THE New Zealand Herald AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 16, 1936 THE SAFETY OF THE KING

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22525, 16 September 1936, Page 12

THE New Zealand Herald AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 16, 1936 THE SAFETY OF THE KING

The McMahon trial is over. On the charge of wilfully producing a pistol near the King with intent to alarm him, the accused has been found guilty and sentenced to 12 months' imprisonment with hard labour. There were two other counts, respectively charging him with unlawfully possessing a firearm with j intent to endanger life and present- ! ing a pistol near the King with intent to endanger the peace; but : on these the jury, at the direction I of the judge, has returned a verdict !of not guilty. Thus the Hyde Park : Corner incident, after exciting attention throughout half the world, ends without fuss in a comparatively mild punishment for a deed that in some other countries would have evoked vengeance set in melodrama. It is a quiet dropping of the curtain on a scene of judicial calm. Not that in Britain safety of life is lightly held, nor that there revolver-play is tolerated with the unconcern common among people less grown up; still less that the King's person has no special sanctity: but the law is such that its processes move equably, and mercy seasons justice. The incident itself had strange, even perplexing, features; and the trial has taken unexpected turns since the initial Bow Street inquiry. Yet nothing has been allowed to divert the weighing of evidence, not even the sensational testimony of the accused at the Old Bailey. A doubt is left as to his mental seli-possession, and this doubt seems; to have played a part throughout the hearing. His obsession by a grievance and his irresolute behaviour when proceeding to extremes in calling attention to it appear to have been given considerate heed. However, he has manifested no little ability in- telling a coherent story—whether it be true or false —and some important details of it have gone uncontradicted, while his open disdaining of leniency strengthens the impression of his sanity. He was moved by no fixed idea of putting the King in jeopardy, and has been dealt with more in sorrow than in anger.

Public opinion must be affected by recognition of the fact that between what McMuhon did and what he might have done at Hyde Park Corner there is a vast difference. Conviction on the third charge, viewed in the light of acquittal on the first and second, supports his contention that, whatever motives impelled him, the utmost he eventually purposed was to create alarm. This, of course, in the circumstances, was criminal and could not be condoned, but it falls far short of deliberate intention to harm the King. For the mildness of the sentence, therefore, there is warrant in reason and in law. Nevertheless, a comparison of the entire legal proceedings with what would have confronted an action of the kind in many another country proves that beneath the process was operating a spirit of clemency. The trial will pass into history as an example of British poise in handling criminal cases. Nobody has. the slightest ground for saying that judge or jury had inadequate appreciation of duty to thfe State, but the complete absence of vindictiveness is impressively evident. A peculiar coincidence has given vividness to this fact. At the very time_of McMahon's trial for a serious offence against the King, an offence amounting to breach of his right to freedom from even the semblance of molestation, His Majesty was concluding a remarkable to'ur abroad amid possible danger. At such a time, when anxiety about his safety was inevitable, whatever the degree of confidence in rr.eans used to ensure his protection from risk, a wish that McMahon nhould be punished with exemplary, condign severity might have had excuse. It has needed none, for it has not appeared. Unconsciously Britain has attested its assurance that, although perils may lurk abroad, they are normally unknown ab home, where the King can habitually move among his people in secure peace. When the question of His Majesty's safety is considered, it relates essentially to fear of foreign attempt on his life, not to anxiety about any lessening of Britain's proud regard of him. "VlcMahon's story of a foreign plot should not bo uncritically believed. In spite of its circumstantial character it is fantastic. What foreign nation, what faction in a foreign country, has anything to gain from the slaying of Britain's King? Certainly not Germany, understood to be the nation McMahon has incriminated. The evidence he has offered for this is altogether suspect. He seems to have been actuated by a desire to shield himself, and this has betrayed him to use reckless speech—to pull the trigger of his tongue with an abandon he hesitated to indulge with the weapon that got him into this trouble. Much is to be said for the opinion that only of diseased minds could be born the notion of serving any interest of a foreign Power by assassinating Britain's King. McMahon's may not be one of these minds, yet it will be well to take precautions lest some such maniacal fancy, begotten abroad, seek to express itsslf on British soil.