forward as prosecutors; and thus, in consequence of the very same excessive severity of the laws, many wrongs go unavenged, and many offenders escape with complete impunity.

This is very much the case with respect to forgery, which, in spite of the numerous sanguinary examples annually made, is far more prevalent than it was under the COMMON LAW, when punished, like other frauds, as a misdemeanour. If the dreadful punishment of death could repress a crime, how effectually ought forgery to be repressed! What hecatombs of human victims have been offered up upon the scaffold to what is called the commercial interests,' or rather to the great idol Mammon, from the Perreaus and Dr. Dodd down to the last unfortunate culprit who expiated his offence at Newgate!-and yet all this waste of life-all this work of extermination, does not prevent in any degree the perpetual recurrence of the crime, and the perpetual exhibition of similar acts of human sacrifice.

Mr. PEEL, it is true, proposes an alteration in the law; but that alteration goes to perpetuate the infliction of the punishment of death in all cases of forgery touching negotiable securities for money. Here the veneration for Mammon overcomes every sentiment of humanity and sound justice;-that deity, when once offended, is only to be appeased by human blood ;—his system of justice is energetic and compendious: it weighs not degrees of criminality in the balance-it cuts away all inequalities of guilt with the

same axe.

The influence which this exterminating principle has exercised over the parliament of England, is recorded in a vast number of statutes relative to forgery, all of which avoid nice calculations upon the gradations of crime by the indiscriminate infliction of death!—Morning Herald, Thursday, April 8, 1830.

BANKERS opposed to the punishment of death

for forgery.

We direct the attention of our readers to what took place in the House of Commons last night relative to the law of forgery, on which we have not, at present, space to offer any comment. The statement of Mr. F. BUXTON will be found peculiarly interesting to those who are anxious for a judicious amelioration of the barbarous and ineffective severity of the law. Morning Herald, Friday, April 9, 1830.

[The statement referred to in the foregoing paragraph was as follows:- -]

HOUSE OF COMMONS.-FORGERY.

Mr. F. BUXTON said he had received several letters from most ' respectable individuals in different places, expressing their strong ' desire that the capital punishment should be avoided. The first was 'from a banker in Gloucester, in which he stated that, for his part (and ⚫ he knew such was the sentiment of many others in the same line of • business), he would rather be exposed to any loss than prosecute for 'the capital offence. The next letter was from a respectable clergy'man in Glasgow. The following is an extract :—

The bankers to a man have been favourable. I am given to ' understand that there is hardly a bank in town (if, indeed, there be ⚫ even one) that has not been in circumstances in which they have ❝ forborne to prosecute, rather than expose the offender to the certainty, ' or even the risk of death; and this forbearance has been exercised 'sometimes in circumstances of an aggravated nature.'

The third was from a banker in Newcastle, and was as follows:"I now wish to offer you my testimony on the subject of forgery, ' in confirmation of your sentiments expressed in the House. My mind ' has long been distressed with the present law. I gladly embraced the 'first opportunity to do what I could for its mitigation, and lately took 'some pains in forwarding a petition from hence, praying that in all 'cases the penalty should be short of the forfeiture of life. The ‹ leading partners of the banks in this town signed, under the prac'tical conviction that the severity of the law was not a protection 'to us, but tended to increase the crime. I also called on our prin'cipal merchants, who concurred in the same sentiment, and signed 'it. This opinion may be said to be universal in this district."

Legislative testimony in favour of mild Criminal Laws. We recommend to all advocates for the preservation of the sanguinary principles of our Criminal Code, the perusal of the following sentiments contained in the statute of 1 Mary, cap. 1,―That the state of every King consists, more assuredly, in the love of the subject towards their Prince, than in the dread of laws made with rigorous pains; and that laws made for the preservation of the Commonwealth, without great penalties, are more often obeyed and kept, than laws made with extreme punishments.

These maxims, which deserve to be recorded in letters of gold, and to be conspicuously suspended on the walls of parliament for the instruction and admonition of our lawgivers, were the production of an age when, in the opinion of our modern philosophers,' the march of intellect' had not begun, and of a reign that is stigmatized in history.

Happy had it been for the nation,' says an able writer on the laws of England, if the subsequent acts of her reign, in matters of Religion, had been correspondent to those sentiments of herself and parliament in matters of State and Government.' Happy would it have been for the nation, we say, if our legislators had always kept those sentiments in view, and, in matters of penal enactment, had never deviated from the spirit of them! Then would a vast number of vindictive and merciless statutes, which have since disgraced the character, and tarnished the civilization of England, never have been passed. Then should we never have heard of forgery being visited with the punishment of murder; for all the statutes, numerous as they are, which make that offence a capital crime, have been enacted since the time those just and humane sentiments went forth to the world with the concurrent sanction of parliament and the throne!

It is well observed by Mr. Justice BLACKSTONE, that 'sanguinary laws are a bad symptom of the distemper of any state, or, at least, of its weak constitution.' The laws

of the Roman Kings, and the twelve tables of the Decemviri, were full of cruel punishments-the Porcian law, which exempted all citizens from the punishment of death, silently abrogated them all. In this period the Republic flourished. Under the Emperors severe punishments were revived, and then the empire fell. * * * * *—Morning Herald, Monday, April 12, 1830.

Capital Punishment no protection to the Banking Interests.

To-night the law of forgery is to come under discussion once more in the House of Commons. Our readers are aware that the argument principally relied on by the advocates for the continuance of the present sanguinary law, is the protection which, they allege, it affords to the commercial transactions of the country, and more especially to the banking interests.

On this argument the policy of the law has been defended, in opposition to those dictates of reason, humanity, and religion which teach us that punishment should never be vindictive, and that the sacred principle of justice should not degenerate into vengeance.

Long experience has clearly proved that the excessive severity of the law, instead of affording additional protection, counteracts the very object for which the distinctions of crime are disregarded, and the feelings of humanity outraged.

The great prevalence of the offence of forgery proves that the infliction of capital punishment has exactly the opposite tendency to that which the admirers of Draconic legislation anticipated. It has the effect of increasing instead of repressing a crime which, though it may be impossible to eradicate it by any law, would not be so frequent as it is, if the punishment were more proportionate to the moral guilt of the offence.

One of the greatest signs, we can perceive, of the advanced civilization of the age, is the increasing aversion

1830.]

A FORGER'S LIFE SAVED BY HIS JURY.

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to the unnecessary shedding of blood by the sword of penal law.

We were always of opinion, and we frequently expressed it, that the banking interests were not protected, but severely injured, by the legislative cruelty which devoted the fraudulent imitator of a one-pound note to the death of a murderer! What with the disinclination of parties to prosecute, and the pious perjuries' of juries *—who sometimes think it a less crime to violate an oath, than to have the stain of human blood upon their consciences—the law of forgery seems especially devised to stimulate and encourage that class of offenders whom it professes to exterminate.

* The following letter to the Editor of the Morning Herald, inserted April 22, 1830, furnishes a single illustration out of several that might be given.

'THE CRIMINAL LAW.

'MR. EDITOR,-I have for a long time been a humble, but warm admirer of your humane and strenuous efforts to mitigate ' the sanguinary principles of our criminal code, and of your con'stant endeavours to press upon Mr. PEEL the necessity of doing away entirely with capital punishment for forgery.

'I subjoin the following anecdote (not to mention many others ' which I might adduce) to prove that laws attended with too severe penalties, defeat their own object; and to urge strongly ' on the notice of the public the principles which you so ably 'advocate.

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'Some years ago a man was tried at Carnarvon for forgery to a large amount on the Bank of England. The evidence was as satisfactory of the guilt of the prisoner as possible, and brought 'the charge clearly home to him. The Jury, however, acquitted 'him. The next day the same individual was tried on another ⚫ indictment for forgery. Although the evidence in this case was ⚫ as conclusive as in the former one, the Jury acquitted the prisoner. The Judge (Chief Baron RICHARDS), in addressing 'the prisoner, expressed himself in these remarkable words :"Prisoner at the bar-although you have been acquitted by a Jury of your countrymen of the crime of forgery, I am as con