A DRAMATIC AND TERRIBLE MURDER
It Reveals a Hideous Picture, but the Picture Cannot be Hidden
The murder of Stanford White, an architect of great reputation, by Harry Thaw, a young man, inheritor of many millions, compels the attention of the entire nation. IT COMPELS COMMENT.
It is not pleasant to speak harshly of a man scarcely cold in his grave.
But beyond the sentimental respect felt for the dead, and beyond the horror of dealing with the shameful details of lives unmentionable, there is a duty to the public in the face of great danger that cannot be ignored.
The man in jail for murder is a young man of weak character in a certain way but of good instincts and impulses. The worst that can be said of him is that he is the victim of heredity, of a false system, of vast inheritd wealth, destroying the nessecity for self-control, taking away all the incentive upon which a good life is usually based.
Almost every human being in this country has discussed this terrible killing of one man by another. And a newspaper which speaks to millions, and for millions, cannot avoid a share in the discussion.
It is a case that for intense interest and deep disgrace has not been equalled in the history of this country.
It is not a mere murder. The flash of that pistol lighted up depths of degredation, an abyss of moral turpitude that the people must think of. because it reveals some of the hidden features of powerful, reckless, openly flaunted wealth.
