RETURNING TO THE DARK AGES.
By L. A. S.
It is provided in the Constitution of the United States that “cruel and unusual punishments” shall not be inflicted upon any person under the laws of this country. That provision was made by men who stood but a little removed from the shadow of the Dark Ages, when men had been the victims of gross cruelties inflicted to satisfy the vengeance of governmental despots. The hearts of right-minded people the world over had sickened at the spectacle of oppression and suffering those times had afforded, and as the dark cloud of religious and civil despotism was lifted by the Reformation, men hailed the dawning of a better day in which man’s inhumanity to man was to give place to the reign of justice and respect for human rights. Our forefathers who framed the Constitution knew well the evils of government where the people were subjected without legal remedy to the cupidity and malice of those in positions of power, and sought here to erect a government in which the rights of the people should be safeguarded by plain provision in the fundamental law. Accordingly it was provided, among other things, that no person, of whatever crime convicted, should under this government be punished in a cruel manner. But to-day, at the opening of the twentieth century, we note a startling change in the order of things established at the close of the eighteenth century. We are coming back to the dark era of cruel and inhuman punishments. And we do not say this ourselves; we only repeat what is being exclaimed by others who are taking note of the signs of the times. What could be more significant of this than the heading of an editorial which we note in the New York Sun of August 27: “The Revival of Burning at the Stake”? Under this heading the Sun says: — “Here is what happened last Sunday, the day of Christian peace and rest and worship, in the town of Chester in the Christian State of Tennessee: — “The mob then took him to the nearest tree. A chain was fastened to his body, and then wrapped around the tree. A young man holding a two-gallon can then poured oil upon him, saturating his clothes from head to foot, and the match was applied. “The flames leaped high above the man’s head, and as the fire reached his flesh, he began uttering heartrending appeals to the mob, but they were replied to with more oil and the piling of more brush around his body until he was almost buried beneath burning debris. After an hour nothing was left of the negro save small parts of his shoes. After the burning, the mob dispersed. “The man burned was a negro, of course. He had murdered a white woman, but had been arrested for the crime, and was in jail awaiting speedy trial and sure conviction, when a mob of one thousand people, ‘mostly farmers from the region,’ broke into the jail and carried him off to the stake, in spite of persuasions to desist, from officers of the law and other ‘well-known citizens.’ “To-day, very likely, we shall read of another burning at the stake; but if it does not come to-day, it will come soon, and will be followed in quick succession by many more. The horrible punishment will stimulate the mania that leads to the crime of the victims, and the savagery of the lawless vengeance will still further brutalize mobs, so that they will demand more burnings to satisfy their mad passions. “Burning at the stake has been revived as a distinguishing popular American institution. Now, negroes are the victims; but who will come next?” And this last question is worthy of repetition and solemn consideration. “Now, negroes are the victims; but who will come next?” The way is being prepared for victims of a different color and race, and for the fulfillment of prophecies that from the standpoint of republican government are so strange as to be incredible. L. A. S.