Judge — September 27, 1924 — page 17: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

Editor, Norman Anthony. Associate Editore, William Morris Houghton, ' Sheep Moving Day, so far as we know, is a purely American institution. In any case it is typical and significant. Perhaps it is the prototype of all the other “days” that now speckle our calendar—Raisin Day, Orange Day, Defense Day, Mother’s Day, Brush-your-teeth Day, Wear-your-stiff-collar Day, etc., etc. At least it has this in common with all these other days that we, the Ameri- can millions, from the Atlantic to the Pacific, are bidden on Moving Day to do one thing, in this case move. And believe us, we step lively—millions of us! No loitering about old familiar scenes, no casting of the long and lingering, @ la Lot’s wife. The gong sounds, and it’s off with the old home and on with the new, and may God help the furniture! Sooner or later, no doubt, we shall have a national Divorce Day, too. Here’s Service The question whether a married woman shall continue to use her maiden name if she choses is not a very exciting one. The Lucy Stone League was having a desperate time keeping it alive—until Controller-General McCarl promulgated his order that all married women on the Federal payroll should enroll under their married names. With one stroke of his pen he presented both the Lucy Stone League and the Women’s Party with a militant cause, and in return they owe him, at the very least, an auto- mobile amply endowed with shares in a biscuit factory. The controller-general thinks he has legal precedent to support his ukase. He hasn’t. All he has is a personal dislike of the new woman and a desire to dictate in matters of private conduct that are none of his business. He’s just another one of the impertinent meddlers, official and unofficial, for which this country is famous. The thing is worse than a disease; it’s an epidemic. A Chance for Research Capital punishment is so often a kindness that objection to it on the ground of its inhumanity seems a little absurd, especially on the part of those who favor life imprisonment. As compared with the swift mercy of a comparatively painless death life imprisonment is hell indeed. Can those who advocate it so calmly know prison conditions? But there are two valid objections to capital punish- * ment: (1) that juries make mistakes, and (2) that mur- derers are too interesting and important to kill. Instead of being executed, or even buried and allowed to rot alive in prison, they should be collected in social laboratories and constantly put under the alienist’s microscope. It Dramatic Editor, George Jean Nathan. may be objected that this, too, would be cruel. Very likely, but it would be cruel to some purpose. No country needs more than our own to make a scien- tific study of its murderers. For heaven’s sake let’s isolate the murder germ! Blood and Gold The idea that the prevalence of crime in this country is due to the laxity of law enforcement comes from the belief that punishment prevents crime. But it doesn’t, any more than slaughter prevents wars. Every soldier who goes to war believes that he will be the one to survive, and every person who commits a crime believes he will be the one to escape. With the criminally inclined the thing that governs is not the risk but the temptation. The prevalence of crime is not due to laxity of law en- forcement but both, in all likelihood, are symptoms of the same underlying social condition. What type of coni- munity in American history has been the most notoriously lawless? The gold mining camp. Wherever spirits run high and money is easy there the criminally inclined flock like flies to syrup. Kill them or trap them all you please, they'll still swarm. But of course no such community relishes the somber duty of law enforcement or feels it has time for it. That is part of the picture. The United States is the El Dorado of the world. Not unnaturally, therefore, it retains some of the attributes of a gold mining camp. That, and not the laxity of our law enforcement, is the answer to our murder rate, though it is still true that our police might better be chasing murderers than bootleggers. Great Danes! A big country may have some advantages over a small one, though we can’t think for the moment what they are. But a small country has one distinct advantage over a big country; it is defenseless. Little Denmark, for instance, has decided to abolish her army and navy. Does anyone believe she will be any the less secure for this economy? She will be more so. She leans in any case on the moral support of the world, and that is the stronger the greater the trust in it. Belgium, Holland, Switzerland could follow Denmark’s example, especially Switzerland with her navy (ha! ha! beat you to it!), with equal benefit to themselves. And then if the Balkans would only take the cue, we might be within hailing distance of a United States of Europe. Which reminds us of another thing about a little country: it can have just as big an idea as the biggest. W. M. H. comicbooks.com