated to make the ruffian King something of a hero; and, judging from the general practice in such eases in America, the chances are that neither King, any more than the man who shot down the notorious Pisk, will ever be brought face to face with the hangman. There are now thirty persons in New York prison alone, either sentenced to death for the crime of murder in the first degree, or awaiting their trial. There are also scores of men and women under sentence of perpetual imprisonment for crimes only one degree less heinous; and nearly all of these criminals, the newspapers lead us to believe, will find their way back again into society at no distant date. " Hanging," we are told, " is played out in New York," and the newspaper correspondents clamour for a special sitting of Judge Lynch's court. We should not wonder if this summary method of dispensing justice be resorted to, for it is evident that the New York criminal code, which is, perhaps, one of the best in the world, is not carried out as it should be for the repression of crime. Indeed, there is a general tendency throughout the entire States of the Union to deal leniently with murderers. The second crime is one which has caused a greal of consternation. A wealthy merchant, Mr. Geo. N. Peay, of Louisville, Kentucky, having business to transact in New York, concluded his business, and after spending the evening before his intended departure with some friends at a respectable hotel, he took his leave of them at the door to walk to his own hotel, a short distance off. He was perfectly sober, and appears to have been a highly moral and exemplary gentleman. From that moment all trace of him is lost, and the police

appear to be at fault. He is known to have had a large sum of money on his person, but being a powerful man and armed, it is supposed that unusual precautions were taken to carry him off. Well may the New York newspapers exclaim against the police organisation of the city, and of the Reign of Murder where such an occurrence is possible. The daily record of murder, in pothouse brawls, is as nothing compared with this latest phase of crime. In short, ruffianism in every possible shape, combined with vice and immorality, float on the top of American society. The beating of the great moral heart of the nation is not felt, ! although it has no superior on the face of the earth. The American people contribute more money to sustain religion, education, charitable, and reformatory institutions, than any other nation; they excel all other people in enterprise and industrial energy. They boast of their freedom, and with justice; but their crowning fault is their worship of " Liberty." In their blind devotion to their ideal of "Liberty," they have become slaves to unbridled licence. They are, by virtue of Manhood Suffrage, the Ballotbox, and the pistol and knife of Rowdyism, the least free of any people living under representative in stitutions. In the cause of virtue and liberty, a special commission by Judge Lynch would be a blessing to the United States of America. The truth of this remark will be apparent from the following extract from the Ifew York Herald, Nov. 26, under the heading, " Crime in the City" :— The frequency of murder in this city is becoming absolutely alarming, and unless some Btringent measures are adopted by the authorities the ruffianism frill become completely master of the eituation. Indeed, to such an extent is the use of the knife and the pistol carried that no one is safe. The law has been proved to be particularly impotent to punish the aasaasin, and, as a result, the rowdy element feel that they are at liberty to vent, their anger on any one who is unlucky enough to incur their ill-will. If the law were administered as it ought to be, the reien of murdor which now holds sway in the community would be checked; for the very clais who are readiest to uee deadly weapons under the present looseness in the administration of juetice would be Tery chary in running the riak of being hanged. Unfortunately, at present, they can nearly always count on the presence of some tender conocience in the jury, with whom to defeat the law is a virtue. It is a great misfortune for a community to be blessed with people of this stamp. Their sympathy seems always to turn with the interesting assassin who, in a fit of jealousy, or heated by drink, murdors in a cowardly and brutal manner some fellow-creature. Unless we are to declare that killing is a noble sport, in which those who feel so disposed are at liberty to indulge, we must find some cure for the consciences of jurymen. The most rational way out of the difficulty would be to pass a law that, except in poli'ical cases, two-thirds of the jury should be sufficient to give a verdict. Sucb a law as this would soon hare the effect of removing a good many interesting assassins out of the way of temptation. It would also have a CJrtain moral restraining effect on hundreds of young men who are being educated into murderers by the present laxity of the laws. One thing, however, is certain, and that is, that the present reign of rowdyism must be brought to an end.