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Show .?K. - n i i in ' ( H mere name of the Rus-sian Rus-sian secret police has al-mii al-mii ways inspired a feeling of pATI ireac' in every honest vft y- American heart. Yet the jfcLdg assassination of the gam-! gam-! bier Rosenthal in New York revealed a murder- W ous ring that makes the czar's spy system appear tame by compa rison. Furthermore, it seems that the rest of the nation, which shuddered with virtuous horror at the Manhattan crimes, has good reason to feel ashamed. asham-ed. Compared to Russia, this joyous land of freedom averages more than three murders to one. Worse than Russia by far Is this country in its reckless disregard for human life; and It is piling up homl-ld..recoxai.s.ucJua-wtAhatjen... Insurance experts are beginning to wonder if our vaunted civilization is progressing as fast as we think. It is always an "open season" for unpopular Russian officials. Pot shots at them are never held to violate the ethics of true sportsmanship. Aside ' W HE mere name f tne Rus- v' sian secret police has al- J ;V ways inspired a feeling of if. ?jt t ' 7 P- Wdr1 dread in every honest C J p'fliCT 7'r Wn v'? American heart. Yet the lr SaiL ' WfMlri assassination of the gam- PI) 6-it,J tt,. I )S. ! WCWt "j S bier Rosenthal in New K A t!,'f'X W&$MWi AA York revealed a murder- ..sJi&vWffl ln( ous ring that makes the i kKWrnQS isJ czar's spy system appear tame by sggaBgV 0VM- Furthermore, it seems that the rest yrt5rr 5 of the nation, which shuddered with V ' srfyffi WVrrrUfP II 0?Y virtuous horror at the Manhattan Wlf ftj$f jS YOAA crimes, has good reason to feel asham- IX 'WwVJTS L$C$VX !$ ed. Compared to Russia, this joyous ) W'WT li land of freedom averages more than LX-s iirVvW bvstf three murders to one. f MC, )' i'JJF. -VrtvAj Worse than Russia by far Is this 7 JlMtfiM'l fYA SEl52 country in its reckless disregard for -f MmmL lSiVl human life; and It is piling up homl- tgl f WfjMMy, "jUMJLU . ld..recoxai.tlwjua.JatAhat.en..; ..jL fwmW,m'W ft WlcS Insurance experts are beginning to M 2? 23 'WvMk VZ&f XuAVT " wonder if our vaunted civilization is Ly WVmK ttfffl - XVrtV. progressing as fast as we think. pj? '''XjY unpopular Russian officials. Pot shots S iSj -41 at them are never held to violate the V &MW$MX V-pf - ft ethics of true sportsmanship. Aside j from them, however, the Russian is not usually looking for human game. When It comes to' real execution, a New York gunman of the good old-days old-days before Lieutenant Becker -was "convicted would put the ordinary nihilist ni-hilist in the class of sparrow shoot-Vers. shoot-Vers. For real deviltry, the . nicely manicured 'murderers of the Second avenue coffee houses were In a -class by themselves; the rough-necked. Iong-bearded Russian agitators, who knew no better than to throw , the primitive and unwieldly bombsr could never expect to rival their records. ': Barring nihilists" and anarchists, however, the great mass of Russians are hot murderers at heart. - By far the greatest proportion of the popula--tion is composed of ignorant peasants, who drudge along as best they may with an extra - portion of food and drink on feast days. They are stolid individuals, with a tingle of pessimism pessim-ism and melancholy as the, common heritage of the Slav race. Considering that almost exactly one official a day is brought down, the Russian marksmanship may be held to be fairly good, in view of the primitive primi-tive methods and weapons. In the body of the population, though, the homicides are not greatly, if any, in excess of those of England. For the. five years 1907 to 1912, according ac-cording to figures recently1 given out by the statistical department of the ministry of the interior, there were 7,716 killings, an average of 1,543 annually. an-nually. With only 298 homicides a year to her 35,000,000 people, England Eng-land is one of the few nations with a record as low or lower. On the other oth-er hand, America, with about 3,000 slayings per year in her "registration area" alone. Is at the top of the life-taking life-taking nations. ' . : Just how many murders there -are In this country in a year has never been definitely ascertained. It is known, however, that, in the 53 per cent, of the population Included in the states that keep accurate vital statistics, the ratio of killings per 100,000 of population has ranged from 5 to 6. In the big cities it has gone as high as 8.3. Judging from the known to the unknown there must be at least 5,000 to 6,000 persons slain every years. - For Instance, during 1911, there were 1,300 lives taken in our thirty largest cities, giving the high-water ratio above quoted. In other words, there are- almost as many persons killed in our big towns as in the whole of Russia. In the decade ending with 1910 there were nearly 10,000 lives taken In these same cities, or three times as many as occurred in England In the same length of time. On this point F. L. Hoffman In a recent article in the Spectator, an Insurance In-surance journal, said: "The comparison brings out In startling star-tling contrast the disregard of human life in the TJpJted States at tbe present pres-ent time. The subject fs obviously one of most serious importance, not onTy to life Insurance companies, but also to the public at large, and, granting grant-ing the defects in the available statistics, statis-tics, there can be no question of doubt buy that the American homicide rate is exceedingly high and that the rate Is on the increase. A condition -of this kind Is not compatible with the common assumption that actual pro- THE MURDEROUS RECORD OF AMERICA COMPARED WITH ' . .. . THAT OF RUSSIA AND OTHER NATIONS. Murders In Russia for five years (1907-11) 7,716 Average yearly number of murders in Russia 1,543 Murders in the registration area of America (about 53 per cent of the total population is included In the area keeping vital vi-tal statistics) for five years (1905-09) " 12,198 Average yearly number of murders in the registration area of America 2,439 Average rate per 100,000 of population of murders In registration registra-tion area of America for five years (1905-09) 5.5 Average annual number of murders In America for five years, estimated at 5.5 per 100,000 of population (latter 93,000,000) 5,115 Ratio of murders In America to murders in Russia, over 3 to 1 Germany's ratio of murders per 100,000 1,86 England's ratio of murders per 100,000 of population 0.9 Total number of murders In England In ten years (1900-09).. 2,982 Average annual number of murders In England In ten years (1900-09 298 Total number of murders In registration area of America In " ten years (1900-09) 16,077 (Returns for first five years probably Incomplete, as are most of our early vital statistics.) Average annual number of American murders In registration area for ten years 1,607 Ratio of American murders of registration area to English murders mur-ders for ten years 5 5-7 to 1 (Figured on a basis of ten years' English population, amounting to 339,-160,000, 339,-160,000, and ten years' total of the registration area of America, amounting to 376,925,000.) ' . - gress l" eing made in the United States in all that is being summed up under the term civilization and national na-tional welfare." Undoubtedly our worst record, which moved Mr. Hoffman to make such a severe assertion, is that of our cities, and, according to the statistics sta-tistics compiled for his article, this follows: HOMICIDE STATISTICS FOR 30 AMERICAN AMER-ICAN CITIES. 1901-I9M 1911 Rate per Rate per No. 100,000 No. 100,000 Memphis, Tenn 556 47.1 85 63.4 Charleston, S. C... 159 27.7 25 . 42.3 Savannah, Ga 154 25.6 25 87.8 New Orleans, La... 702 22.2 83 24.1 Atlanta, Ga 215 17.1 48 29.3 LoulsvUlel Ky 356 16.5 36 15.9 Nashville, Tenn 132 13.6 40 85.3 St. Louis. Mo 804 12.6 108 15.5 San Francisco, Cal. 343 11.2 44 10.4 Cincinnati, Ohio .... 328 9.4 Chicago, IH 1,659 8.4 203 9.1 Spokane, Wash 55 8.0 3 2.7 Seattle. Wash 119 7.6 20 7.9 "Washington, D. C 210 6.8 31 9.2 Manhattan and The Bronx. :N. Y 1,249 5.1 197 6.9 Cleveland. Ohio .... 231 4.9 60 8.6 Pittsburgh, Pa 243 4.9 50 6.3 Providence, R. I.. 87 4.S ' Boston. Mass 283 4.6 33 4.8 Dayton, Ohio 44 4.3 8 6.7 Brooklyn, N. Y 583 4.2 61 3.6 Baltimore, Md 216 4.0 27 4.8 Reading, Pa 32 4.0 7 7.2 Philadelphia. Pa. .. 529 3.7 66 4.2 Hartford, Conn 24 8.3 4 4.0 Buffalo, N. Y " 109 2.8 25 6.8 Minneapolis. Minn.. 71 2.7 11 3.6 Newark. N. J 68 2.3 ' 6 1.7 Rochester. N. Y 43 2.3 14 6.2 Ililwaukee, Wis. ., 56. 1J Jl 2,g Totals, 9,672 6.9 1,300 8.3 The further we go the worse the record gets. Nor Is it strange that we reach a point where as Mr. Hoffman Hoff-man says, we begin to have grave doubts as to whether our vaunted civilization is all that it Is cracked up to be. Counting enly the 30 principal cities, the average ratio per 100,000 of population popu-lation has increased from 5 since the decade ending with 1891 to 7.2 for the 10 years ending with 1911. The maximum maxi-mum so far was reached in 1907, when the ratio rose to 7.8. Such a showing, indeed, moved our former ambassador to Germany, Andrew An-drew D. White, to declare some years ago In a speech to the students of Cornell University, of which he used to be president: "My own Btudies on the subject, which have now lasted through years and have been made in all parts of the Union, convince me that we lead the civilized world, with the exception, excep-tion, perhaps, of Lower Italy and Sicily, Si-cily, in murders, and especially in unpunished un-punished murders. "In proof of this you have only to consult statistics for the last 15 years, which show that the number of murders mur-ders has risen in proportion far beyond be-yond that of the Increase of population popula-tion and from about 3,000 a year to close upon 10,000. Also that of recent years only about one homicide in 74 has been capitally punished." While there were more than 1,650 murders in American cities in 1911 there were In all the Nation less than a hundred executions. When It comes to a section study of murder, the south, with its large colored population, leads. ' While in actual numbers Chicago Is at the head of the "murder cities," its ratio is far eclipsed by some of the smaller towns below it. Lowest of an ratIosare shown by the eastern clUes, 1? of which during 191 1 had 442 homicides or 5.2 per 100,-000 100,-000 of population. Much worse were th.g central municipalities, six 0f which showed" 391 sTaylugs of 9 per 100,000. Just a shade better were the three biggest western townB, with 67 killings or a ratio of 8.5. Away the highest was the southern group nine of which produced 400 casualties' reaching the terrible rate of 20 per 100,000 or one for every 5,000 of their population. |