Page 87 - The Circle of Life

used up to 1996 in Jamaica I hear, to a cane (light or heavy) in this country

because that "reduced the punishment to school boy level" and will not "leave
scars which criminals can be proud off."

A man above the age of 30 years and political prisoners could not be flogged.
Yeah, amazing world we live in and it is horrifying when you read these things in

the elegant legal English of the old law books. A different time I suppose for I
mean no disrespect towards the old Judges and lawyers. I am very much against

this type of thing and frequently had to watch judicial floggings in my time in the
Police. You can read about it in my book Mean Streets - Life in the Apartheid

Police. I can tell you, it is not nice and I don't care to see it again. Luckily and
rightfully it is now written out of our law books but of course not in all countries.

Whilst true that under Charles the Second a husband could give his wife

"moderate correction" that meant only to confinement to his house and in fact
unambiguously excluded the right of a beating with or without a stick thinner

than his thumb. Do not suppose now as some clever idiot once asked me if this
means she could be walloped with a thicker stick then? No. She could not be

walloped at all. It is a legal myth and never existed in law to start with.

Naturally different laws existed for slaves for slaves were not seen as humans

but as possessions like a wagon or bale of cotton and thus legally treated like an
animal. Since they also could be (and were) used to work for the South during

the American Civil War the Union declared run-away slaves as contraband and

refused to hand them back to their owners in the South as they should have if
following the usual rules of war of the time. Now that I can tell you was
exceedingly clever and I bow to the general who thought it out. Major General

Benjamin Butler, commander at Fort Munroe in Virginia, that was in case your

history teacher failed you.

The thing is President Lincoln was unimpressed for it also strengthened the case

for secession in law by the State which he denied in law and kept on denying. To
do otherwise would have been to acknowledge the right of States to withdraw

from the Union which they joined freely. That would have acknowledged the
existence of the Confederacy as a separate country. It is rather complicated but

the fact is the slaves were kept and then freed and then given the vote. I say

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