Society in Kentucky

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Oct 27, 1874

Society in Kentucky.

THE Louisville Courier-Journal gives the following description of the condition of society in Kentucky. It is from a Southern not a Northern pen, and therefore may not be presumed to be overdrawn. Moreover it is not written by one at a distance who is dependent upon rumor for his information, but by one who is on the very scene, or in the immediate neighborhood, of the evils described, and who therefore knows whereof he affirms. What must be the condition of society which calls forth such a description, from such a source. The Journal says:—

“In the darkest and bloodiest days of the dark and bloody ground there was not a tithe of the murder done which has disgraced the soil of Kentucky during the present year. The law against the carrying of concealed weapons is a dead letter. Every coward and bully goes armed. Every case of manslaughter goes unpunished. Every case of shooting with intent to kill passes by as an amusing episode, provided there be no funeral. Even the most atrocious, cold-blooded, deliberate, malignant, dastardly assassinations have left no mark on the statute-books except the mark of acquittal purchased by money or intimidation. Red-handed murderers roam at large among respectable people. Red-handed murderers occupy places of responsibility and trust. . . . There are at this moment fifty cases of homicide on our criminal docket which ought to be recorded as murder cases, where the defendant is at large on bail, with the least possible danger of an adverse result. There are five hundred cases of petty shooting with intent to kill, which will never come to trial. . . . In a word, there is no security for life, because no law for those who take it, in Kentucky, and has not been this many a year.”