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Show Object Leaaoru j RECKLESS automobile driving .continues to claim a heavy toll In human life In various sections of the country. Jn spite of safety campaigns cam-paigns the record of fatal automobile fatalities is increasing rather than decreasing.' Every community com-munity In the country is afflicted with the prob- lem of reducing the loss of life attending reckless driving. ' Beyond Insisting upon the observance of the. traffic laws and advocating prison terms for offenders, they have not progressed far. The average- community is relentful. It coldly cold-ly announces thatrison terms will be enforced. And then when a manconvicted of violating .the law, it relents. The authorities hold the prisoner pris-oner for a few hours and turn"" him loose. The sentence becomes a Joke and wedoubt if it makes any serious Impression on. the nan who has . taken unnecessary chances with innocent lives. There is, however, one city judge who has assumed all of the moral obligations of his office in the determination to reduce the loss of life attending shattered traffic laws. Judge Charles T. Bartlett of Detroit is offering of-fering some object lessons to Detroit motorists who find themselves in court for. violating the traffic laws. The other day he conducted a party of twenty-eight speeders through the city receiving receiv-ing hospital, where they viewed twenty young-trr young-trr uhn hid been maimed and crippled In auto mobile mishaps. The judge offered a sound lecture on the effects of reckless driving while the speeders gazed upon the little victims of their practice. . This object lesson, however, did not spare them from punishment, for they were led away to begin jail sentences which had been imposed im-posed before the tour started. It is reported that the prisoners were more reconciled to their sentences , after viewing the plight of the J'.ttle victims. ' The next batch of speed fiends to come be- fore Judge Bartlett were taken to a morgue, ' where the bodies of a child, a woman and five men, victims of reckless automobile driving, were . being prepared for burial, commanding the prisoners to raise their right hands, the judge administered ad-ministered this oath: ' "You do solemnly swear as under oath that ; you will not 'only carefully observe the traffic laws here In the future, but that you will spread ; the gospel among other motorists against this dastardly crime." They too were led away to begin prison . sentences for violating the traffic laws. If the motorist could be given a meptal picture of the misery,, the sorrow and distress that accrue to ' reckless driving he would be more careful. There Is a lasting punishment in the policy of the Detroit De-troit judge, and it shows conclusively that he -is more Interested In checking the' heavy toll of traffic accidents than in punishing motorists or In drawing his salary. The country at large should have mors judges of his caliber. |