"Launched into Eternity:" Sympathetic Interaction as a Response to Public Executions in Canada West, 1847–1869

In this article, ideas central to Adam Smith's Theory of Moral Sentiments as well as those of Benthamite reformers are shown to have informed legislative reports and statutes enacted during a period of legal and penal reform in Upper Canada/Canada West. Using newspaper reports, this article discusses the relationship of these themes to narratives of public executions. In the context of an increasingly democratic state in Canada West, sympathetic interaction between the condemned and the community appeared as the foundation of moral lessons to be drawn from the experience of public hangings.