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THE GREEN BAG

women, but the former are seldom and the latter never executed. In five of the twentyseven states of Mexico, and in one of the three territories, the penalty of death is legally abolished. Even where the death penalty is nominally in operation, it is very seldom applied. Of two hundred and fortysix applications for Executive clemency in the Federal District, during the twenty-one years, 1881-1902, only twenty-one were refused. The penal code of Guatemala pro vides the death penalty for five offenses without regard to the sex of the condemned, but no woman has ever been legally exe cuted in the republic, and only one male criminal within fifty years. One might almost conclude that the death penalty for women is at the present time an essentially Protestant institution, so seldom is it applied in Catholic countries. In Teu tonic but Catholic Austria, no offender be longing to the sex of the Virgin is ever regarded as a criminal, no matter how dia bolical the nature of the offense committed. Female murderers are always sent to Neudorf, a convent only a few miles from Vienna. While most of the Catholic clergy are strongly in favor of the death penalty, at least as applied to male murderers, it is nevertheless precisely in Catholic countries that the repugnance to the judicial killing of criminals is strongest. The United States

being neither a Latin nor a Catholic country, the question naturally arises, " Why should a purely physical or sexual difference be tween male and female murderers be set up as a barrier to the administration of jus tice?" Again: "Why should a female who has proved herself to be devoid of all the moral attributes that normally pertain to ' the gentle sex,' be regarded as outside the provisions of the penal code?" The same argument that is brought forward against the hanging of a woman is applicable also to male criminals. ■ If the people who cry out against the hanging of female murderers are willing to concede that the deliberate killing of any and all unarmed and properly guarded human beings is out of harriony with the spirit of modern civilization, and inconsis tent with our present knowledge of the causes and cure of criminality, then their protests are justifiable. If, on the contrary, they believe in the justice and necessity of capital punishment for male murderers, whether incorrigible or not, it is clear that their protests against the hanging of female murderers are based upon sentimental, rather than upon humane, practical, or scientific grounds, and may, therefore, con sistently be ignored by the chief executive, or the board of pardons, of any state. Reno, Nevada, March, 1907.