The man who has declared war upon the world, as every man has done who
is not reformed by two successive prison sentences, should be seized
and permanently imprisoned. Modern thought does not sanction the
literal translation of this idea, but that does not interfere with the
possibility of carrying it out for the benefit of society.
The world spends millions of dollars every year in the business of
protecting itself against the criminal and in caring for him. But that
is because no serious attempt has ever been made to solve the problem
of crime.
Crime is largely a matter of suggestion and therefore if all the
habitual criminals in the country were segregated where their
influence would no longer be able to exert itself, crime would not
propagate itself so fast. The young men would not have presented to
them so often or so forcibly the example which causes most of them
to take the crooked path. Thus the expense of prevention would be
enormously diminished at once.