CRIME BREEDS CRIME. (New-York freeman's Journal)

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XX, Issue 27, 22 April 1892, Page 7

CRIME BREEDS CRIME. (New- York freeman's Journal)

The awful tragedy which has shocked and agitated New York society for some time pa«t, has culminated this week in " S«ntence of Death " —terrible words— being paused by Recorder Smyth upon the boymnrdeier, Carlyle Harris, for the poisoning of his girl-wife, Young, bat with such a record. Broken hearts and rained homes, a secret marriage, a child murder, a wife murder, and within the week of March 21, if Justice has her sway, an execution. And may not all this sadness be attributed to the light and frivolous manner in which the sacred ties of matrimony are held by the young people of this generation. It is said that when tbe grief-stricken mother of the unfortunate girl discovered the secret marriage, Bhe demanded that Carl Harris remirry her daughter, eaying that the first marriage was not a religious ceremony. The young man laughed and said :"A religions ceremony ? I should say not. Wbj tbe old fellow (the Alderman who married them) kept a ginmill." Could such a marriage be aught but disastrous ? And another great truth which this sad affafr brings to us, is the prevalence of child murder, and the lax laws concerning it.

Had Helen Potts mainthined her right af motherhood, her right of wifehood would have been established beyond doubt, and she would have probably been alive to-day, and her young husband would not be under the awful shadow of an ignominious dea'h. And so it is that one crime leads to others, and society looks on unshocked at the am which has become an everyday affair, vitiating the whole moral life of our people, and incurring for them the vengeance cf an outraged Creator, buth in this world and the next.