LIQUOR-SELLER THE CRIMINAL.

White Ribbon, Volume 22, Issue 258, 18 December 1916, Page 6

LIQUOR-SELLER THE CRIMINAL.

Judge Pollock, in passing sentence upon a murderer, gave utterance to the following remarks: “Divine and human law declare, Thou shah not kill. You stand before the bar of justice confessing to having committed the revolting crime of murdering, in cold blood, the woman you promised to love, honour, and protect. Another crime, that of attempted self-destruction, could justly be laid at your door. The innocent babe which came to bless your home has been robbed of a mother’s tender care. You having pleaded guilty, now await the sentence of an offended law. “Your only excuse in mitigation i that you were drunk when you committed the deed —a plea which can only be received to save you from the gallows. Liquor-Seller the Criminal. “I do not know, and, under the present state of our laws, I never want to know, who sold you the l.quor, under the influence of which you committed this unnatural crime. Let that man’s conscience bring such remorse that its energising power will never let go, until the largest possible reparation be made. “Whoever he was, and wherever he may be at this sad moment; whether his place of business is in the wel adorned and highly decorated room, where tempting viands appeal to the taste; where sweet music delights the ear and lulls to sleep the reasoning faculties; or whether it was in the lowest, dirtiest, man-abandoned, Godforsaken and death-dealing charnel house of despair, where only abides thoughtless and sullen greed for gain, it matters not; before the bar of God, if not of man, he stands alike with you morally responsible for this horrible crime. “The trouble is he is not here with you to receive a merited punishment. “The statute says ‘All persons concerned in the commission of a public offence, whether they directly commit the act . constituting the offence, or aid, or abet in its commission; or who by fraud, contrivance or force, occasion the drunkenness of another for the purpose of causing him to commit ,anv crime, are principals in any crime so committed.’ “If your partner in this offence were here, he would plead by way of

defence that he did not ‘bv fraud, contrivance or force’ occasion your drunkenness —a plea which would have to be sustained. “How much longer will the Courts be deprived of authority to do complete justice between their fellowmen? An enlightened and longsuffering public will some day, and that very soon, rise in the majesty of its power, and demand that the Legislature strike out the words ‘by fraud, contrivance or force’ and ‘for the purpose of causing him to commit any crime,’ and boldly declare that he who in any manner sells intoxicating liquor to another as a beverage, under the influence of which a crime, whether of murder or of some lesser offence is committed, is equally guilty as a principal in any crime so committed. Such a law would distribute the blame, and place it upon all those responsible for the crime.”