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M. H. de YOUNG

The following item of interest to you appeared in the San Francisco

Chronicle on Apr 11 1915

"BY RIGHT OF SWORD"

Leigh H. Irvine's Able Defense of Capital
Punishment.
UNDER the title "By Right of Sword," Leigh H.
Irvine, the well-known California journalist who
has made a special study of penology for years,
makes a strong defense of capital punishment. By liberal
citations from history he shows that fear of capital
punishment is the only deterrent to the graver crimes.
"Why is it," he asks, that "in Chicago headquarters of
the Anti-Capital Punishment Society of the United States
there were x62 murders in 1914 in a population of two
and one-third millions, while in London, where the hemp
speedily follows the murder, there were only thirty-six
murders in 1914, with a population of almost six millions."

Irvine does not ignore the fact that the terrible punishments
for petty crimes in England in the eighteenth century
did not reduce crime; but what he does assert is
that for the brutal murderer the only safe remedy is
to rid the earth of him as speedily as possible. He denounces
the sickly sentimentality shown in sending
flowers to criminals and in demanding that their
lives be spared so that they can be reformed. He shows
that the reformation of the confirmed criminal is a myth.

In conclusion he urges all who have the well-being of
the Nation at heart to unite in opposing the anti-capital
punishment craze which is responsible for the large increase
in brutal mruders in this country. If the English
method of speedy trials, no newspaper publicity and swift punishment were adopted here there would be a great
reduction in crime in this country. Mr. Irvine's little
book is ably written and deserves a wide circulation.
(New York: The Baker & Taylor Company; price$1.5c net.)