Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 6.djvu/715

 PUNISHMENT TO FIT THE CRIME 70 1

for the extinction of two lives, whatever those lives may have been. Nor does the substitute for legal execution, imprison- ment for life, satisfy any of the true ends of punishment : no life is restored for the life that was taken ; the opportunities for the "reformation" of the criminal are the same as if he were legally executed ; and as a warning to others it is decidedly less, for the ultimate pardon of the prisoner is almost certain, and he knows it. On the other hand, life-imprisonment intensifies the wrong already committed, because the burden of the murderer's sup- port and detention falls on society a burden that must be meas- ured in terms of individual life. Furthermore, in imprisoning the murderer for life (unless he be condemned to "separate and soli- tary confinement," a punishment which is unusual, as well as most cruel and soul-destroying), his vicious life is more than likely to contaminate the lives of others, who also become a burden and a prey on their fellows. And thus again is society wronged. The natural, and therefore the proper and ideal, punishment is to use the life of the murderer in such a way that the lives of human beings may be saved and, at the same time, that all the ends of justice shall be satisfied. How can it be done ?

Of the total number of deaths throughout the world at least one-half are caused by diseases that should be absolutely under human control. In the census year 1889-90 the total number of deaths in the United States was 872,944. Of this number 102,199 died of consumption, 76,496 of pneumonia, 74,711 of diarrhceal fever, 18,594 of malarial fever, 27,058 of enteric (typhoid) fever, 5,969 of scarlet fever, 41,677 of diphtheria and croup ; and all of these are germ diseases. Nearly 350,000 souls in a single year a sacrifice to these germ diseases alone ! And there are others. Every one of these germ diseases can be pre- vented or controlled, if the destroyer of the germ is known and can be applied in time. The death-cries of these annual hundreds of thousands of souls should move us to stop at no half-hearted measures of relief. Almost all, if not all, of these germ diseases have been produced experimentally in animals, and serums which destroy or render harmless the germs in animals have been dis- covered. With the exception of diphtheria (a disease whose