1883-11-19im

The Palladium of Labor, published in Hamilton, was a weekly newspaper, an organ of the activist organization, the Knights of Labor.

On November 19, 1883, the Palladium published a letter written by a young, highly-opinionated and very literate young woman. The letter was prompted by two things, subjects which interacted.

First, was the judgment and sentence rendered in the case of a Toronto man charged and convicted of murder.  Second was the case of Maria McCabe, a Hamilton servant girl, who had given birth out of wedlock and who had subsequently murdered his baby.

The impassioned latter follows :

“To the Editor of the Palladium :

          “Sir, - Girls have nothing to do with the making of the laws by which they are governed, consequently are not expected to criticize them in anyway. However, I cannot help remarking the many inconsistencies of British law as administered in Canada.

“I could mention scores of cases disposed of in Ontario with the past few years, but I will refer only to two at present. The first is that of the Queen vs. Andrews, tried at the York Assizes last week. A man named Andrews deliberately shot and killed on named Maroney, the evidence shows that it was a clear case of willful murder, and so thought the jury, but when they returned their verdict of willful murder with a recommendation to mercy attached, the court would not accept it, but sent them back to their room where they immediately discovered that the accused was not guilty of murder but of manslaughter, and he, Andrews, was sentenced to four years in the Penitentiary. He was then tried for shooting at a policeman with intent. Found guilty and sentenced to one year in the Penitentiary, the second term to run concurrent with the first, which means if I mistake not, four years for the two offences., the second trial being only a farce or a few yards of red tape, for although found guilty and sentenced to twelve months, it did not add a single moment to his term of imprisonment. There is a man who kills another and attempts a second without any cause or provocation whatever and all he receives is four years confinement.

“The other case is that of the unfortunate Maria McCabe, which is attracting so much attention at the present time. She stood accused of willful murder, acknowledged her guilt and was sentenced to be hanged by the neck, etc.

“Now, sir, there is something very inconsistent about those cases; in the Toronto one, the man who committed the foul deed is a lazy, gambling hoodlum, his victim was an industrious young man, the only support of a widowed mother, and three or four small brothers and sisters, and the cowardly villain who murdered him in cold blood receives the same punishment for the awful crime that was the other day inflicted on a man for stealing a calf.

“Unlike Andrews, Maria McCabe, after suffering untold agonies of body and mind, destroys her babe and is doomed for death – for whether she is reprieved or not – she will, to all intents and purposes, be consigned to the tomb, for a helpless young girl of eighteen, without friends to intercede for her, might, in a sense, as well be laid in the grave as locked in the prison cell, for she is dead to the world in either case, and death, I should think, would turn to her a happy relief. But God forbid that she should die on the scaffold – unnatural as her crime is, she has already suffered ten times the punishment inflicted on Maroney’s murderer – a man without a single redeeming quality or the shadow of an excuse for his crime, while she has every excuse that could be offered under the circumstance.

“Perishing with cold and hunger in the streets, without friend home or habitation; laughed and jeered at by the unnatural scoundrel, father of her infant; told by our unfeeling and charitable Chief Magistrate to look to that father for support; and finally thrust on the street with her babe in her arms in the dead of night by the woman, Foster, under such circumstances, it is a disgrace to civilization to hold her accountable for her actions, but Mayor Magill and the woman Foster ought to be held out accountable for theirs. If the latter has any respect for her reputation, she certainly ought not object to give her reasons, first for preventing the removal of the child to St. Joseph’s Convent when the sisters had agreed to take it; second, why did she turn the mother and child out of her house at midnight; and third, why did she swear at the Coroner’s Inquest that she wanted to adopt the baby, but the mother wouldn’t give it to her, when her conduct clearly shows that she did not want to do anything of the kind. Answers to these questions are in order, and I hope Mrs. Foster will attend to it. The Mayor should also be called on for an explanation, respecting the part he played in the tragedy if he could do nothing for the girl. What, I ask, is the House of Refuge for; to my knowledge, many women in Maria McCabe’s condition have found shelter in it, then why, I pray, was she excluded? Her destitute and helpless condition would have been sufficient passport to admit her if the Mayor was what all Mayors ought to be, white-souled, generous-hearted gentlemen, instead of heartless, attenuated, fossil remnant, which his conduct in her case has shown him to be.

“When I commenced to write, I intended to say something about the father, but I guess he is hardly worth speaking of, he certainly is not a man, and it would be a libel on the brute creation to rank him as one of their number, for he lacks the necessary instinct to provide for his offspring, and is disqualified in consequence.

“If I ever write to you again, I will show you wherein organization would benefit the girls, not only respecting remuneration for their labor, but for cases of sickness and destitution. Do you doubt but that Maria McCabe would have been provided for if the girls of this city had been properly organized? I don’t; for I am certain she would have been cared for whether she was a member or not.

“Now Mr. Editor, in concluding, perhaps I ought to apologize, as it may seem to some of your readers very naughty of a girl to call things by their proper names, but if it is hereafter to be one law for men and another for women, I think it is high time that the latter raise their voices to the highest pitch, and, as the saying goes, ‘call a spade a spade.’

                                      Yours, etc.

                                                A Canadian Girl.

November 16, 1883.¹

¹“Correspondence : Law and Justice : To the Editor of the Palladium”

Palladium of Labor.    November 19, 1883.