VOL. XIII, NO. 14
JUNE 8, 1972

Attention All Graduates:
Crime Is Your Responsibility!
Recently, the United States Supreme Court upheld a decision of the California Supreme Court which has now abolished the death penalty. In other words, it is possible for a person of any age in the United States to kill anyone he wishes or commit any crime he so desires feeling certain that he will not be put to death for it, but instead get a life of imprisonment. With the many intelligent lawyers and due to the tiny loop-holes in our laws, he feels quite certain before he commits a crime that he will not be behind bars very long.

It is a documented fact that there are practically no major crimes within a country where capital punishment is used. Of course, there are some, but compared to the United States and other countries who have abolished the death sentence it is but a tiny percent of what our totals are.

Recently during President Nixon's trip to China, it was pointed out through television and the press media, that no-body in China locks their bicycles. Why must we lock our bicycles outside MW? - in a community where we have so much - and why do they not lock them in China? To steal a bike in Des Plaines results in a gentle slap on the rump. To steal a bike in China means a long prison sentence, and everyone in China knows it and as a result there is almost no bicycle stealing.
 If China can cut out bike stealing and most all crime by using stiff prison sentences, it seems to be telling us something when comparing with our way of doing things in this country.

To get law and order back in the streets, we must plug the loop-holes, stop the bribes, try very hard to eliminate corruption in the government, and amend the Constitution if necessary, to regain some semblance of order here.

If nothing more ever comes from President Nixon's trip to China, the unlocked bicycles should be impressed in the minds of those who want to abolish capital punishment.

It is so simple to make the laws tougher, to catch the criminal and make him pay for his crime. This is what Governor Wallace has on his mind. Whether you back him is not the issue. What we all should do, as soon as we are old enough to vote, is to back the candidates that will see to it that law and order are restored. Some of the black community leaders in Chicago say that the only way to do away with violence in the communinity is to punish the criminals severely. Some of them think crime would come to a screeching halt within six months.

Most of you graduates are already old enough to vote. When you go to the polls, why not back the candidates who want to restore law and order?