To which all male criminals between the ages of fifteen and twenty-five,
sentenced for the first time, shall be committed. The purpose of this
Reformatory is, if possible, to save to society youthful criminals. The
jail and the penitentiary only harden the offender, and turn him forth
hopeless, helpless, revengeful, and in his own terrible language, “To get
even with the society which has punished and destroyed him.” Ex-Governor
Hoyt, whose large mind and generous heart are only fully known to those
who have close personal intercourse with him, was strongly impressed
during his administration with the defects of our treatment of the
criminal classes. He made himself a thorough master of the literature
bearing upon this subject, and became an ardent, even enthusiastic
advocate of the reformatory system; and during his administration, and
since his administration, has done his utmost, in public and private, to
further the completion and the opening of this institution, which, it is
hoped, may be ready for occupancy at an early day.
Pennsylvania, which spends such large sums for its poor, which pours out
its thousands for its insane, its sick and its afflicted, may well afford
to spend even millions for the reformation of its criminals, many of whom
are quite as much sinned against as sinning.