HC Deb 01 May 1849 vol 104 cc1058-90
MR. EWART

, in rising to move for leave to bring in a Bill on this subject, said that he believed that the conviction was every day growing stronger, openly with the public and secretly with the House, that the time was not very distant when they must totally abolish the punishment of death. The increasing conviction among the public was proved by the numerous and almost unanimous meetings in the country. In the House many Members who seemed neutral, or even unfavourable, had avowed to him that the time must probably come when the Motion would be carried. The only crime virtually punished with death was murder. Yet the number of murders lately had most unfortunately and lamentably increased. Now suppose that they had abolished capital punishment in the last year, would not his right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for the Home Department have attributed to the repeal of capital punishment the number of murders that had recently taken place; and was not he (Mr. Ewart) equally justified, when those murders had continued notwithstanding the executions, in attributing the murders to those executions? As his right hon. Friend would have used that argument against him in the event of his Motion having been carried, he (Mr. Ewart) was equally right in using the argument against the right hon. Gentleman when the Motion was not carried. During the course of all the arguments on this question, he had carefully avoided the theological part of the discussion: he maintained that upon this question, as upon all others, they were bound to act upon a system of exalted expediency, and to look at the general interests of the country. He, therefore, abandoned on this occasion anything like the theological part of the question. He again took his stand on the principle that they who justified executions were bound to prove that they were indispensable. The first writer on the subject of such deep interest to humanity, the immortal Italian jurist, Beccaria (the man by whose writings he was first converted to the opinions he held), laid it down that nothing but necessity could justify the execution of any individual. [The hon. Gentleman here quoted, from his work, De' Delitti e dette Pene, the words of Beccaria.] In the last report of the Criminal Law Commissioners they equally expressed their opinion that the right of the Legislature to inflict capital punishment rested on the ground of strict and cogent necessity, and (to quote their own words) that "to go beyond this involved a transgression in foro cœli"on the part of the Legislature. Now he maintained that during the course of the argument on this subject, his opponents had begged the question: they had assumed the necessity, they had not proved it. They had appealed either to the prejudices or the fears of the community. He denied that his right hon. Friend, with all the evidence which he could command, went further than to state that the country was not yet prepared for the change proposed: a question which he (Mr. Ewart) would like him to try anywhere in this country himself. It was true that he advanced a certain series of statistical arguments, which he (Mr. Ewart) believed to be rather ostensible than real. There were elements in the calculations of his hon. Friend which deprived them of their validity. His right hon. Friend had stated that in cases of attempts at murder there had been an increase in the last five years ending 1846, as compared with the five years ending 1831, from 451 to 1,099 crimes. He stated also that there had been an increase in the cases of rape, of arson, and of forgery; and he added, in all those crimes you abolished capital punishment, and therefore the diminution of capital punishment has caused an increase of crime. If this were true, his right hon. Friend was bound in consistency to ask them to restore capital punishment. His right hon. Friend did not do this, but he selected four crimes out of twenty in which capital punishment had been abolished; but he did not go to the whole number of twenty, in which he (Mr. Ewart) was prepared to show that in the majority of instances the crime had diminished. He said, with respect to attempts to murder, that in the five years ending 1831 the committals were 451, and in the five years concluding 1836, the committals had increased to 668. From 1836 to 1841, when capital punishment had ceased, the crime rose to 937, and in 1846 to 1,099. Therefore, according to the statement of his right hon. Friend, there was a rise from the year 1831 to 1846 of attempts at murder from 451 to 1,099. This was a large increase, undoubtedly; but even whilst capital punishment existed, there was as great an increase in the crime as after it was abolished. Then his right hon. Friend showed an increase since the repeal of capital punishment in cases of rape. It was true that in that case also the number of crimes had increased, but it was also true that before the repeal of capital punishment, prosecutors did not prosecute for the crime; they indicted for the minor offence—an assault with intent; and when both crimes were blended in one, no doubt there appeared to be a rise in the number of crimes. Then his right hon. Friend took the case of wilful burning. It was true that this crime had increased; but, according to the tables produced by the right hon. Baronet, it had diminished very considerably in the first six years following the repeal of capital punishment. For the five years ending 1831, the committals for wilful burning were 312; for the five years ending 1836, they were 360. Capital punishment was abolished, and in five years ending 1841 they fell to 183. Then his right hon. Friend referred to the crime of forgery, and said that the committals for five years previous to 1836 amounted to 350, when the capital punishment was abolished by "Lord Denman's Act," and that they rose from 350 to 564, and that in 1846 they rose to the still greater number of 735. He (Mr. Ewart) had carefully looked at the returns made to the House, and he found that there was a different mode of making the return in the first period from that which had taken place in the last. In the first period it was customary to put on the register such forgeries only as were capitally punished, but now all forgeries were entered—there was no distinction; hence the apparent increase of crime. This was admitted in a return made to a Motion of his own in 1847. He did not think it fair in his right hon. Friend to select a particular time and a particular series of years to prove his ease. The real way to prove whether or not crime had increased or diminished by the abolition of capital punishment, was to take a certain number of years antecedent to the abolition of capital punishments, and a certain number of years subsequent; and if you found that on the whole the result of the abolition of capital punishment had been the diminution of crime, it might fairly be argued that the experiment had been successful. There had been a return laid before the House, in his opinion, most conclusive on the subject; it was made on his Motion, at the suggestion of a much respected friend, a man who had laboured hard in the cause of the repeal of capital punishment, Mr. Wrightson, and the result was that crime had diminished most decidedly with the diminution of capital punishment. He had a return of eighteen different crimes which had been capitally punished, and the number of committals after the capital punishment was discontinued. In cattle stealing there was more crime in the five years previous to the repeal, than in the five years after. So, with regard to coining, there was a very large diminution; the same in wilful burning; and, with regard to burglary, there had been a diminution from 4,307 to 3,700. He had a return printed by the House in 1839, which took two periods of five years each. In the first of these periods, the five years ending 1831, there were executed in England and Wales 259 persons; in the second period 99 persons were put to death. In the first period, there were nearly 12,000 capital offences; in the next period, 11,320. He maintained that on this general and perfectly fair view of the case, the experiment had been successful, and justified the House in carrying it further. It would not do for his right hon. Friend, or any one else, to appeal to the vindictive feelings of the community. His right hon. Friend was bound to prove that it was expedient for the good of the State, that for the crime of murder the criminal ought to die; he was bound to put it on the ground of legislative expediency. To prove that the fact of the diminution of executions for murder had diminished the crime, he would lay before the House the following table: In six years ending 1818, there were executed for murder, 122—the crimes were then 444; in the six years ending 1824, there were executed 91, and the crimes diminished; in the six years ending 1830, the executions were 75; in the six years ending 1836, 74; and in the six years ending 1842, the executions for murder amounted to only 50, and the committals for the crime fell to 150. The crime had diminished one-half, although the population had largely increased. In 1834, 1835, and 1836, in which no executions took place in London or Middlesex—these were the only years in which there were no convictions for murder. It had been laid down by the jurists of all times that the excellence of a punishment consisted in its certainty, and its defects in its uncertainty. He asked his right hon. Friend, was he prepared to execute for every crime of murder? Within the last few days, a considerable sensation had been caused by the execution of two criminals, whose crimes were very different—he meant the unfortunate woman who had been executed at Bristol, and the infamous criminal who had recently been executed at Norwich. He knew that, even among those who still upheld the necessity of capital punishment, the inequality of the punishment relatively to the crime had in these cases excited some degree of astonishment. He, therefore, maintained that his right hon. Friend could not, consistently with a due regard to public feeling, invariably execute in all cases of murder. Then he maintained that he lost the proper degree of certainty in his punishment. It had been laid down that a small punishment which was certain, was far more valuable than a cruel punishment which was uncertain. It was most justly considered by the public that these degrading exhibitions contaminated public morality. He remembered that in an old Act of Queen Elizabeth it was stated, that it having been found that thieves and pickpockets resorted to the gallows at the time of an execution, it was expedient that all such thieves and pickpockets should be hanged. That Act was an early proof both of the inefficiency and of the demoralising tendency of public executions. During every period before and since, they had been alike inefficacious, and alike demoralising. He knew how his right hon. Friend met this part of the case; he said that it was not the mere exhibition, the scaffold and all its solemn appendages, which affected the people; but although they were not affected by the sight of the execution, they had unfortunately the means of reading the accounts of these degrading exhibitions in the newspapers of the country. The purity and morality of the Sabbath were contaminated by the issue of such publications. It was the execution, not the crime, which first attracted readers. Those crimes which had ceased to be capitally punished had ceased to have this false and dangerous attractiveness; and the details of those crimes were no longer dwelt upon and followed. But the retention of capital punishment for murder, caused a retention of a low, immoral, and sanguinary curiosity. Nay, it had a reactive effect on the public mind. It was for the general interest that public attention should be fixed on the magnitude of the crime. But by executions the attention of the public was diverted from the magnitude of the crime to the magnitude of the punishment; instead of concentrating observation and abhorrence on the crime, you diverted it towards the punishment and the criminal. The same effect was produced on the mind of the criminal also. Instead of dwelling on his crime, he was absorbed in the contemplation of his punishment. But not only the magnitude but the nature of the punishment was objectionable. How could that punishment be effectual which imitated the crime which it professed to control? But the strongest, and therefore the often-repeated, argument against it was, that it left room for neither compunction nor repentance. This was the reason why the resistance of the mind to capital punishment went on constantly increasing. It was in vain for his right hon. Friend to assert that men's minds were not yet favourable to abolition. The clergy, who had long maintained a neutral position, were gradually becoming the opponents of executions. They were the authors of several works in favour of their abolition. He had last year cited the opinions of the Judges. He was justified in saying that the opinions of three English and two Irish Judges, and of the recorders or magistrates of many of our towns, were favourable to total abolition. But that conviction was still more widely prevailing among the great moral and religious classes which formed the glory of this country, he meant the sacred alliance of those different religious denominations which had achieved the great triumph of the abolition of slavery and the slave trade. They had succeeded in their former great and holy efforts. They would succeed in this. They, in common with him (Mr. Ewart) believed that the Gospel unfolded two sacred and mighty principles, at variance with capital punishment—the condemnation of revenge, and the encouragement of repentance. In unison with their feelings and his own, he called upon the House to sweep from the Statute-book of England the unchristian principle of revenge, and to follow, as their inspirer and their guide, the Christian spirit of repentance. The hon. Member concluded by moving for leave to bring in a Bill to repeal the punishment of death.

LORD NUGENT

seconded the Motion.

SIR G. GREY

My hon. Friend the Member for Dumfries has rightly anticipated that I shall feel it my duty to oppose the Motion. With every respect for the opinions of many Gentlemen who think that the punishment of death might in all cases be dispensed with, I entertain the strongest conviction that, without making any predictions as to what in the course of years may be the duty and policy of the State to do in this matter, the time is yet far distant when we can safely dispense with the extreme penalty of the law in cases of extreme guilt. I must remind my hon. Friend that many of the arguments he has used are more applicable, perhaps, to former periods than to the present; for since 1841 no person has suffered death, the extreme penalty of the law, except for the offence of wilful and deliberate murder. My hon. Friend, at the commencement of his speech, expressed an opinion in which I concur, that this question does not rest upon theological grounds; and I am not prepared any more than he to argue it upon such grounds. I will only say upon that point, that while I entertain the strongest conviction that there is nothing in the written Word of God which precludes the State, for its own safety, for the safety of society, from inflicting the punishment of death, I conceive that there is nothing, on the other hand, which imposes upon the ruler the obligation of inflicting that punishment even in cases of murder. I entirely agree with what is stated in a pamphlet which contains similar statistical statements to those which my hon. Friend has adduced—a pamphlet entitled Punishment of Death—Statistical Argument, reprinted from the Eclectic Review for August, 1848—that it is the duty of the Government to treat the malefactor with reference to the welfare of the State, and that if the State is as safe without the infliction of this punishment as with it, it has no right to inflict it. But that holds good of every other punishment also; we have no right to transport a man for the mere gratification of a vindictive feeling; the only justification for imposing any punishment is the interest of society, the protection of life or of property, or of those other interests which it is proper to protect. Now, with respect to the crime of wilful and deliberate murder, that being the only one which, in ordinary circumstances, subjects the offender to the extreme punishment, I am prepared to maintain that there is a necessity—I do not mean that it is one capable of absolute proof and demonstration, such as I think my hon. Friend has rather unreasonably required of me, but I am prepared to appeal to reasonable men and ask them whether it is not necessary, not merely for the protection of society, but of human life, to throw around it that guard which is constituted by the deterring effect which I am convinced the terror of death has upon the minds of men? My hon. Friend says that murders have recently very much increased, and that as, if he had succeeded in this Motion last year, I should have appealed to the increase as a proof of the evil effect of the alteration of the law, he has a right to appeal to it now as a proof of the bad consequence of retaining the law as it is. Now, first, I deny the fact of the increase. There have been two or three instances of very great aggravation recently, which have attracted much public attention; but taking, as he says we ought, a series of years, I find that murder is the only crime which has not very materially and considerably increased. I take for a period of 25 years the average of commitments for murder; in the last 10 years ending 1848 they were C7 yearly, and in the 15 previous years the same number—67; the convictions for murder in 1844, 1845, 1846, 1847, and 1848, did not very materially—21, 19, 13, 19, 23. I have no reason to suppose that the number will vary materially this year; it may not even equal that of 1848. I trust it will not. My hon. Friend has no right, therefore, to say that murders are increasing notwithstanding capital punishment, and that that is a proof that it is not only ineffectual, but tends actually to produce the crime. I believe that there is in the human mind that terror of death that makes this punishment operate with a deterring influence upon parties who otherwise would take human life from vindictive motives, or motives of gain, or other motives; and I believe that that does tend to keep down the crime, notwithstanding the temptations to it, almost to a fixed standard. I am not prepared to say that men who commit murder always calculate upon consequences; there are many cases in which men, reckless of all consequences, under some strong passion or evil motive, commit crime, and then the kind of punishment does not act with any determinate effect upon them. But we are to look at those who do not commit the crime, and who are deterred from it by the knowledge that they would suffer death if they did; and that there are such I think we may safely infer from the fact that murder is a crime which has not increased. My hon. Friend says, that nothing but necessity can justify an execution; I quite agree in that, meaning however not a necessity capable of mathematical proof, but that degree of necessity which should induce those who make the law, and those with whom the execution of law rests, to impose this punishment till they are satisfied that they can safely remove what they have hitherto believed to be a strong protection to human life. My hon. Friend has also referred to statistical arguments, following my statement of last year; but I must remind him that I did not profess to rest the case much upon statistical arguments, for the statistics are so liable to the operation of various disturbing causes, that there is not much reliance to be placed upon them. In Tuscany, Belgium, and the Roman republic, there were no executions, and my hon. Friend said that murders had, in consequence, been very few. My hon. Friend said further, that in all those crimes from which the punishment of death had been removed, there had been an actual diminution since it had been taken away. I must state, however, that looking at the class of offences in which this punishment was frequently, though not generally, executed in late years—attempts to murder, rape, arson, burglary—I am hound, notwithstanding what he has said of the incorrectness of my figures of last year, to adhere substantially to the statement I then made, and to say that crime under those heads has increased since the abolition of capital punishment. My hon. Friend says, that if so, I ought to move for leave to bring in a Bill to restore the capital punishment; but I deny that life and property rest upon the same grounds, and that you ought to afford the same protection to property that you do to life. You might, by executing every sheepstealer, deter from stealing sheep; that was attempted many years ago, but it was found utterly impracticable; the feeling of mankind would revolt against the application of the extreme penalty to a comparatively minor offence, and the consequence would be—as it was—the greatest degree of uncertainty in the infliction of punishment, and so no sheepstealer would have the fear of punishment before his eyes, not one in a hundred being really punished. I agree with my hon. Friend that certainty is an essential element in the administration of the law, and certainty has prevailed in respect to murder; I do not say in every case, in cases where there were circumstances of extenuation, but in general in cases of deliberate wilful murder, every one does leave the court with the firm conviction that the law will be vindicated by the execution of the criminal. My hon. Friend says, that uncertainty must attach to this punishment, because we cannot execute in every individual case, and that he has a certain punishment to offer: what that is I do not know, but I think he ought to have mentioned what is this substitute of his—a punishment to be inflicted in all cases, so as to avoid the possibility of uncertainty as to the penalty to follow the crime. But then, he says, look at the inequality, and he refers to two recent cases where the degree of public abhorrence was different, and the punishment was the same; then what becomes of his "certain punishment," which in all cases is to attach to murder, irrespective of circumstances? I admit that the facts of the two cases may be widely different. My hon. Friend referred to the case of a poor woman, who, under the influence of deep poverty, consigned to untimely death her new-born offspring; and said in such a case it was impossible to inflict the extreme penalty. The law makes this last crime also capital, and I admit it may be difficult and unnecessary in such a case to inflict the punishment of death; and, if it is not necessary, taking all the circumstances into account, it may be right to recommend such a person to the mercy of the Crown. I am far from extenuating that crime, or saying that there is no such case which would justify execution; but what would become of my hon. Friend's certainty of punishment when he came to deal with a case of this nature precisely as he would with the most revolting case of deliberate murder? If you apportion the punishment to the circumstances of the crime, then you fall into the fault which he says now attaches to the punishment of death. Now, with regard to these statistics, I must tell him that he, with the writer of the pamphlet in question, has fallen into some great errors, while professing to correct mine. First, with regard to attempts to murder, the mode in which I stated the case may have led to the error. I stated the great increase that had taken place in the attempts to murder since the capital punishment had been removed in those cases in which no injury dangerous to life had been inflicted; but I ought to have stated that the class of offences under the head of "attempts to murder," in the criminal tables, comprised many to which my hon. Friend adverted as formerly omitted from that class, namely, assaults with intent to do some grievous bodily harm. Those assaults were formerly capital; they are not now; and since they ceased to be so, the convictions for that crime have very considerably increased. It is said, this shows the punishment to be of no avail, for these persons attempted to commit murder—the capital crime. That would be so, if there had been an attempt to murder in all the cases; but the class comprises those attempts to which I have referred, merely to inflict some bodily harm; and, of 1,159 cases in the last five years, 1,002 are cases which were formerly capital, and are not so now, in which there was no intention to murder, but only to commit some bodily injury. With regard to rape, it is said that I ought to have taken into account the increased number of prosecutions. There may be something in that; the very great increase in those cases since the abolition of capital punishment may be in part accounted for by the increased willingness to prosecute. But when it is said that formerly they prosecuted for the minor offence, I believe that is a mistake, for it did not rest with the prosecutrix unless she perjured herself—it rested with the magistrate to determine the nature of the charge, and with the clerk of assize to frame the indictment, and with the jury to decide of what offence, if any, the accused was guilty. I fully admit that juries were more in the habit then of convicting for the minor offence, but the commitments for rape in the seven years subsequent to the abolition of capital punishment have been 818, to set against 412 in the seven preceding years; and, allowing a fair deduction for the unwillingness of parties to prosecute when the offence was capital, I must say that, the number having doubled, this crime cannot be cited in favour of the abolition of capital punishment as tending to diminish crime. With regard to arson, the capital punishment was abolished in 1837; in the 22 previous years the commitments amounted to 897; in the 11 years since (half the former period) to 946; being more than double the proportion. With respect to forgery, it has been stated that that head comprises many offences not included under it in former returns, and that therefore the comparison is unfair. To a limited extent that is true. By the 1st William IV., c. 66, all offences relating to forgery were consolidated, and, by the 10th section, forged receipts for the delivery of goods, formerly punishable as simple frauds, were brought within the law of forgery. No doubt this would disturb the comparison of commitments to some extent; but, when it is stated that the larger class of offences are of this kind, I must be permitted to say that that is directly contrary to the fact; for I have here a statement which shows that these cases bear a very small proportion to the whole. Then with regard to burglary. On this point it is said I have committed a most egregious error, and I am charged with making what amounts to a gross misstatement. It is alleged that about the time that capital punishment was changed, the crime was by law defined anew, and made to include offences committed between certain hours of the evening and morning—including a much longer time than before; and that, although I was aware of this circumstance, I nevertheless had argued that the crime of burglary had greatly multiplied. Now, by the same statute which abolished capital punishment in cases of burglary, the time which is essential to the offence of burglary is declared to be between the hours of nine o'clock in the evening and six o'clock in the following morning; whereas before this enactment the time was defined by common law as the period between sunrise and sunset; so that the assertion that this statute greatly enlarged the period within which the offence could be committed, is quite contrary to the fact; and I have a statement before me of the committals for burglary during the ten years preceding the abolition of capital punishment and the ten years after, showing a considerable increase in the latter period; but I will not trouble the House by entering further into this part of the subject. I have already said that I do not ask the House to decide this question upon statistical figures—but to take a broad common-sense view of the whole question. I ask the House whether they are prepared, on full consideration, to say that capital punishment can be abolished with a due regard to the interests of the country and the prevention of crime? The hon. Gentleman has adverted to the crime of high treason. Now, we certainly in these days do not hear much of this crime—but I ask whether, if a man levies war against the Queen, and involves the country in scenes of war and bloodshed, the law is to be chargeable with cruelty in consigning that man to the scaffold, in order to deter, by the fear of the utmost penalty of the law, others from pursuing a course that might lead to the death of hundreds or thousands of Her Majesty's subjects? I hold that till it can be clearly and satisfactorily shown that some other punishment will equally deter from the commission of crime, and protect society, it is the duty of Government and Parliament to exercise the power of capital punishment now possessed, in order to the vindication of the law and the protection of the subject. My hon. Friend trusted that in this debate I would not appeal to the vindictive feelings as an argument, and that I would not give in to the notion that merely because a man was guilty of a great crime, therefore he ought to die. There are, however, considerations connected with this view of the question, which I cannot but regard as of importance. If the impression is once produced in the minds of the community, that the law does not sufficiently protect them from the crime of murder, will an inducement not be held out to private individuals to do what they will be led to regard as a protection for themselves? I believe the effect would be to promote feelings of private revenge that are now kept down and subdued because the law is known to be strong enough to vindicate its rights, and inflict that punishment which is essential to the protection of human life. I will refer, very briefly, to what has been said with reference to the absence of executions producing the absence of convictions for murder. It has been stated, that in the years 1834, 1835, and 1836, no executions whatever took place in London and Middlesex, and that during those years no conviction for murder occurred. Now, I might draw just the contrary inference from the statement, and say, there were no convictions for murder, and, therefore, no executions. The law still attaching the penalty of death to murder, there were no persons executed in those years, be-cause none were convicted; and, therefore, I might argue that the law was effectual. I cannot understand how any argument for abolishing capital punishments can be founded on the statement that no executions took place, seeing there were no convictions. But he might appeal to the experience of the year 1833 with far more force than his hon. Friend appealed to the following years. He might say, that, because there were various executions in 1833, they had proved deterrent in 1834, 1835, and 1836. But while it is true that in 1834, 1835, and 1836, no executions and no convictions took place in London, as had been stated, yet I must remind my hon. Friend, that during the same period several took place at Horsemonger-lane gaol—which, as regarded the population, might be said to be comprised in London as much as any of the metropolitan prisons. My hon. Friend, however, reserved his strongest argument to the last, namely, the evils arising from public executions. I quite agree with him, that those evils are very great. Nothing is more to be deplored or censured than the desire exhibited by multitudes—and the facilities given them, for mere pecuniary gain, to gratify their depraved taste—to witness the last dying agonies of a fellow-creature suffering the extreme penalty of the law. This is an evil which all should seek to check; but some years ago, when a Bill was brought forward to alter the practice, none protested more against that measure than my hon. Friend, on the ground that it would be likely to perpetuate this kind of punishment; and yet my hon. Friend has made the evils arising from public executions his strongest argument. On this point, I can say no more than that I entirely concur with him in the censure he has cast upon the scenes attending public executions; but a public execution is not absolutely necessary. If that question comes before the House to be discussed on its merits, I shall be prepared to give my opinion; but I warn the House against supposing that it is necessary to the maintenance of capital punishments to have them public; and, therefore, the arguments of my hon. Friend have no direct bearing on that question. My hon. Friend has spoken of the opinions of two English and three Irish Judges, and several Recorders; but I will remind my hon. Friend that when those distinguished functionaries were examined before Parliamentary Committees, the great majority gave a decided opinion that capital punishment could not be dispensed with in cases of murder. I confess that I can address no new arguments to the House in addition to what I have said on this subject on former occasions, I will only express the hope that the House will not allow my hon. Friend even to lay his Bill on the table; and that the opinion of the House will be so firmly and decidedly expressed as to leave on the public mind no doubt whatever as to the views entertained on this question.

MR. BRIGHT

I am rejoiced to have heard the speech of the right hon. Baronet the Home Secretary, because it does not indicate that he feels quite so confident on this question this year as he did twelve months since. The right hon. Baronet commenced his speech by an allusion to this not being the time when my hon. Friend's proposition could be safely entertained. The right hon. Baronet would seem to admit by that that he was looking forward to a better time; and I suppose he means a time which is not far distant, when the proposition of my hon. Friend the Member for Dumfries may be taken into consideration, and may become the law of the land. The right hon. Gentleman has also, as the House will observe, repeatedly, during his speech, repudiated any conclusion drawn from the statistics of this question. I agree with him in thinking that statistics cannot be absolutely relied on with regard to this subject, because they are so likely to be disturbed; and I should not urge that the question should be decided on the figures connected with it, although I do not fear the conclusion to which they lead. But the right hon. Baronet has avoided throughout his speech any defence of the present system on any ground of principle. He has asserted that nations are not prevented by divine law from putting individuals to death when the public safety requires it; but he does not assume that we are bound by that law to inflict capital punishment, or that it is impossible that a time may come when the public safety, even according to his own view, may no longer require it. Now, I think this is a question which at this moment is invested with peculiar interest, because recent events have brought it before the public view in a manner which demands attention. And when it was said by some persons that the cause of my hon. Friend might suffer if he brought the question forward at this moment, I gave him my opinion that there never was a time when it was so much his duty to bring it before the Legislature as on the present occasion. We all wish—nobody, I am sure, more than the right hon. Baronet—that public executions—that capital punishments—should be done away with; but, unfortunately, public executions, that is to say, the infliction of capital punishment, is so ancient a practice—at least, nearly as ancient as crime—that we have become used to it, and men do not investigate carefully the grounds on which a contrary practice is urged on this House. I agree with the right hon. Gentleman as to the limits of the question; I believe it is unnecessary to go into what is called the Scripture argument. The hon. Baronet the Member for Oxford University is not present, and as he was the only Member who used that argument last year, it may not be necessary to say any thing in contradiction of it now. But there is one thing which may be said for the conversion, if it be possible, of such Members as the hon. Baronet the Member for the University of Oxford, and that is, that for some centuries after the introduction of the Christian era, no person holding, or professing to hold, the Christian religion was known to interfere in capital punishments. It is on record that a Roman emperor removed Christians from the office of prefect, and refused to appoint them to that office, upon the ground that their religion prevented them from adjudicating in cases of capital punishment. And we have it upon the testimony of a learned historian, that up to the period of the fifth century Christianity was understood to forbid its converts to be implicated in any degree whatever in the infliction of death upon criminals. We come then to the simple question of expediency, upon which I am ready to rest this case, although I think a great deal might be said upon it on grounds of principle, with which expediency has little or nothing to do. The right hon. Baronet said he would not rely upon statistics; but there can be no doubt that statistics prove this—that in those countries where capital punishments are not now, and have not been for many years inflicted, the lives of the inhabitants are at least as safe as they are in those countries where they are still inflicted. There can be no doubt that in the New England States of North America, in Tuscany, Belgium, Sweden, Austria, Prussia, and Prance—that in all those countries where capital punishments are rarely or never inflicted, human life is just as safe as it is in Spain, or in England or in Ireland—in the former country, where capital punishments are very frequent, or in the two latter countries, where they have been much too common. But our past legislation, I think, affords no proof of the advantages of capital punishment. I recollect a passage in a very admirable piece of biography—I mean the life of that most excellent man the father of the hon. Baronet the Member for South Essex, which bears upon this point. In the Life of Sir Thomas Powell Buxton, by his Son, that eminent man is reported to have stated, in a speech on this very question of capital punishments, that within the lifetime of persons then living not more than fifty or sixty offences had been capital—that this House went on increasing the number of capital offences until they amounted to 250, and that having reached that enormous amount, the Legislature found all its efforts ineffectual to repress the commonest offences by this punishment. And from 250 capital offences some twenty-five or thirty years ago, the House has very wisely come down until now practically we have only one offence which is punished with death; and there is a strong argument to be drawn from this fact—that whereas hanging men up at Newgate, by the dozen occasionally, was not sufficient to put down even common and minor offences, I cannot conceive how the same punishment can he effectual to put down offences which are committed under circumstances of intense passion in most cases, and under a condition of mind in which, I am quite sure, the deterring effect of any punishment must be exceedingly small. Now, hanging for horsestealing, or for forgery, or for burglary, or for coining, did not and could not suppress, or even prevent, the increase of those crimes, and the House has admitted it by abolishing the punishment. Well, then, how can it have an effect to put down the crime of murder, which is almost always committed under circumstances which shut out from the contemplation of the criminal the consideration of that which must follow from the offence? I am of opinion that the effect of punishment to deter from crime has been at all times greatly over-rated, and this is probably at the foundation of much of the error which has prevailed with regard to the measurement of punishment for particular offences. Now, take the cases which have recently occurred. I am glad this question has come on now, because of those cases, for they afford the best possible illustration for those who oppose the punishment of death. If the abolition of this punishment cannot be defended upon that most awful case at Norwich, I say our principles and policy are not worth defending at all. Now, take the case of the individual who suffered death the other day at Norwich. Does any hon. Member of this House believe that the threat of any punishment, either in this world or the next, could have deterred that man from the crime which he committed? It was evidently long contemplated. It was the crime of an educated man. It was a crime committed on calculation. It was the crime of a man of remarkable ability in some points of view. Every precaution was taken to escape discovery; and there can be no doubt whatever that all punishments which legislatures or courts of justice could have inflicted would have had no effect in deterring him from his grave offence. Take the case that occurred at Bristol, and the same argument will apply. The murder there was not premeditated. It arose from great aggravation. It arose from sudden impulse, when the opportunity offered; and there can be no doubt in that case, precisely the same as in the other, that the idea of the punishment was wholly shut out from the contemplation of the criminal. There are other cases to which I might refer where the same argument might be used. But now I would ask the House to consider what is the effect of these executions. The right hon. Baronet, if I understood him, admits that the effect of these executions on the public assembled to witness them is bad. But the object of a public execution is to bring people together. And they are brought together that they may see the awful punishment which the law assigns to certain offences. Now, we have it in the public papers that at the moment when that murderer at Norwich fell, there was a shout of execration from the thousands that were assembled. I ask the House whether that shout of execration did not arise from that feeling which is the source of murder—whether it did not arise from a vindictive feeling, out of which must necessarily have sprung the deed in his case—the very offence for which he suffered? There can be no doubt that among the twenty thousand persons who, we are told, were there assembled, a large number returned to their homes in some degree more ready to commit a crime of violence than they were before they had attended the execution. We have it upon the page of ancient writers, and I think it is especially mentioned by St. Augustine, that gladiatorial exhibitions and the execution of criminals in the circus had the effect of increasing crime—that they increased the ferocity of the people, and that the sight of those cruel acts made the people less merciful, and more inclined to the commission of crime. But that case at Bristol is one of a still more horrible character. I cannot conceive how any Government can continue, or wish to continue—I believe the right hon. Baronet does not wish to continue—a punishment which can lead to scenes so frightful and disgusting as took place at the recent execution at Bristol. What can be more appalling than the sight of half-a-dozen men dragging a woman of 18 or 20 years of age—a woman untrained, most ignorant, to some extent partly imbecile—dragging her to a public execution, and clergymen coaxing or exhorting her to walk quietly to the scaffold. Now, what could be the effect upon the multitude assembled to witness that execution? I do not believe there is a single Member of this House who can be of opinion that the effect of that execution upon any human being who witnessed it would be otherwise than most unfavourable for the very purpose for which these executions are assumed to take place. There is another very strong argument with regard to the publicity of these punishments. I think it invests criminals with a character which is bad for the criminal and for the public. There was an execution in Wales the other day—I think at Brecon. When the individual was convicted—when the jury had pronounced him guilty, or when the judge had sentenced him—some person in the court called out to him and said, "Now, Jem, mind you die game!" That was the expression of some person, a comrade it might be of his, who was in the court and saw all the awful scene. And the man did "die game," according to their views; and the sheriff, and the clergyman, and every officer connected with the execution of that criminal, I believe, would say that the effect of that single expression in court had been most unfavourable upon his mind—that during the whole period that elapsed between the trial and the time of his execution he was maintaining the resolution to "die game." He was not listening to the chaplain. He was not preparing himself for that tribunal before which he was so soon to be sent; and his accomplice, or his comrade, and such as he who witnessed the execution, would, of course, glory in the hardihood exhibited, and the defiance which this criminal bade to the law and to its terrors. But there is another point connected with this which I think important. Why is it that the newspapers give such great notoriety to these cases of murder? Why, chiefly because there is the death of a human being in the question. If the murderer was to be subjected to a punishment short of death, do you think your newspaper offices would have been crowded in all the towns of the country waiting for the newspapers with all the horrid particulars of the Norwich execution or the Norwich case? No. The murderer would be a murderer, but he would not be a hero; and you would find that that most mischievous appetite which is created under these exciting circumstances, and which among the feeble, or incapable, or vicious portion of the population brings on a repetition of the offence, would no longer be created and excited. Now, I have some cases of the results of that kind of excitement which I think are striking. Some time ago a young man in the town of Manchester—in the open street—shot a woman who was either his wife, or with whom he had been living as his wife, and who for some cause had left him. He was executed at Liverpool. Very shortly after a young man in the open street—precisely as in the former case—cut the throat of a young girl to whom he had been paying his addresses in the town of Stockport. Neither of them denied the crime. In fact, there were many people in the street at the time the offences were committed. Well, that young man at Stockport was also hanged. Almost immediately afterwards, a young man at Leeds stabbed a young woman to whom he was paying his addresses—stabbed under circumstances which made his escape impossible. He returned immediately to his house, and there could not for a moment be a doubt of his guilt. Since that there have been two other cases. I have not the particulars, but in one there was a murder followed by suicide, and in another there was an attempt at murder which did not succeed. Now, these cases are evidently all of the same class. They have been committed under almost precisely similar circumstances. They have followed in rapid succession; and I believe that the fact of the great notoriety of these cases—first of all, of the offence, then of the trial, then, and which is made still more notorious, of the execution, and all the horrible circumstances attending the execution—I believe the effect of this has been, to induce the commission of these offences in as great a number as I have stated. The right hon. Baronet the Home Secretary, in reply to my hon. Friend's argument as to the irregularity and injustice of this punishment, appears to me to have used arguments which are utterly fallacious. He says, my hon. Friend's punishment would not be more regular than this. I think the right hon. Baronet must know his argument was unsound. If you had a punishment short of that of death, it is clear you would not find men acquitted while there was a moral, I may say a legal, certainty of their guilt; and although there would still remain a difference in the guilt of criminals, as there is now, you would be able, in some degree, to apportion the punishment to the guilt. For instance, if the punishment was perpetual imprisonment, you could, if you thought fit, after a certain period, relax its rigours with regard to those whose offence was not of the blackest die, and you could continue it in all its severity to those who had committed offences of the very highest nature. But the right hon. Baronet must know that the present irregularity of punishment is a thing which saps the very foundation of your judicial system altogether. It is quite notorious that juries in many cases allow men to escape, of whose guilt they have a moral certainty. A friend of mine has a letter from a physician in a town in the north of England, in which he states that he knows that not less than four murderers are now at liberty in his district, every one of whom has been tried, of whose guilt there cannot be a shadow of doubt, and is not in the minds of the people; and yet they have been tried and acquitted, and acquitted on this ground solely, that men were on their juries so conscientious on this point, or so timid, that they seized upon objections which were not valid, and, rather than send these men to the scaffold, they allowed them wholly to escape. Now, upon the principle of my hon. Friend the Member for Dumfries, these men would not have escaped; they would now have been enduring a punishment commensurate with their crimes. But I would ask the right hon. Baronet's attention to one or two cases which have come very distinctly and painfully under his own notice, and I apologise to the right hon. Gentleman if anything I may say shall call up recollections that may be painful; but he will, I am sure, admit that this question is of so much importance that a Member of this House, holding such strong opinions as I do upon it, is bound to lay the whole case before the House, with the view of bringing about such a change in the law as he may believe to be desirable. Now the right hon. Baronet will recollect a case at Durham last year, in which two men were convicted of the murder of the Duke of Cleveland's gamekeeper. One of those men was hanged. The other was not. The ground taken was, that it was believed the shot fired by the one man produced the fatal effect. The evidence was to that effect. I have it from very good authority that not only the man who was executed, but his comrade who was reprieved, was of opinion that the selection had fallen upon the wrong man, and that the man who was hanged had not fired the shot which had taken fatal effect; and, I may add, that that also is the opinion of others who were interested in the case. I find no fault with the evidence, nor with the opinion of the Judge, nor with the decision of the right hon. Baronet, if it was fair to make a selection upon this ground; but I am bound to believe that the right hon. Baronet did shrink from the hanging of the two men upon the evidence; and that, under the circumstances, if one was reprieved, the other should also have been reprieved. But what was the effect of that execution? At this moment there are two men awaiting their trial at Durham for the murder of another gamekeeper, whose murder, it was said, was contemplated by the two men convicted last year; and there is a strong belief that the murder which has taken place this year has been in revenge for the sacrifice of the life of their comrade who was executed last year; and I know that persons who gave evidence last year on that trial have not felt they were so secure as before in their ordinary passing through the country, owing to the excited and irritated feelings which had been produced by the results of that trial. The right hon. Baronet will recollect another case—the case of a young woman who was convicted of a murder last year near this House, and who was not executed. Now, the right hon. Baronet was probably of opinion then, and may be now, that the reprieve of that criminal was not a course which, under the present state of the law, ought to have been taken. But compare the case of Annette Myers with Harriet Thomas, and you will see that to reprieve the former, and to hang the latter, is an administration of the law that cannot create respect for it, or any belief in its justice or impartiality. I was glad that Annette Myers was not hanged. I received a letter from the family of the soldier whom she murdered, requesting me to apply to the right hon. Baronet the Home Secretary, and to express a hope on their behalf that she might not be executed, and it speaks well for that family, that they had such a feeling; but it was a feeling that was participated in almost through the whole country, and the Home Secretary only obeyed the public sentiment in the course he took on that occasion. I believe it is a practice with the right hon. Baronet, and with Gentlemen holding his office, to refer those cases to the Judges where application for a commutation of sentence has been made. But how difficult it is to arrive at a proper conclusion with regard to these! There are fourteen Judges, I believe, who go circuit. Before the whole of these, I presume, at times these cases come. Here are fourteen or fifteen men to whom reference is made. They are not asked in the capacity of a jury, of whom a majority may decide, but one Judge is asked with regard to this case, and another with regard to that, and the opinion of one Judge varies very much from the opinion of another. Now, there was a man recently convicted at Newcastle. He was convicted of murdering his own child. The jury recommended him to mercy. The Judge asked on what ground. They said, on the ground of their hostility to capital punishments. The Judge observed that that was not a ground he could entertain. A deputation afterwards waited upon the Judge, who said that he would be delighted if they could suggest anything that would serve as a ground upon which he could recommend a lesser punishment. But suppose he was a Judge of another character—a man with strong opinions in favour of capital punishment—a man of stern and unrelenting character—then you would find that the right hon. Baronet from one Judge would get an answer that would justify a reprieve, and from another an answer of an opposite character, though the cases and facts might be precisely the same. Well, then, I say that a punishment which is so hostile to the opinion of juries—which places the Home Secretary in this painful, I will say this distressing, position—the execution of which depends upon the opinions of twelve or fourteen men of varying temperament—I say that a punishment like that is not fit for this age and country, and is one which, with our regard for justice and law, ought no longer to be retained and practised. Now, with regard to public opinion, the right hon. Baronet appears to me to be in some degree not willing to take into his view the strength of opinion on this question. The right hon. Baronet will recollect a case of execution last year at Monmouth, where nearly every householder and every male inhabitant sent a memorial entreating that the execution might not take place. [Sir G. GREY: It was not upon the merits of the ease; they objected to the execution taking place at Monmouth.] The right hon. Baronet says it was not upon the merits of the case. The memorialists did not wish it to take place at Monmouth; but if you took it to Newport you would have had a similar memorial from there. It was not because the people of Monmouth had a greater objection to it than the people of Newport or Abergavenny would have had that they memorialised. How many memorials has the right hon. Baronet had from Bristol? I am told that 3,000 women signed a memorial praying that Harriet Thomas might not be executed; that as many men did the same; that five different religious congregations also forwarded memorials; and that the mayor, the magistrates, and the authorities, I believe, of Gloucester also sent memorials relative to the same case. Surely this proves that public opinion is running very rapidly in the direction to which, I feel certain, the right hon. Baronet only wishes it might run faster, in order that it may call upon this House, in a voice not to be resisted, that this question may be settled in the only way it ever can be settled in a Christian and civilised country. An intimate friend of mine is very active upon this question—I allude to Mr. Gilpin of Bishopsgate-street—and when this question is settled, I believe that his name will be ever known in connexion with it. I have had information from him as to a largo number of meetings—probably fifty—that he has attended in various parts of the country. There has never been a question, however exciting, however interesting, which has gathered larger assemblies in the largest rooms in every city—not of passionate and hasty persons, ready to pronounce against the punishment of death, but of persons prepared to argue the question dispassionately, taking into consideration the statistics which the right hon. Baronet is disposed to cast aside; and from all these meetings there have come most unanimous declarations which attest that the public opinion is ripe upon this subject. Now, the right hon. Baronet has some difficulty upon one point. He has not faith in this House with regard to the question. He believes that in the course he takes he is acting in accordance with the preponderating opinion of Parliament. I do not say what the House of Lords would do; but I believe the right hon. Baronet mistakes if he thinks you would not go with him in abolishing the punishment. I believe, also, that five-sixths of the hon. Members of the House have not considered the question minutely, because it is not a party question. You must grapple with it. Why take it for granted that, because people have been put to death for generations or for centuries, you ought to go on hanging still? Recollect that "custom without truth is but agedness of error." We are about to discover that at this time of day, and in this country—with public opinion as it is—with the undoubted fact that public opinion in favour of the sacredness of human life, is ten thousand times more powerful to preserve it than all the terrors of the law; under such circumstances we shall come to the conclusion that this question must be settled, and that the death punishment will be abolished by the House if the right hon. Baronet will propose it. Suppose he were to come down with a proposition that the punishment should be abolished. What would be the result? I believe there would not be six men out of the 656 who would object to it—not a man who would move an amendment to it. It might be suggested that the measure should be temporary—an experiment for five or ten years—and I should be willing even to consent to that. Now, the right hon. Baronet has more influence in this matter than anybody else. He is, in his present high office, the one authority in the kingdom. His dictum would still the fears of the timid—the doubts of the hesitating. It would put an end to the indifference or opposition which prevails now in the House to a considerable extent, and, throughout the whole kingdom there would be an almost universal acknowledgment that the Government and the right hon. Baronet had acted in accordance with the intelligence and experience of the age, and that they had done that which was in accordance with common sense and Christian principle. Now, I have shown, I think, that statistics, so far as we have gone into them, do not prove that life is more secure in this country than in countries where capital punishments are not inflicted. I have shown that our past severity has failed; that we have had sixty capital offences, which number has been raised to 250, and has now been reduced to one; that the infliction of death did not deter from the common offences, and that it cannot be expected to succeed better in the case of the gravest crimes. I have shown that executions excite the passions which are the sources of murders; that the notoriety which is given to these cases is evil for the criminal and the public; that some guilty persons escape, while the innocent may suffer; and that the greatest irregularity and injustice inevitably prevail. Two cases which recently occurred—the one at Norwich and the other at Worcester—are illustrative of the truth of the proposition I endeavour to establish: the Norwich criminal was a much greater criminal than the one at Worcester—the one a hardened and a calculating murderer, and the other an almost imbecile, a wandering, incapable vagabond, to whom the leniency of the Crown, according to the opinions of great numbers in Worcester, might have been extended. But let me say that the right hon. Baronet is more interested in having this punishment abolished than any other man in England. The Judge upon the bench does not suffer so much as he. The jury do not suffer, because they decide according to fact. The Judge decides according to law; but the law gives to the Home Secretary a veto, which throws upon him the full, the awful responsibility of the execution of the punishment. No doubt, the right hon. Baronet has exercised the awful duties of his office to the best of his judgment and conscience; but how much more gratifying would it be to his feelings to be relieved from the responsibility attaching to such an office. It is on all these grounds, and assuring the House that I feel more strongly on this question than upon any other that can come before it, I have the greatest pleasure in supporting the Motion of my hon. Friend the Member for Dumfries.

MR. H. DRUMMOND

said, the hon. Gentleman who had just sat down had argued the question with his usual ability; but he thought he had the happiness to have heard the same speech before. ["No, no!"] Yes; he remembered precisely the same appeal to the right hon. Baronet—he remembered the same remarkable cases from Durham—and he remembered, too, the answer which was given to those cases at the time. The hon. Gentleman the Member for Dumfries, who began the debate, anticipated that in a short time the law enforcing capital punishments would be repealed. He confessed, he, for one, should not be surprised at it; for he saw every day increased morbid sentimentality, increased false humanity, and increased sympathy with murderers on every side. He had seen the petitions which came to the Secretary of State for the pardon of murderers with unbounded disgust; for he saw that, so far from any reverence for human life being manifested, it was just the reverse: there was a total indifferentism towards murder, and a sympathy with murderers. It was unfair in the hon. Gentleman the Member for Manchester to say that the right hon. Baronet the Home Secretary anticipated the time when this law would be altered. He (Mr. H. Drummond) understood him to say nothing of the sort. That murders had increased, there could be no doubt. They had increased not only in frequency, but in intensity; and he believed, that they had done so mainly because murderers were made heroes in that House; and because these debates, which had gone abroad, instilled into people's minds the idea that, after all, murder was not such a detestable crime as in the dark ages people were accustomed to think it. One argument used was, that murderers said they did not care for being hanged. He wondered if the people who used this argument were ever at school. At school it was common enough to hear boys say they did not care for being flogged; but at the same time they all knew very well that boys did care for being flogged, and that their fear of a flogging did prevent many offences from being committed. With respect to secondary punishments, which people were so anxious to substitute for the punishment of death, nothing could be so fatal as to look to public opinion, expressed at public meetings, as their ground of action. If they adopted secondary punishments, of course they must have places where secondary punishments could be inflicted. He had lately presented a petition to the House on this subject; and he wished the House to hear what people would say on the other side. The petitioners complained that, judging from the splendid buildings which were erected to carry out the cellular system, it was and must be a most costly outlay. Separate apartments were required, which should be lofty and spacious, well warmed and ventilated, with conveniences and even luxuries which were known only to the opulent; the diet, also, was required to be generous, in order to sustain the mind and body, and prevent them from wasting away in idleness and ennui. Now, no sooner would such establishments be built, than a mass of petitions would be poured into the House, as much as those that were now directed against the punishment of death. The hon. Gentleman who spoke last, said, that they might mitigate and modify the punishment for murder—that while some were confined for life, others might be liberated on their good conduct.

MR. BRIGHT

I did not say so. I said, it might be possible to relax the imprisonment with respect to hard labour or solitary confinement. I referred to no provision for their coming into society again—it is the present law that does that.

MR. H. DRUMMOND

begged the hon. Gentleman's pardon, as he had misunderstood him. They were told that this was not a theological question, and undoubtedly he was not going to talk theologically. But there was one plain sentence in holy Scripture, to which he could not but advert—" He that sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed." An hon. Gentleman had said, that they were not bound by the Christian religion so to act. No, certainly not; they might act in defiance of it if they pleased; but if they did, they must take the consequences; and these consequences, he believed, would be, that not only murders would be increased, but also deeds of violence.

SIR E. N. BUXTON

felt reluctantly bound to say that he was not prepared to vote for the Motion of his hon. Friend the Member for Dumfries, inasmuch as it seemed to him that they had not yet arrived at that point at which they could say that there was so great a difficulty and uncertainty in obtaining convictions for murder that they must abolish the punishment now attached to the crime. On the other hand, it appeared to him that there was a growing dislike amongst the people of this country to convictions in capital cases. He had observed instances of this in the county he represented, where some atrocious cases of poisoning had occurred. In one case, a woman charged with poisoning her husband was now at large; but so convinced was the prosecutor of her guilt, that he tried her again on a second indictment, and he (Sir E. Buxton) had no doubt upon his own mind that she would have been convicted if the punishment were not death. In a second case, there was a conviction; but again, in a third case, also that of a woman, there was no conviction. If they found that there was an increasing difficulty in getting convictions in cases of murder, they would thus be only adding to the evil by retaining the punishment. He believed it would be a much better check to crime to have a certainty of punishment in a diminished form, than a severer punishment if uncertain. While he could not assent to the Motion, he thought that before long they might, through motives of expediency, be obliged to come to the conclusion it involved. He entirely concurred in the remark of the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for the Home Department, that public executions were a great moral evil; and he would suggest, as public trials took place within the limits of a building, so should executions. It was well known that at Norwich a much larger number of persons desired to be present at the trial than could be accommodated; and he saw no reason why executions should not take place within the precincts of the gaol; so that although they would be public like the trial, very few could be present at them.

MR. BROTHERTON

said, that after the powerful and eloquent speech of the hon. Member for Manchester, he did not think it necessary to trespass beyond a moment on the attention of the House. The hon. Gentleman who had just resumed his seat, and the right hon. Baronet the Home Secretary, had told them that, in their opinion, the time was not yet come when the country ought to dispense with capital punishment. He would humbly ask what was the symptom whereby they were to know when that time would come? He had often heard it said that they were a Christian Legislature, and that they lived in a Christian country. But when he came to consider the important injunction respecting our rule of faith, he very much feared that they disbelieved the principles they professed, by not looking more to the reformation of society for the prevention of crime. It was fully shown and admitted that capital punishment did not prevent crime, and that it had a demoralising effect on those who witnessed it. It was the duty of the Legislature to act on and inculcate the principle of cherishing the sacredness of human life; for if they should disregard it, how could they expect the people, generally, to pay respect to it? He believed, although some of the Judges were favourable to capital punishment, that the improved education of the people had given rise to a strong public feeling against the taking away of human life. It was recorded of a judge having stated that a man who would cut down a tree would take away human life—and a man was hung for cutting down a cherry tree in Essex. Lord Campbell, in his Lives of the Lord Chancellors, related of Lord Loughborough, that he thought the change of burning to hanging would have the effect of awing those who beheld it, and deterring from the crime of murder. When it was the habit of judges to condemn to burning, public opinion was found to be very much opposed to it, as it was now opposed to hanging. He wished to see the punishment of death totally abolished. He believed that by such a measure crime would not be increased, while by it they would be acting in accordance with justice, humanity, and sound policy. After the eloquent speech of the hon. Member for Manchester, he (Mr. Brotherton) did not feel himself called upon to enter more fully into the question, but would give his cordial support to the Motion.

SIR G. STRICKLAND

entirely dissented from the opinion expressed by the hon. Baronet the Member for South Essex. He hoped to live to see the day when capital punishment would be nearly if not wholly abolished; but he hoped he would never live to see it take place privately. His horror of an execution would be ten times greater if it were to happen in a private manner. Prom an early period of his life he entertained a horror of capital punishment, but on grounds different from those taken by other hon. Gentlemen. Having been called to the bar, he went circuit for a few years, when lie became so deeply impressed with the imperfect character of all human tribunals, that he felt thoroughly convinced that in some instances the innocent had been found guilty, and were wrongfully executed. He had seen poor wretches in the dock struck with such terror at their position as to be unable to defend themselves. He had the satisfaction of seeing that state of things altered, and of having assisted in giving counsel to the prisoners, which was not previously the case. Still, when he considered that human tribunals must he imperfect, he thought they ought not to have recourse to that punishment which, if wrongly inflicted, never could be recalled. He believed that argument and public feeling were daily gaining strength in favour of the sacredness of human life; and he hoped the time was not far distant when capital punishment might be totally and safely abolished.

COLONEL THOMPSON

would submit, that the practical way to put an end to capital punishment, would be by setting about the preparation and improvement of some punishment not including death, and trying the effect of it on those cases or crimes which at present were spared from the actual execution of capital sentences. If this was proved effectual, there would be a disposition to trust the repression of murder to the same. But there appeared a total absence of such punishment at present, though there would be no difficulty in creating it. The public had not much confidence in transportation as now administered, even though declared to be for life; for there was always the idea abroad, that a criminal, by pretended reformation, would find some good-natured governor to send him back again. There should be a removal to some distant land, return from which should be made as hopeless as from death, with the single exception of innocence being subsequently proved. In this way the threat might be held out of cutting off from all that made life valuable, as effectually as by the rope, value four-pence, whose cheapness had been contrasted with the expense of penitentiaries.

SIR G. GREY

hoped the public out of doors would not, from the description of the hon. and gallant Gentleman, be induced to adopt the idea that transported convicts were sometimes sent home by governors, because no governor had the power of exercising the prerogative of mercy. Transportation for life could not be altered, except by the express act of the Sovereign.

LORD NUGENT

said, that if the supporters of the Motion wished for an argument confirmatory of their views, it was to be found in the actual state of crime at this moment. Not only statistics, but example and experience, were in favour of those views; so that the whole burden of proof rested with their opponents—first, that capital punishment had a tendency to repress crime; and, secondly, that crime could not be equally well repressed by any other punishment. He believed that the great majority of the Judges of the country were in favour of removing the punishment of death, and in corroboration of which, the opinions of Mr. Justice Wight-man, Mr. Justice Coltman, and Mr. Baron Richards, were opposed to death punishment. Mr. M. D. Hill was also of opinion that the punishment of death ought to be abolished; because, he said, if we did wrong, we never could atone for it. [Cries of "Divide!"] In deference to the wish of the House to go to a division, he would at once conclude by appealing to those hon. Members who might have any doubt on their minds to lean to the side of humanity, and vote for the Motion.

SIR H. VERNEY

said, that a quarter of a century ago, when acting with the father of the noble Lord who spoke last, on the Prison Discipline Committee, he felt as he now did as to the iniquity, abomination, and wickedness, of public executions. He held that they did not tend to repress crime, while they were abhorrent to humanity. He thought the Secretary of State should bring forward some Motion and test the feeling of the House upon the subject of some better mode for the punishment of criminals. A friend of his, a man of benevolent and humane feelings, attended the execution of Rush, in order to determine his mind on the subject, and he wrote to him to say that he was fully convinced that if men were no longer seen alive after their conviction, a much better effect would be produced on the public mind.

The House divided:—Ayes 51; Noes 75: Majority 24.

List of the AYES.
Adair, H. E. Heyworth, L.
Adair, R. A. S. Hobhouse, T. B.
Aglionby, H. A. Horsman, E.
Anderson, A. Lennard, T. B.
Barnard, E. G. Lushington, C.
Blake, M. J. Meagher, T.
Bright, J. Masterman, J.
Brotherton, J. Mowatt, F.
Clay, J. O'Brien, J.
Cobbold, J. C. O'Connell, J.
Cobden, R. Pilkington, J.
Cowan, C. Pryse, P.
Crawford, W. S. Robartes, T. J. A.
Devereux, J. T. Salwey, Col.
D'Eyncourt, rt. hn. C. T. Scholefield, W.
Divett, E. Sidney, Ald.
Ellis, J. Smith, J. B.
Fagan, W. Strickland, Sir G.
Fox, W. J. Thompson, Col.
Gibson, rt. hon. T. M. Thompson, G.
Greene, J. Thornely, T.
Hanmer, Sir J. Trelawny, J. S.
Hardcastle, J. A. Willcox, B. M.
Harris, R. Williams, J.
Headlam, T. E. TELLERS.
Henry, A. Ewart, W.
Heywood, J. Nugent, Lord
List of the NOES.
Abdy, T. N. Howard, Lord E.
Baldock, E. H. Jervis, Sir J.
Berkeley, hon. Capt. Keogh, W.
Blackall, S. W. Lacy, H. C.
Brooke, Sir A. B. Lewis, G. C.
Campbell, hon. W. F. Lewisham, Visct.
Clive, H. B. Littleton, hon. E. R.
Craig, W. G. M'Taggart, Sir J.
Dalrymple, Capt. Maitland, T.
Denison, J. E. Martin, C. W.
Drummond, H. Maule, rt. hon. F.
Duff, J. Maunsell, T. P.
Duncuft, J. Milner, W. M. E.
Dundas, Adm. Mitchell, T. A.
Dunne, F. P. Morris, D.
Du Pre, C. G. O'Connor, F.
Ebrington, Visct. Ogle, S. C. H.
Evans, J. Owen, Sir J.
Ferguson, Sir R. A. Packe, C. W.
Fordyce, A. D. Palmerston, Visct.
Granger, T. C. Parker, J.
Greenall, G. Peel, rt. hon. Sir R.
Grey, rt. hon. Sir G. Plowden, W. H. C.
Haggitt, F. R. Portal, M.
Hastie, A. Prime, R.
Hawes, B. Pugh, D.
Heald, J. Richards, R.
Heathcoat, J. Romilly, Sir J.
Herbert, rt. hon. S. Sandars, G.
Hildyard, T. B. T. Sibthorp, Col.
Hope, A. Somerville, rt.
Spooner, R. Verney, Sir H.
Stafford, A. Watkins, Col. L.
Stansfield, W. R. C. Wawn, J. T.
Stanton, W. H. Wilson, J. W.
Sullivan, M. Wood, rt. hon. Sir C.
Thicknesse, R. A. TELLERS.
Townley, R. G. Tufnell, H.
Turner, G. J. Bellew, R. M.