State of New York (Volume 3); Messages from the Governors (Paperback)

Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: At the January term of the general session of the peace of St. Lawrence county, of the last year, William Kirby was indicted for the murder of John Hughes, aged four years; and also for the murder of Frances Kirby, his daughter, aged two years; and at a court of oyer and ter- miner, held in September last, in that county, he was tried and convicted upon the indictment for the murder of John Hughes, and sentenced to be executed on the sixth of November following. From the representation of the judge who presided at his trial, and the district attorney who prosecuted on the part of the people, and on an examination of the testimony transmitted to me by the latter gentlemen, facts are presented sufficient to induce a belief that the prisoner was insane when he committed the alleged murder. I have, therefore, deemed it my duty to postpone his execution until the second day of April next, in order to annex the condition to his pardon, of imprisonment in the state prison during his natural life, under a full conviction that it would be dangerous and unsafe to the community to suffer him to go at large. But as the inspectors of the state prison were not authorized to receive him without a law for the purpose, I have thought proper to represent his case to the legislature, so that necessary measures might be adopted to enable the officers of either of thestate prisons to receive and retain him, according to the contemplated condition upon which he may be pardoned.11 in working out the issues involved in an election. The committee thought that a change of policy, by abandoning congressional nominations would reduce " the influence of this state to a level with that of the smallest members of the American confederacy." The Tennessee resolutions were accordingly disapproved, and a conc...