Rensselaer Union, Volume 1, Number 18, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 28 January 1869 — More Brutality. [ARTICLE]

More Brutality.

On I,»M Monday, our State was j again disgraced by /a brutal prize I fight, which came off in Tipton j county. Probably no State in tbeUnion it so utterly powerless to | prevent toese disgraceful occur- I anees asTndinna. In but one in- 1 stance, see believe, have the author-.! ltics interfered, to preventor break 1 up these Inhuman' exhibitions, and that was in the attempted fight i>c tween MikwJVL Cool, and Joe Co- j bviin, last summer. Our laws may i be defective in not particularly specifying that prizefighting w it bin the State.is a felony and uftiAng a. penally, but the statutes are more defective in not investing thgrreacg offlceVrofoomittPH :tml' tiifiliwhipiwith the authority necessary to break tip these’unlawful assemblies, and to prevent these systematic breaches of the peace. In the late tight the Sheriff of Tipton county appeared upon the ground w ith a pome of about thitky citizens, and commanded that the peace be kept. The bruisers and roughs pulled up the stakes—with the expressed determination of going into an adjoining county —and the Sheriff left the ground, the most of his pout, however, remained. As soon as the vulliant Sheriff turned h'u back the bruisers returned, reset the stakes on the ground already marked «>ut, and the figltt. went off with no further interruption.

It is to be hoped that our Legislature will promptly enact such laws as may effectually prevent the rccurance of such violations of order and common decency. There is not a county in the State where the Sheriff could not in ten minutes call around him r "a force sufficient to disperse all the roughs, thieves, bullies and cut-throats that gather at any one time, even though the fight is made up at Chicago or Cincinnati, and to arrest the principals. If .resistance was made, so much the better, for then a good excuse would be had for shooting down and ridding the country of a set of hardened villains, and the State be saved the trouble and expense of their apprehension, trial and punishment.