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Show 1 GETTING THINGS MIXED. It is curious how pooplo who aro or dinarily fair-mindod and squaro-doaling will squirm around and try to excuse or justify tho acts of those with whom thoy nro in closo friendship, or whom the' havo determined to support. An instance of this very human tendency is shown in a recent editorial from the Springfield (Mass). Republican. It deals with tho now notorious "whito slave" case in California, in which Diggs and Caminetti are the alleged criminals as follows: Tho prompt arrest of Diggs and Caminetti Cami-netti following their indictment shows how "perfectly ablo a Stato In to punish offenders against morals without weakly waiting for tho Federal long arm. One prime objection to stretching the "interstate"1 "inter-state"1 principle to matters which the Slates arc competent to deal with is that either such a debilitating dependence must develop, or tho Federal law3 will become be-come In great part dead-letter laws, to be enforced only when there is a clamor. In the latter case law nnd politics would become dangerously mixed, and Injustice would be done by erratic treatment, one case here and there being singled out of many for prosecution under a Federal law passed to meet some roal or fancied emergency. In the former case the logical logi-cal end would be a centralizing process by which the United States government govern-ment would be called upon to keep in motion a vast machinery of courts and police for the treatment of minor offenses of-fenses properly punishable under local laws, as well as for those special matters mat-ters which properly concern the National government. When ono recalls that tho indictment against these two accused men mado in the Stato jurisdiction is for a different offense altogether from the so-called "whito slave" infamy, one must be surprised that a paper liko our Massachusetts Massa-chusetts contemporary would consent to what is clearly a misrepresentation in the case. The Federal jurisdiction was invoked under the Mann "white slave" law, since Diggs and Caminetti, both married men, -wcro alleged to havo taken tak-en two high school girls from California Califor-nia over into Nevada for unlawful purposes, pur-poses, and the case thus 'became an interstate in-terstate one, and tho Federal statute would govcru. But the State case is quite a different differ-ent matter. These men are arrested under un-der the State law which provides penalties pen-alties for men who desert their families. Diggs and Caminetti are charged under that State law with the desertion of their families, and aro to be prosecuted under the State statuto which provides penalties for such desertion. The case is quite a different oue from that brought under the Federal statutes; and when our 'Massachusetts contemporary undertakes to mix the two and to assume as-sume that the State is taking up the same offense and prosecuting under the same charge as that embraced in the Federal statute, it befogs the matter altogether, al-together, and undertakes, perhaps without with-out knowledge, to give a deceptive turn to tho whole case. |