John Winthrop Quotes
It would not be safe to set him at liberty, neither have we sufficient ground for us to put him to death.
In 1643 the Massachusetts Bay Colony wanted to dominate the region. Miantonomi, the Narragansett Indian Chief had a large well organized tribe who while friendly with the English were very independent. The Mohegan Indians, close allies of the colonists captured Miantonomi and turned him over to the Colony. Governor Winthrop’s actions have always been a disgrace to the justice of the Colony. Winthrop then turned him over to his traditional enemy, Chief Uncas, of the Mohawk to remove him from the boundaries of the Puritan Colony and then tomahawk Miantonomi to death. Winthrop actually sent several Puritan Englishmen to “see the execution for our more full satisfaction.” Among Miantonomi’s “evil” deeds was the fact that he gave Roger Williams, a religious and political dissenter from Winthrop’s Colony and religious “heretic”, a large tract of land (Providence) for his colony.
John Winthrop, 1588-1649, Governor, Massachusetts Bay Colony, Statement, 1643
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Einstein had changed his mind. He like almost everyone else at the time favored the death penalty, but in 1927 came to the new conclusion for the same reasons that many American politicians stated 70 years later. He had no compunctions against capital punishment for murderers who were dangers to society, but the potential error of the justice system led him to oppose state sanctioned execution. At the time the number of errors in capital cases that had been demonstrated were few. But as a scientist, Einstein knew that all human endeavors were prone to error. He was a strong law and order supporter however—see {588606}.
It is surprising that these ideas would come from one of the most autocratic powerful monarch in the world at the time. However there were many very liberal influences on her from Europe. This set of proposals she even sent to Voltaire to get his feedback and criticism.
Vallandigham was urging Union soldiers to refuse to fight and serve. Lincoln had to approve all the death sentences of deserters from the army and there were few duties that troubled him more … so much so that he even violated the 1st Amendment responsiblities he had sworn to uphold. Based in this precedent and others, President Woodrow Wilson jailed critics of the First World War including the labor leader Eugene Debs.
John Winthrop was an English Puritan lawyer and one of the leading figures in founding the Massachusetts Bay Colony, the second major settlement in New England following Plymouth Colony. Winthrop led the first large wave of colonists from England in 1630 and served as governor for 12 of the colony's first 20 years. His writings and vision of the colony as a Puritan "city upon a hill" dominated New England colonial development, influencing the governments and religions of neighboring colonies.
