FULL TEXT: New York, Feb. 17. – Few propositions of a legislative nature have aroused more interest than the ones for which Commodore Elbridge T. Gerry, New York’s famous yachtsman, humanitarian and society leader, has just become sponsor, and which is nothing more nor less than the establishment of the whipping post in the Empire State. Wife beaters are the malefactors singled out in particular as the target for the statutory fusillade. The State Legislature in March begins a series of hearings accorded by special resolution to the advocates of the measure. There seems to be every prospect of its final passage. Governor Morton is understood to have no objections to the idea of an experiment.
Yet
it should not be thought that this whipping post proposition is intended as a
local measure simply. The Gerry society has long contemplated an agitation
national in scope, the end of which is the extermination of the wife-beater. The
stocks and pillory, after long relegation to the domain of obsolete things,
promise again to become familiar objects. The Commodore has received unexpected
support in this new crusade of his. From every State in the Union have come
resolutions by humane societies expressing hearty sympathy with the object of
the bill.
In
spite of the experience of the little State of
Delaware, which has maintained a whipping post from Colonial days, the
country knows nothing of the methods of our ancestors. Whipping in the
colonies, according to our chroniclers, was a very familiar mode of penal
correction. New England particularly favored it, the less heinous offences
against society being visited by the lash with inflexibility rather than
severity. The stocks, the pillory and the whipping post were things as
commonplace as bread and butter. In Massachusetts whipping was daily practiced,
but Commodore Gerry in support of this proposition of his. Whipping was the
usual punishment for Quakers in New England without distinction of age or sex,
and here again the Commodore makes a variation on the ancient plan, for only
men will be placed in his pillory. Men and women were tied to the cat’s tail,
in what Howard Pyle calls “those day,” and scourged from town to town. Now they
will be scourged in prison. Nor will the new scourging be as drastic as that of
former times was. For women were driven through seven settlements in the fin de
siècle of the seventeen hundred years, receiving ten lashes at intervals on
their bared backs, “though the weather was biting cold and the snow deep.” At
one place two bystanders, expressing sympathy for the poor woman, was put into
the stock to suppress their ardor. Nay, we read that at Cambridge, Mass., a
woman 65 years of age was cast into jail without food and with nothing to lie
upon. This was her preparation for the agony of the scourge. A friend brought
her some milk, when he was fined and put into the same jail. The old woman was
whipped through three towns. It seems she was a mother-in-law.
Now
numerous are making to head off the Commodore’s crusade by circulating
thrilling accounts of these horrors and by dwelling upon the austerities of the
Prudential blue laws. But the numerous advocates of the whipping post are
pointing out that all these needless atrocities will be eliminated from the new
administration of the punishment. Much importance is attached by the humane
societies throughout the country tyo the bill now before the Legislature of the
Empire State. For efforts are being made to legalize the pillory in eight other
States, and the fate of the Gerry bill will settle that of all the others with
similar intent.
“The
very point raised against the introduction of the whipping post,” said
Commodore Gerry, when he was asked to give his views of the controversy, “is
the one we deem most weighty in its favor. It is pointed out that whipping a
human being is most inhuman and barbarous. It lends, we are told, to destroy
all sentiments of humanity and to brutalize us by familiarity with this degrading form of suffering. Exactly.
Now wives are beaten daily by ruffianly husbands, and we find that no ordinary
form of punishment avails to wipe out the evil. Here, then, we have the very
condition against which the opponents of the whipping post complain. Clearly,
then, it behooves us to end this as speedily as possible. It can be ended only,
we think, by giving these malefactors a taste of their own medicine. We deny
that the whipping post tends to degrade to brutalize any community. It is dread
that the community will deteriorate in altruism as a result of the spectacles
afforded by legalized chastisement. These arguments, which are advanced in the
best faith and from the highest motives, I am sure, do not regard the
brutalizing influence of that illegal beating now on the increase. That is the
beating we must put an end to in the principle of fighting for peace when it is
necessary.”
[“Whipping
Posts In The East. - Commodore Gerry’s Society Is Advocating Them – Views
Of Humanitarians. - Why They Think The Pillory And The Stocks Are
Destined To Become Familiar Objects Throughout The Republic. – The Gerry Bill
The Beginning Of A National Crusade. – Condign
Punishment.” (syndicated, Batchelor, Johnson & Batchelor), Salt Lake
Tribune (Ut.), Mar. 3, 1895, p. 14]
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►• You have been told that before the rise of feminism in the 1960s that domestic violence against women was tolerated by society as acceptable behavior and was not taken seriously by police and the courts.
You have been lied to. The people who told you these
lies were paid to tell them you. In most cases you paid your own money (taxes
and tuition fees) to be lied to.
Here is one of countless pieces of evidence that demonstrate
the truth.
►•►• To see more eloquent, vivid
evidence proving the lie and giving you the truth, see:
►19th Century Intolerance Towards Domestic Violence
► Treatment of Domestic Violence Against Women Before 1960 – this post collects cases classified by the form of punishment or sentencing (whether judicial or through community action)
No, the claim that laws created by males were for the benefit of males is false. Yes, the "Rule of Thumb" myth has been proven to be a Marxist-feminist hoax, taking an ancient English common historical notation published in the 18th century and extrapolating it into unsupported claims that 18th and 20th century United States communities, courts and legislatures (laws on the books) were in agreement with the18th century historical notation (Blackstone).
***
“[O]nly since the 1970s has the criminal justice system
begun to treat domestic violence as a serious crime, not as a private family
matter.”
From the entry: “Domestic Violence” on encyclopedia.com
This claim has been proven to be false.
***
[2171-7/27/21]
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