absolute control of all the penal institutions, or even that the
authority of all boards of management should be measurably disturbed;
but only that some central board should so far possess authority over
all the penal establishments as to be enabled to make a rearrangement
that would promote efficiency of effort.
“In order to show how such a degree of centrality might be sufficient
for large reforms let me outline briefly what I believe would be the
best method of classification of prisoners if all suitable facilities
could be given by the legislature:
“I would recommend the establishment of one receiving prison for all
persons convicted of serious crimes and sentenced to hard labor; in
this place prisoners would be held under continual observation for
a period long enough to allow the authorities to decide where the
prisoner would apparently be likely to receive the most benefit, or
where he could be kept with the most advantage to the State.
“As accessories to this place I would provide departmental prisons,
in each of which some particular element of instruction or discipline
or treatment should be brought to the highest possible degree of
efficiency, such as schools for the illiterate, the manual-training
school and schools for trade instruction.
“Another department should be assigned to those who are mentally weak,
so that they could be put constantly under special guardianship. There
are in the prisons, as we all know, many persons who, while not so far
below the normal intelligence as to warrant the experts in declaring
them to be insane, are nevertheless incapable of performing any useful
work or of taking any benefit from prison agencies. In most States
provision has been made for the removal of prisoners who are actually
insane to an asylum specially provided for that class; but so far
there has been no similar establishment created for the safe detention
of prisoners who are found to be so far deficient in intelligence as
to need the sort of treatment that is given in the schools for the
feeble-minded.
“Another humane department would be a hospital prison, an establishment
that should combine the needed safeguards for custody with all the
essential features for the most scientific and skillful treatment of
the different ailments. To be sure it would be necessary to maintain
a small infirmary in each prison for emergency cases, but all cases
requiring long and continuous treatment would be removed to the
hospital prison.
“The last stage of all in such a plan as I outline should be a prison
where the guardianship over the prisoner would be relaxed by degrees,
so that he could approach his freedom in such a way as to regain some
degree of self-reliance.
“To make the general plan of a classified prison system harmonious
and effective, the particular place of imprisonment should not be
unalterably fixed at the outset. In effect to-day the court in
Massachusetts does not absolutely determine the place of imprisonment.
The central board has the power to make transfers from one prison to
another, with the single exception that no person can be put into the
state prison from another place.
“I have seen in other places, however, many prisoners who manifestly
belonged in the state prison.
“It would be needless to recite cases of inequitable sentences that
show the need of classification. As a type of many others I mention
one instance where, through lack of knowledge of the prisoner’s
antecedents, a justice sentenced to the reformatory a man who had been
six times under imprisonment, including a term in the state prison,
and as far as one human being can judge of another, had shown himself
incapable of amendment or unwilling to accept the means of reformation.
“Information that may be immediately available to the prison
authorities when the prisoner is committed, so that they can assign
him to his fit place, is in most cases lacking when the prisoner is
before the court. The needed adjustment of prisoners I think could be
made by a central authority having all places within its purview, after
conference with the prison officials.
“In what other ways can we make centrality help a prison system? We
can do it by requiring, as many States have done, that all reports of
prisons shall go to a central office so that there shall be available
to the central board the needed information in regard to the prisons.
We can do it by the establishment of a more effective method of
registration, so that there shall be available for the guidance of the
transfer board all the records of prisoners, whether obtained in one
State or another.
“Under the same authority with the bureau of registration and
identification, all the data possessed by that department would be
accessible to the agent who was seeking to discover how far it might
be practicable and useful to assist a prisoner at liberty. A central
registration office would in the end yield a large return to the State
by securing a comprehensive oversight of prisoners on parole. In the
central office in Massachusetts we endeavor to keep a record of all
prisoners at liberty from the prisons under our supervision. This, to
be sure, is not always easy to do, because names are readily changed
and it is not difficult to conceal identity. The only reliable method
of following up the prisoners at liberty is to maintain a system of
identification based upon the plan that does not rely on names, or upon
any data that is subject to change.
“What the scheme of registration has done for this State and for other
States cannot now be measured, but the interest that has been excited
in this subject and the information that has been spread from the
central office must prove invaluable to the police and prison officials
of the entire country. When all the States adopt this plan it will not
only be difficult for a paroled prisoner to evade his obligations to
keep the terms of his release in his own State, but he will find if
he returns to evil practices in another State that his record will be
readily brought against him.
“All that I have said so far has seemed to apply mainly to persons
convicted of felonies, but I intended that there also should be
comprehended in the scheme a large number of misdemeanants, who need
generally the same sort of correction and training as felons.
“There is one class of misdemeanants, however, which I would exclude
as a rule from any elaborate prison system, although the place for
their detention might be made one of the departments of the plan I
have described, and that is the large number of persons committed
for drunkenness. Most of these have passed beyond the age when they
would be the best subjects for an industrial reformatory. They have
no criminal instincts, are merely social disturbers, and what the
State does in the way of their correction should be different from the
means employed in the care of criminals. And the persons committed for
drunkenness can be dealt with in a better way than now prevails if they
are drawn into larger groups where fitting employment can be given; and
this arrangement would need the intervention of a central board.
“Under a well-organized and thoroughly equipped system, with such a
degree of centrality as I have indicated, all the beneficent methods of
the prisons would be sustained and strengthened.”
The second address of the evening was by Dr. Frederick Howard Wines,
on “The Prisons of Louisiana.” Residence in the South and an intimate
acquaintance with Southern people and Southern prisons, gave the
utterances of Dr. Wines authoritative value. The prison question in the
South, he said, is almost exclusively a negro question. The greater
proportion of crime in the South is committed by negroes. Hence most of
the prisoners are negroes. The negro prisoner is a distinct problem.
The methods we apply to white prisoners are not applicable to him. The
religion of the negro, for example, is altogether emotional and has
little connection with morality. As to education, the Southern people
do not greatly favor the education of the negro. A partly educated
negro thinks he belongs to a select class and must no longer work. As
to the question of labor, he is not fitted for indoor work, nor wanted
by the industrial classes.
As conditions are in Louisiana, I can think of nothing better than the
large plantations on which the convicts are employed. The barracks
are absolutely clean and sanitary. There are no chains. The guards
are unarmed. After breakfast the prisoners go to the cotton and sugar
fields, accompanied by armed guards and hounds. There are few escapes
and very little punishment. Hospital and physician are provided. All
the convicts are well fed, and at the close of the day’s work all must
take a bath. As the labor is steady it is more profitable than that of
the free man. All the earnings go to the support and improvement of the
prisons and prisoners. The lease system is gone in all the counties
but one. Baton Rouge has the only prison of the old style, with walls,
etc. Camps are now the thing, on plantations. Since the abolition of
the lease system, and the adoption of State control, the health of the
prisoners is much better.
A third address by Mr. F. B. Sanborn, Concord, Mass., on “Prison Reform
and Prison Science,” was largely a review of the results accomplished
in the past forty years, and reminiscent of the many eminent men
associated with the movement since its inception.
WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 19
MORNING
The session of the Physicians’ Association, held this morning, was most
interesting, and was marked by some notable features. The President,
Dr. S. H. Blitch, Ocala, Florida, presented a paper on “The Open versus
the Close Penitentiary System of Handling Prisoners,” in which he took
strong ground in favor of the former, especially in the South. He
defined the “open” penitentiary system as that mode of social restraint
according to which the prisoner sentenced to hard labor is required to
perform skilled and unskilled service in fields, woods, and surface
mining, and in such industries and occupations as do not necessitate
his daily cellular or circumscribed confinement, as is the case under
the “close” system. He claimed that in spite of criticism, the “open”
system, wherever climatic conditions make it practicable, is far more
conducive to the mental and physical rehabilitation of the convict than
the “close” system. In the South, especially where the vast majority of
prisoners are negroes who have been accustomed to life in the open air
and to outdoor employment, the confinement in a “close” penitentiary
would be most detrimental. The open-air system puts these men at work
under conditions to which they have been accustomed from youth up, and
the results demonstrate the wisdom of the plan.
In the discussion which followed this paper, Dr. Barrows said that many
penologists felt that the Southern system had many advantages, but
that other industrial and reformatory elements should be added. Dr.
Wines saw an immense advantage in the Southern method, and claimed that
Northern prisons would find it very beneficial to have farms connected
with them for the outdoor employment of convicts.
The paper on “Prison Sanitation,” by Dr. W. D. Stewart, West Virginia
Penitentiary, Moundsville, was followed by that of Dr. S. A. Knopf, of
New York, on “The Tuberculosis Problem in Prisons and Reformatories.”
The presentation made by this eminent specialist on tuberculosis was
probably the most exhaustive on this subject to which the Congress ever
listened. This very valuable paper, any condensation of which would do
it injustice, is published in full in the _New York Medical Journal_,
November 17, 1906, to which the reader is referred.
Dr. J. W. Milligan, Indiana State Prison, Michigan City, read a paper
on “Mental Defectives Among Prisoners,” of which the following is
a synopsis: Where reformation, not punishment, is the aim, a just
estimate of the prisoner’s mental state is essential. Without this the
indeterminate sentence cannot be successful. Communities as well as
courts too frequently overlook mental defect as an important element
in crime. Too many prisoners on admission are insane, epileptic, or
feeble-minded. Epilepsy is not an infrequent factor, especially in
atrocious crimes without motive, and overlooked because _not of the
pronounced type_ popularly considered characteristic of this disease.
Indiana prison records show among the defectives, a percentage for
murder _three times_; for murder, manslaughter, and rape, _twice_;
but for larceny, _two-thirds_ that of the average for all classes. On
admission, forty-four per cent. admit mental defect or criminal record,
in the personal or family history. This tainted influx, and the fact
that defectives are not paroled, explains why twelve per cent. of our
population is insane, epileptic, or feeble-minded.
The psychosis are chiefly degenerative in type. Insane among prisoners
are not especially difficult to manage; no harsh measures are ever
justifiable. Indiana has as yet no institution for insane criminals;
it needs one badly. A ward in the prison hospital gives good results,
though far from ideal. Insane criminals should be judged in the light
of modern psychiatry, and their rights and the safety of society
carefully guarded.
AFTERNOON
Mr. C. W. Bowron, Superintendent of the Wisconsin State Reformatory,
Green Bay, presented the Report of the Committee on Prevention and
Reformatory Work, in a paper entitled, “Reformatory Sentences and
Discharges,” which concluded with the following propositions:
1. That the authority to transfer prisoners from the reformatory to
state prison is an essential safeguard to the successful management of
a reformatory; and this power on the part of prison officials has been
abundantly upheld by the courts.
2. That the so-called indeterminate sentence has been repeatedly held
valid, but apparently upon the construction that it is a definite
sentence for the maximum limit. It is therefore a misnomer.
3. That the fixing of a minimum period in the indeterminate sentence is
illogical, and detrimental to reformatory purposes.
4. That the power of parole is purely an administrative function
exercised in the establishment of a prison regulation, the validity
of which has been upheld by the courts; and that the determination of
parole should largely if not wholly rest with the principal officers of
the institution.
5. That the parole system does not depend upon the so-called
indeterminate sentence, or any other form of sentence, but stands apart
from it as a separate and distinct reformatory element.
6. That a definite and uniform sentence fixed by statute, subject to
modification through the legal powers of the administrative officers to
parole and discharge, is not inconsistent with reformatory purposes,
and in some respects is an advantage to reformatory management.
7. That final discharge after a suitable term of probation on parole
is a just and essential feature of the merit system, in which the
pardoning power should coöperate with the reformatory officials.
8. That the indefinite sentence does not exist, probably cannot
constitutionally exist, possibly ought not to exist, and certainly
would be the object of severe criticism if it did exist.
9. That a central bureau of identification operated by the general
government is so essential to the proper ends of justice that its
establishment would mark an important advancement in our criminal
jurisprudence.
“Methods of Reformatory Administration” was the subject of a paper by
Mr. W. H. Whittaker, Superintendent of the Indiana State Reformatory,
Jeffersonville. Mr. Whittaker claimed that in many institutions methods
had not kept pace with advancing civilization. Ideal reformatory
management must, first of all, have a solid foundation to stand upon.
Said foundation consists of the men in charge of an institution. These,
from the superintendent down, should be men of broad intelligence,
good morals, and clean habits, who thoroughly believe that they are
their brothers’ keepers, and who, in the discharge of all their duties,
will constantly have in view the reformation of the prisoner. No good
results can come from physical punishment or the employment of such
methods as humiliate the prisoner. All methods should aim to secure the
harmonious training of the heart, the head, and the hand, and should
have for their one purpose the building of character.
In a paper on “The Delinquent Girl,” Mrs. Lucy M. Sickels,
Superintendent of the State Industrial Home, Adrian, Michigan,
pointed out that the real delinquent in most cases is the parent.
The delinquent girl is not born so. She comes into the world with
all the winning graces of babyhood; but when she reaches the years
of girlhood, she is allowed to have her own way and to run wild. The
mother is perhaps so busy attending missionary and temperance meetings,
endeavoring to save others, that she has no time for her own daughter.
If the girl has no mother, or a widowed mother, who, in order to
support her little family, is obliged to go out to hard work day after
day, until she becomes nervous, impatient, and petulant, an equally
unfortunate situation again presents itself. Or parents are constantly
quarreling, until divorce stalks in, breaks up the home, and sets the
children adrift. In eight cases out of ten, ill temper and divorce in
the home are the cause of delinquency. Delinquency or incorrigibility
is only another name for parental neglect. What we want are laws to
protect the children and punish the delinquent parent, for this is the
root of all the evil we are striving and contending against.
Mrs. Sickels outlined the methods followed in the institution which
she directs. “We go back to the first home principles, a mother and a
mother’s love. A manager or mother is at the head of each family home,
of which we have eight, each family having a kitchen, dining room, and
laundry, just as complete in itself as you are from your neighbor.
Each family cooks its own food, makes its own bread, and does its own
laundry work. Each girl has a nice little room all to herself, in which
is a single bed covered with a clean white spread, a pretty pillow
sham on the pillow, a dresser, a mirror, a rug and a chair. Each room
has a large airy window. The girl may beautify the walls and dresser
according to her own taste and skill.
“The first requisite for a girl as she enters the Home is _occupation_,
not work only. It may mean work, but instruction is given along all
lines most necessary and useful to every woman in order to fit her
to be a housekeeper and home-maker.” A chapel, in which two services
are held each Lord’s Day, a schoolhouse and graded school with eight
teachers, a hospital and trained nurse, a sewing school, a cooking
school, a dressmaking department, a greenhouse, and an orchestra and
brass band composed of girls, form part of the equipment. There is no
wall or fence around the Home, but a clear open space and beautiful
lawn, with walks and flowers, shrubbery and trees. The results obtained
have been most satisfactory, at least seventy-five per cent. of the
girls so far received having turned out good, true women, many of them
being devoted wives and mothers.
EVENING
Mr. Alexander Johnson, General Secretary National Conference of
Charities and Correction, Indianapolis, Indiana, spoke on “The
Reformation of Jails.” Many county jails, he declared, are a blot on
civilization. Should this be the case when we seek the reformation of
the prisoner? Reform has begun at the top of the prison system, but
the jails have made little progress upward, and a great number deserve
to be called “schools of vice.” What is the remedy? The physical
condition of the county jail must be improved. Each prisoner should be
separately confined. The fundamental error is that the jails are used
for two dissimilar purposes: for men awaiting trial, and for men who
are sentenced. The two do not belong together. I have seen these two
classes together in the same cell, and treated perfectly alike. When a
man has been convicted he no longer belongs to the county, but to the
State, and should be sent to a State institution. Then the jail would
remain only as a place of detention for those awaiting trial. But why
the State? Because the county would hardly be justified in going to the
expense of supporting a real work-house. Another reform imperatively
needed is speedier trials. It is infamous to hold a man in jail for
months awaiting trial. “I hope the time will come when the question
will be, ‘What kind of a man is this, that we may fit him for society.’
When we make our prisons hospitals for the moral reformation of men, we
will realize that the jail will be the place in which to begin.”
“The Juvenile Court: Its Uses and Limitations,” was the title of
a paper by Dr. Hastings H. Hart, Superintendent of the Illinois
Children’s Home and Aid Society, Chicago. The juvenile court is an
evolution. Some twenty States have juvenile court laws--all within
about six years. This evolution is still in progress, and the matter
still in its infancy.
The juvenile court is founded on three great ideas: 1. The value of the
child for its own sake and for the community. 2. The abandonment of the
_lex talionis_, _i. e._, the infliction of a punishment commensurate
with the wrong done. This is impossible as well as a wrong. No man is
wise enough to adjust the punishment accurately to the crime. 3. The
recognition of the responsibility of the mother State for the children,
especially for the erring and neglected ones.
The first essential feature of the juvenile court is the breadth of
its scope: it deals with delinquents and dependents. The second is
the character of its proceedings. “What is the best possible thing
to be done for the good of the child?” This is the question which
the juvenile court endeavors to solve every day. A third feature of
the juvenile court is that it places the child in such hands as will
do what is best for it. Having such a high character and such noble
purposes, no jurist is too eminent to serve as a juvenile court judge.
Another distinctive mark of the juvenile court law is the probation
officer, who is the very heart of the work, and who not only learns
to know the child in the home, but also represents it in the court.
Finally the juvenile court recognizes the great fundamental principle
that the home and family, when properly constituted are the great
molders of character.
THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 20
MORNING
From the proceedings of Thursday morning the following admirable
paper by Mr. C. E. Haddox, Warden of the West Virginia Penitentiary,
Moundsville, is selected and reproduced in full:
SOME ELEMENTS OF PRISON DISCIPLINE
Old Noah Webster, in that charming book of his entitled “Dictionary,”
of which Bill Nye says his chief criticism is that it changes the
subject too often, gives the following definition of discipline:
“Education, instruction, cultivation, and improvement; comprehending
instruction in arts, sciences, correct sentiments, morals, and manners,
and due subordination to authority.”
These are not all the elements Webster says constitute discipline, but
they are quite enough upon which to base a paper, and it is well enough
to keep this definition in mind, especially for such as may have the
impression that discipline consists solely and alone in administering
punishments for real or imaginary, deliberate or unintentional,
breaches of good conduct.
To the unthinking, the sole object of imprisoning a convict may be
regarded as the making him suffer for the crime he committed, and that
the judge in imposing sentence should calculate how much suffering will
be commensurate with the crime, and adjust the sentence accordingly,
the prison authorities then taking hold of him, holding him in “durance
vile” for the period of his sentence, keeping him as quiet and orderly
as they can, and when his sentence has expired, discharging him without
further concern or responsibility for him or his future.
THE SCOPE OF DISCIPLINE