ABSTRACT
Sir James Mackintosh, the leading advocate of law reform after the death of Romilly, rose and addressed the House of Commons in March 1819 on a motion for the appointment of a select committee to consider capital punishment in felonies. Buxton, a deeply religious man, married into the Gurneys, a Quaker family of Norwich. The prison reformers Elizabeth Fry and Joseph John Gurney were his sister-in-law and brother-in-law respectively. Buxton followed their lead. Buxton’s speech in March 1819 was factual and formidable; with few pretensions to eloquence, yet well received. The public, as prosecutors, feel reluctant at the escape of a criminal, but still more reluctant to be instrumental to his death. Sense of duty, of interests, desire of vengeance, are found to be but feeble motives, when contrasted with the dread they entertain of clouding their days, and burthening their conscience with the blood of a fellow-creature.
