HUNGER CONQUERS.
He Fasted Too Long for Tired Nature's Needs.
G. Henry
Stratton was until early in the fall a meat cook in the Messenger House in
Cortland. Among his other acquirements he had the faculty of abstaining from
food for long periods of time. He had a record made in Buffalo of fasting for
30 days.
About the
first of October Stratton, after undergoing a thorough course of training left
Cortland, went to New York, entering upon a fasting trial at Huber's Fourteenth
Street Museum. From October 5th until Nov. 12th, 411/2 days he went without
taking anything into his stomach except water. Last week Thursday morning he died
in Bellevue Hospital. Stratton's fast at the museum ended Monday afternoon Nov.
16th. Four days before the close of the fast by the advice of physicians champagne
in small quantities was given him.
The Mail
and Express gives this account of the events succeeding the close of the fast:
"Monday morning when the fast was ended, he refused absolutely to take any
food. When the physicians tried to force him to eat, he stuffed a handkerchief
in his mouth. I will not eat until I have fasted fifty days,' said he. He was
taken from Huber's residence, 107 East Thirteenth street, to Bellevue Tuesday
noon in an exhausted condition. He was placed in one of the medical wards, but
from his actions the physicians found that he was also suffering from
alcoholism. He was then transferred to the alcoholic ward. Dr. Hollister
refused to say whether Stratton's death was due to exhaustion or alcoholism.
Dr. Douglas, of the insane pavilion, thinks that death was due to exhaustion, although
alcoholism might have hastened his demise.
The
autopsy was made by Deputy Coroner Donlin at the Morgue Friday afternoon, and
alcoholism was said to be the immediate cause of death. A brother A. S. Stratton, of No. 70 Pine street, Brooklyn,
called at the hospital in the morning and said that he would take charge of the
remains.
The news
of the death of Stratton had not reached the District Attorney's office when a Mail
and Express man called. Assistant District Attorneys Charles E. Simms, Jr., and John D. Lindsay, looked up the
authorities bearing upon the case, but could find nothing which would warrant
the prosecution of the dime museum managers. The decision of Chief Justice Folger
in the celebrated Cowley case, the eighty-third New York, would cover the death
of the faster if he had been a minor. Cowley had the custody of children in what he
represented to be a charitable institution. He starved and neglected them and
was sent to prison for the crime. He was bound by the law to care for these children.
"So
far as I can see," said Mr. Simms, the museum people were not legally
bound to supply Stratton with food. There was a moral obligation to be sure,
but that does not furnish the grounds for a criminal prosecution."
"Mr.
Lindsay said: I might see a burglar at work, but I could not be prosecuted for
neglecting to hinder him. I might see a child fall into the water and drown,
and make no effort at rescue, yet the law could not hold me responsible. This
man Stratton abstained from food voluntarily. It can not be argued that it was
a case of suicide, and that the museum managers were accessories to that crime,
for the reason that suicide was not intended, and fasting is no more a crime
than such tests of endurance as bicycle races and six days go-as-you-please
affairs."
The First Assembly District.
(From the
Syracuse Evening Herald, Nov.24.)
The contest
over the Member of Assembly in the First Assembly district is making itself
felt all over the State. The latest development is perhaps the most noteworthy
of the series. It is the presentation of charges to the Governor against County
Clerk Cotton by William B. Kirk, member of the Democratic State committee from
this district, and the summoning of the Clerk to a hearing before the Governor at
Albany to-morrow. These charges are given elsewhere in the Herald to-day.
It is
evident that County Clerk Cotton finds himself so unpleasantly involved in this
matter because he followed the advice of George N. Kennedy, a Justice of the Supreme
court, whose partisanship has outrun his political acumen. Mr. Cotton as
secretary of the Board of County Canvassers is a ministerial officer, but he
took counsel with Justice Kennedy as to a plain clerical duty. No one, we are
confident, thinks for a moment that he has committed any willful wrong, and he
is simply unfortunate in having such an adviser as Mr. Kennedy.
Mr. Kirk's part in the matter is entirely political.
As member of the Democratic State committee for the district, he was naturally
chosen to sign the affidavits in this purely political move on the part of the
Democrats. They are seeking by resort to technicalities to gain a party
advantage. And Mr. Kirk, as the official head of the party in Onondaga Cortland
district by virtue of his committee position, takes the formal action.
And the
Republicans have Justice Kennedy to thank for the present complications. In his
partisan readiness to relieve the anxiety of Rufus T. Peck over the Senatorial
vote, he ordered that the Canvassers complete at once the count for that office,
without waiting for the returns to be sent back for correction. He succeeded in
his purpose to have Mr. Peck declared elected. Next, when the Canvassers, obeying
his instructions not to have the returns corrected, proceeded to canvass the
vote for Member of Assembly, and to declare the result on the face of the returns,
he again issued a mandamus, taking exactly the opposite ground, and ordering that
the returns be corrected, in order to arrive at a political result that pleased
him.
It is
fair to say that Justice Kennedy is endeavoring to make himself the Canvassing
Board, its official members simply carrying out his instructions. He has, we
understand, advised the County Clerk in private, and he has used expressions in
public that already show him to be a partisan ready for any political emergency.
His attempt to intimidate the chairman of the Board of Canvassers by threatening
him in a matter entirely foreign to the case in hand called for the rebuke
promptly administered to him by the chairman's counsel, and the happening was a
most extraordinary one. It is lamentable that a Justice of the Supreme Court so
soon to retire from his judicial position should leave such a record of partisanship
behind him. The Republican managers chose not wisely when they had resort to
George N. Kennedy, J. S. C.
As for
the merits of the contest between Mr. Munroe and Mr. Ryan, we are confident
that the people of this county, irrespective of party, will admit that a plurality
of the votes for Member of Assembly were cast for Mr. Munroe. Whatever may be
the outcome of the struggle now going on, that conviction will remain in the
minds of Democrats and Republicans alike.
The new
ballot law is a splendid one, but it is not perfect because, in the first
place, some voters are not using brains enough in voting under it. The uproar
in Sullivan county over Member of Assembly and in
Dutchess county over State Senator is directly attributable to careless voting.
To a certain extent the trouble in Onondaga county is traceable to the same cause.
Voters must wake up and cast correct ballots if they would see less difficulty in
canvassing the vote. If the present contests serve such purpose they will not
have been in vain. And notably in this First Assembly district fight has it
been shown that many inspectors of election are either ignorant, stupid or
careless. They should not hold their office if they cannot perform its plain
duty correctly. They ought to
know enough to write a name correctly
when it is in plain print
before them. They ought to know
enough to fill out blanks plainly
directed. A suitable civil service examination would be a good thing for
not a few Inspectors of Election in
this county.
COUNTY
CLERK COTTON.
He
is Summoned to Appear Before Gov. Hill and Answer Four Serious Charges.
SYRACUSE, N, Y., Nov. 23.—[Special.]— To-day, County Clerk George G. Cotton was
served by a special messenger from Albany with a copy of an order citing him to
appear in Albany Wednesday, November 25, at the executive chamber, at two M.,
to answer to charges of misconduct in office. He is a bitter partisan, and it
is charged that he has used his position for partisan purposes. The petitioner
is ex-Mayor and Democratic State Committeeman William B. Kirk, a gentleman of high
standing and influence.
There are four specifications. They are distinct
and clear. First, that he omitted official endorsements on the ballots. Second.
that he assumed illegal and unwarranted authority in issuing illegal and
erroneous directions to inspectors and ballot clerks, by which ballots cast
might be identified. Third, that he exceeded his authority as secretary of the
board of canvassers; and fourth, that "he changed, or caused to be changed,
in various important respects the election returns" filed in his office.
The latter is a serious charge. It is stated that there is evidence sufficient to
convict him on that alone.
[By Associated Press.]
SYRACUSE, NOV. 23.—The county board of
canvassers met at noon, to-day, and then adjourned until 4 o'clock in the
afternoon. At 4 o'clock they came together again, but transacted no business.
Something came from Gov. Hill later. It was in the form of summons to County
Clerk Cotton, informing him that charges had been preferred against him for
malfeasance in office, and that he should go before the governor in Albany, on
Wednesday afternoon, at two o'clock, to answer to the charges.
The charges against County Clerk Cotton were
made upon the affidavit of ex-Mayor W. B. Kirk, of this city. There are four counts
in the charges. The first alleges that County Clerk Cotton purposely mixed the
ballots delivered to the town clerks of the towns of Camillus and Tully,
thereby marking them and destroying the secrecy of the ballot. The second count
charges that County Clerk Cotton refused to deliver a copy of the certificate
of election voted by the canvassing board to Patrick J. Ryan, Democratic
candidate for member of Assembly in the First district, upon application. The
third count charges that County Clerk Cotton wrongfully instructed the
inspectors of election in instructing them to affix their signatures to the
stubs upon the ballots. The last count charges the county clerk with tampering
with the returns, changing their face and with allowing members of the
Republican county committee to have free access to the returns during the
absence of the members of the board of canvassers.
Kennedy
vs. Kennedy.
(From the Brooklyn Eagle.)
The Democratic Board of Supervisors of Onondaga
County on Thursday received a peremptory order from a Republican Judge named
Kennedy "not to make any correction on the face of returns, but to declare
the result as those returns correct or incorrect, [as] might indicate."
The Board of Supervisors literally and instantly obeyed this order, with the
result of declaring the election of a Democrat by a plurality when, in point of
fact, a Republican appeared entitled to the seat, if ballots intended for him
but incidentally misspelt were counted, as they ought to be, in his favor.
On Friday the same Republican Judge solemnly
overruled himself, reversed his order and issued another one to the
Supervisors, directing them to do what they were engaged in doing, when he stopped
them by his original mandate. They are to reconvene on Monday and are to allow to
the Republican candidate the misspelt ballots which were intended for him.
The only moral to be drawn from the Onondaga
incident is that Judge Kennedy was too quick on the trigger in his first order in
the presumed interest of his own party, and had solemnly stultified himself in his
second order, in the interests of justice and common sense, as well as
incidentally in the interests of his own party.
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