CORPORAL PUNISHMENT

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXV, Issue 23137, 8 September 1938, Page 17

CORPORAL PUNISHMENT

Sir, —An English M.P. has lately pointed out that the flogging ordered and carried out in the Mayfair cases earlier in this year tlid not, in spite of all tho pubjicity they received, succeed as a deterrent. The number of cases of "robbery with violence" in tho month before the Hogging was 41. That in tho month after was 42.

Also, I have just been reading an extremely interesting examination of the "case for corporal punishment," by a celebrated (pre-Hitler) German journalist, now, I gather, in exile. He says finally, "in corporal punishment I see a crimogenous, and therefore injurious, means of punishment. There is no certain and lasting deterrent of the perpetrator. The only thing certain is the brutalisation of the punished, the inflictors of tho punishment, the' public officials present in their official capacity, and especially of the population. I am certain that in a country which generally introduced corporal punishment, tho number of brutal criminal actions would increase. It has certainly done so in Germany. If, then, flogging especially is proved no deterrent, is probably bad for the State, and, as newspaper correspondence has shown us, it is regarded with abhorrence by many law-abiding citizens, may wo not hope that the time is ripe for abandoning it in New Zealand? ' B. E. Baughan.