James Haughton

“ Gentlemen, intemperance and ignorance are the great promoters of crime. So long as these predisposing causes are allowed to exist, so long will the statistics of murder fearfully attest the inefficacy of the scaffold as a deterrent from crime. ”

“ For my own part, I conceive that a full justification of such a course is to be found in the fact, that innocent men have been found guilty and executed, the evidence of whose guilt was apparently so clearly set forth, that no man could have reasonable doubts on the subject. This is one of the grounds on which I contend that death punishment must ever render the conviction of the accused a matter of greater uncertainty, than in cases where that extreme penalty is not present to the minds of the jurors. ”

“ I would not convey the idea that jurors should not in all cases weigh well the evidence which comes before them; but it is a fact, which we may not set aside in the consideration of this question, that the irremediable punishment of death is one which many men will not consent to inflict upon any human testimony; which proves the uncertainty of any punishment for the crime of murder. ”

“ At all events, whatever may be the cause, we find, from the history of man in all ages, and in different countries, that the infliction of death punishment, attended, as it has necessarily been, with the excitement of an interest in the criminal, has had a tendency to call into activity this morbid feeling, and to place the lives and property of men in jeopardy, instead of affording them adequate security.
The death penalty is still resorted to in these countries in cases of wilful murder ”

“ In a word, our object is to do as much good as we possibly can, on the principles of our association, leaving a reasonable latitude for digression to our members; still expecting from them such an adherence to our specific objects, as that all the papers read before the Society shall be mainly conducive to these objects. I have endeavoured to keep this idea in view, and I believe I may say for the Council of the Society, that they are most desirous to receive papers from such members of the general body as may be disposed to aid, in that way, the useful ends we all have in view. ”

“ The "feelings of humanity," or some kindred sensations in the minds of jurors, have frequently—I might almost say universally, of late years—tended to render the punishment of our greatest criminals a matter of so much uncertainty, that there is good reason for supposing murderers are not unfrequently influenced by that consideration, when balancing the amount of chances in their minds, before giving way to their revengeful feelings. It often happens that jurors cannot bring their minds to be in any degree instrumental in the infliction of an irremediable punishment. ”

“ It requires no argument to prove that death punishment is not conformable to those principles, and that therefore, if we assume them to be correct, all such punishments should be abandoned. So long as human judgment shall be found fallible, some or all of those principles are outraged when we take the life of man. ”

“ It treats the subject in a masterly manner, and proves to demonstration that the "safety of society" would be best secured by the entire abandonment of capital punishment. Without at all referring to the moral and religious aspects of the question, it does seem to me extraordinary that, in the face of the most incontestible evidence in proof of the fallacy of a resort to violence for the prevention of murder, intelligent men are yet to be found who advocate its necessity. ”

“ It is to me matter of deep astonishment, how men, who believe in an eternity of punishment so severe that we have no words in which to convey an adequate idea of its horrors, are found to be the advocates of hastening their guilty brethren out of life, and away from the possibility of repentance ”

“ The solid reasoning, sustained by statistics and experience, is all on the side of mercy, and yet men still advocate and pursue the vengeful course. It is true, they endeavour to conceal from themselves that revenge forms any part of their feeling towards the criminal. ”

“ Upon this question of capital punishment, it does seem to me that there is amongst those in this land, who favour its entire abolition, a want of that zeal and activity which so great a work calls for at their hands. ”

“ Lest any should say that the decrease of crime, as evidenced by the foregoing returns, has been caused by a better system of police deterring men from the commission of crime, I regret being obliged to disabuse their minds of that idea ”

“ Again, let us view the effect of the principles I am now advocating, when carried into operation in India by Sir James Mackintosh, who says, in a charge delivered at Bombay in 1811, "Two hundred thousand men have been governed for the last seven years without capital punishment, and without any increase of crime." ”

“ While we are sleeping, criminals are being constantly hurried out of existence; and instead of being ever wide awake, and actively engaged in taking the film off men's minds—a film which is woven by prejudice in favour of ancient usages, and by erroneous views of our duty to God and our fellow man—we are only aroused to energetic action when some horrible event takes place ”

“ But, till the advocates of Christianity shall have become universally much better acquainted with the true character of their religion, than they have ever yet been universally, we must always expect that every branch of study, every scientific theory, that is brought into notice, will be assailed on. ”

“ Some may doubt the force of my conclusions, and allege that it is contrary to common sense to suppose that men will be more effectually deterred from the commission of great crimes by milder than by severe punishments. ”

“ I gladly avail myself of these enlightened sentiments of that eminent man, and I apply them to the subject I have now in hand, in the fullest confidence that men will yet, in this light look, upon the present opinion of many, in relation to scriptural declarations upon the subject of death punishment. ”

“ On the other hand, however, the friends of reform should be careful that no indecision, or want of perseverence on their part, should give a sanction to unnecessary delay in the accomplishment of such alterations, from time to time, in these customs and practices, as man's increasing knowledge, advancing civilization, or purer and more enlightened views of the Divine government demand. ”

“ In Tuscany, too, where death punishment was for a length of time entirely discontinued, the reigning grand-duke declared, after an experience of twenty-three years, that the alteration, "instead of increasing the number of crimes, considerably diminished the smaller ones, and rendered those of an atrocious nature very rare." Under the ascendancy of Napoleon, who was a man of violence, and appears to have had no faith in any law except the law of violence, death punishments were re-enacted ”

“ For forgery—a crime which some mercantile men would still visit with the extreme punishment of the law—in the ten years ending December, 1829, 64 criminals were executed, and 746 committed. In the next ten years there were none executed, and the committals were 731.
I might readily multiply facts of a like nature with the foregoing. Indeed, I believe that in no single instance in which death punishment has been repealed, for any crime, in any country, have any other results been realised. ”