SPARING THE ROD

Otago Daily Times, Issue 23558, 22 July 1938, Page 12

SPARING THE ROD

Recently a Massachussets judge, apparently a member of the school which' believes that to spare the rod is to spoil the child, sentenced two boys to b e horse-whipped for thievery (writes a correspondent in the Christian,.' Science Monitor.. The idea behind this unusual sentence vyas probably sound, although it was roundly criticised, and protests were received from such organisations as the Massachusetts.. Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children. Undoubtedly it was intended as a form of punishment that would make an. impression on the boys without subjecting them to the ignominy and the bad influences of a reform school. The judge, however., reckoned without the fathers of the boys who were to administer the punishment. Both fathers appeared m court the other day to state that they had never corporally punished their children, and they did not propose to start now. Whereupon the justice as , an alternative, sentenced both youths to the Shirley Industrial School for an indeterminate time. There is considerable cause for regret here, for with therespective fathers wielding the whips the punishment would have been tempered with fatherly restraint. In the reform school, however, these boys may encounter bad influences which will be difficult to resist, with nothing to temper the temptations but their own strength of character. It’s quite a test.