_Question_. What do you think of Governor Roosevelt's decision in
the case of Mrs. Place?
_Answer_. I think the refusal of Governor Roosevelt to commute
the sentence of Mrs. Place is a disgrace to the State. What a
spectacle of man killing a woman--taking a poor, pallid, frightened
woman, strapping her to a chair and then arranging the apparatus
so she can be shocked to death. Many call this a Christian country.
A good many people who believe in hell would naturally feel it
their duty to kill a wretched, insane woman.
Society has a right to protect itself, but this can be done by
imprisonment, and it is more humane to put a criminal in a cell
than in a grave. Capital punishment degrades and hardens a
community and it is a work of savagery. It is savagery. Capital
punishment does not prevent murder, but sets an example--an example
by the State--that is followed by its citizens. The State murders
its enemies and the citizen murders his. Any punishment that
degrades the punished, must necessarily degrade the one inflicting
the punishment. No punishment should be inflicted by a human being
that could not be inflicted by a gentleman.
For instance, take the whipping-post. Some people are in favor of
flogging because they say that some offences are of such a frightful
nature that flogging is the only punishment. They forget that the
punishment must be inflicted by somebody, and that somebody is a
low and contemptible cur. I understand that John G. Shortall,
president of the Humane Society of Illinois, has had a bill introduced
into the Legislature of the State for the establishment of the
whipping-post.
The shadow of that post would disgrace and darken the whole State.
Nothing could be more infamous, and yet this man is president of
the Humane Society. Now, the question arises, what is humane about
this society? Certainly not its president. Undoubtedly he is
sincere. Certainly no man would take that position unless he was
sincere. Nobody deliberately pretends to be bad, but the idea of
his being president of the Humane Society is simply preposterous.
With his idea about the whipping-post he might join a society of
hyenas for the cultivation of ferocity, for certainly nothing short
of that would do justice to his bill. I have too much confidence
in the legislators of that State, and maybe my confidence rests in
the fact that I do not know them, to think that the passage of such
a bill is possible. If it were passed I think I would be justified
in using the language of the old Marylander, who said, "I have
lived in Maryland fifty years, but I have never counted them, and
my hope is, that God won't."
_Question_. What did you think of the late Joseph Medill?
_Answer_. I was not very well acquainted with Mr. Medill. I had
a good many conversations with him, and I was quite familiar with
his work. I regard him as the greatest editor of the Northwestern
States and I am not sure that there was a greater one in the country.
He was one of the builders of the Republican party. He was on the
right side of the great question of Liberty. He was a man of strong
likes and I may say dislikes. He never surrendered his personality.
The atom called Joseph Medill was never lost in the aggregation
known as the Republican party. He was true to that party when it
was true to him. As a rule he traveled a road of his own and he
never seemed to have any doubt about where the road led. I think
that he was an exceedingly useful man. I think the only true
religion is usefulness. He was a very strong writer, and when
touched by friendship for a man, or a cause, he occasionally wrote
very great paragraphs, and paragraphs full of force and most
admirably expressed.
--_The Tribune_, Chicago, March 19, 1899.