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CHAPTER VII.

THIRD REASON FOR ABOLISHMENT.

IRREMEDIABILITY.

Execution of the Innocent-The evil cannot be remedied-Declaration of LafayetteExecution of the Innocent during the French Revolution--Dying Protestations of Innocence Injustice of executing the Innocent-Instance of the Imprisonment of an Innocent Man-Agony which the Innocent must experience in Conviction and ExecutionExecution of an Innocent Man in Indiana-Execution of a Poor German-Execution of an Innocent Young Girl-Innocent Man hung in England-Circumstantial Evidence not to be relied on Positive Evidence not always Certain-Extract from O'Connel of Ireland.

One of the most pressing and cogent reasons with me for the abolishment of the Death Penalty, is the fact that so long as it remains on our statute books, and is enforced, the INNOCENT are liable to be put to death as well as the guilty.

The great and good Lafayette said, "I shall ask for the abolishment of the Penalty of Death, until I have the infallibility of human judgment demonstrated to me." And he said this because of the awful scenes he had witnessed in consequence of the execution of the innocent. "The punishment of Death has always inspired me with feelings of horror," he exclaimed, "since the execrable use made of it during the former revolution." During that revolution, the innocent and the guilty were made to pour out their blood upon the block indiscriminately. "Oh! spare me; for before God I proclaim my innocence!"—" With the voice of a dying mortal I solemnly declare that I am guiltless!" were protestations for

which the guillotine tarried not in its work of death. Neither has the gallows in Europe and America. In England more than 10,000 men and women have been executed who protested most sacredly, with their last breath, that they had no knowledge of the crimes for which they were about to suffer. And, in the United States, the number is rising three hundred.

It is true, that even the dying testimony of men is not always to be credited; but, out of so many, is it not altogether probable a large number uttered the truth? Some of them-indeed, a majority-were entitled to credit, for they had become hopeful converts to the Christian religion 66 were changed from nature to grace"-fitted for the immortal spheres, and were expecting a world of glory on passing away from this world of sin. So said their spiritual advisers, and so said the Christian Church generally. Hence I repeat, they were entitled to credit among Christians. But they were not credited. On the contrary, every one of them was strangled; yes, strangled by the hands of Christians, in the very midst of their protestations of innocence!

Now, as I view the subject, to kill a human being for a crime of which he is innocent, is one of the most unjust and dreadful deeds that can be perpetrated. He is made to suffer an evil which it is impossible to remedy. We can restore property, and liberty, and even character, to the innocent, but we can never restore LIFE. A few years ago, a man in the western part of Massachusetts was convicted of burning a barn, on the positive evidence of a neighbor, and was sentenced to the State prison for six years. But when three years had passed, the very man on whose testimony he was convicted, when on his death. bed, confessed his own guilt in the crime; and thus was the innocent man restored to liberty, and to his discon

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An Innocent Man preparing for Execution-Page 69.

LOVIE BAUERLE

solate and wretched family, who had been deprived of his presence and assistance during these long and painful months and years. But though he was restored, how could that world of mortification, and anxiety, and suffering, which he and his family had experienced, be restored?

Now, this was sufficiently unjust and dreadful, but it is as nothing or as the mere "dust in the balance"-when compared with the evil perpetrated in executing the innocent. Here, nothing can be done to remedy the evil. The poor victim has gone into eternity. It is now too late. Think of the long days and nights of suffering of the doomed man, when in prison awaiting his trial; of his agony, when the awful word "GUILTY" is pronounced, and his sentence passed. Think of the days and weeks of wretchedness which follow;—of his soul on fire with the conviction of his own innocence, when the world will not credit his protestations. Think of his grief when the awful thought comes to his soul, that his own parents, his wife, his darling children, will always believe him a felon; and must always suffer the disgrace that will attach to his memory. Think of his agony as his day of doom approaches, and he takes his last farewell of wife and children. He is innocent, but no man believes it, and he has no means of proving it. He stands upon the gallows, and still protests his innocence, but in vain. For weeks and months he has lived on the hope that a just God would not desert him; that in his Providence the truth would be revealed, and his innocence proved. But now he is in despair. The fatal noose is

*The State, feeling the injustice it had thus inflicted on one of its citizens, by three years' false imprisonment, made an effort-a very weak effort it was to compensate him for his labor while in prison. The Legislature magnanimously voted the stipend of $300, as an equivalent for three years' confinement and hard labor. And this was all.

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