[Under this heading will appear each month numerous paragraphs of
general interest, relating to the prison field and the treatment of the
delinquent.]
_Warden Bridges._--The Boston (Mass.) Record says:
Warden Bridges wishes to retire from the post at the State Prison
which he has held for more than 20 years. He is past 78 years of
age. If Gen. Bridges insists upon his retirement the State will
lose the services of a man who through a long career in a post of
extreme difficulty has maintained the dignity and efficiency of an
important branch of the public service in a manner which will never
be forgotten. The trials and suspense of such a position as Gen.
Bridges has held for two decades are hardly weighed by the average
citizen, who regards them as matters of course, and expects, in this
State, thorough efficiency. During these past 20 years that public
expectation has not been disappointed. It has been worth much to the
Commonwealth to have had a man of Gen. Bridges’ sort at the head of
its State Prison.
He assumed his present position in 1893 when he was appointed by the
late Governor William E. Russell. Only one prisoner remains who has
been an inmate continuously since General Bridges took control. The man
is Jesse Pomeroy.
* * * * *
_Convict Labor and Labor Unions_--According to the Cedar Rapids (Ia.)
Times, Union labor’s war to prohibit state authorities to allow honor
prisoners at the penitentiary at Fort Madison to work for outsiders
as painters, plumbers, etc., at Fort Madison, will now go into court,
following the passage of an ordinance by the Fort Madison city council,
which prohibits prisoners entering the city only on official business.
Police will be ordered to arrest them and the ordinance provides for a
fine of from $1 to $100 in violation of the ordinance. The war against
the system has been going on for two years. The Governor and State
labor commissioners have been appealed to but nothing was done. The
State board of control allowed Warden Sanders to put honor prisoners
outside in competition with union labor. Leaders of union labor took
the matter to the city council, which resulted in the passage of the
prohibitory measure and will now be tested out in court.
* * * * *
_Says Georgia to Tennessee_--The Atlanta Georgian has this to say in a
recent issue:
“Since Governor Hooper of Tennessee and his party of prison
investigators, who came to Atlanta last week to inspect convict
conditions in Georgia, have returned home they have given interviews to
Tennessee papers upholding the Tennessee system of convict control as
superior to that of Georgia, particularly from health and humanitarian
viewpoints.
“To one who has spent several years in each state and has had
opportunity to observe the prison systems of the two states--not in
a three-day cursory inspection, but at frequent intervals extending
over these several years--the view’s of the Tennesseans seem open to
question.
“In Georgia all the able-bodied men convicts are worked out of
doors, under the direct supervision of state and county officials and
inspectors, constructing public highways.
“In Tennessee about half of the able-bodied convicts are worked under
ground in state-owned and operated mines, having exceedingly little
opportunity to enjoy the fresh air and sunlight necessary to the
physical well-being of a man. The other able-bodied half are worked in
factories within the penitentiary walls at Nashville under the lease
system that Georgia five years ago abolished as inhuman and unjust.
“A small per cent., too old or too infirm for mine or factory, are
worked on a farm adjacent to the Tennessee penitentiary. Georgia has
equally as good a farm at Milledgeville for its prisoners of the same
class who are not fitted for work on the roads.
“Tennessee convicts in the mines and in the factories come in direct
competition with organized free labor. Georgia’s road building convicts
are worked for and not in competition with other classes of labor.
“It is true that the temporary road building camps, which of necessity
must be moved from place to place as construction progresses, do
not possess the permanent sanitary improvements that Tennessee has
installed inside the walls and at the mines--a condition to which the
Tennessee party calls attention--yet this is more than offset by the
health-giving open-air life led by the Georgia prisoners.
“It is a matter of record that both Governor Hooper and his
predecessor, Governor Patterson, pardoned hundreds of Tennessee
convicts because they were victims of tuberculosis, produced by the
close confinement in the mines and factories. Without comparative
statistics on which to base the assertion, the writer is confident that
in the last five years there have been at least fifty per cent. more
cases of tuberculosis among Tennessee than Georgia convicts, despite
the fact that Georgia with its larger area and population, has about
fifty per cent. more convicts than Tennessee, of whom eighty per cent.
are negroes against Tennessee’s sixty per cent. of negro prisoners.
“Governor Hooper says Georgia is making fine roads. There may not be
as many prayer meetings in the Georgia road camps as in the Tennessee
mines, but Georgia is not blindly killing off the bodies with
tuberculosis while trying to save its convicts’ souls. Georgia believes
in saving both, but says to save the body first and have a better
chance at saving the soul.”
* * * * *
_A New Warden at Sing Sing._--Warden Clancy, who made a creditable
record at Sing Sing, has resigned, and Superintendent of Prisons Riley
has appointed Thomas T. McCormick of Yonkers as warden. Which leads the
New York Evening Post to say:
“Sing Sing Prison has long been a disgrace to the State, but this fact
was never so familiar to the people as it has been during the past few
months. The Superintendent of Prisons appears, however, to think the
present an auspicious moment for placing in charge of the prison a man
whose only recommendation for the post, so far as known to the public,
is that he has been successful in the plumbing business, and that he is
one of the mainstays of the Westchester County Democratic machine. In
the face of things like this, the men and women who are laboring to get
our penal institutions properly conducted have need of all the faith
and resolution they can command to keep on in their endeavor. But they
_will_ keep on, and the time will come when the idea of appointing the
warden of a great prison for any other reason than his special fitness
to conduct it wisely and well will seem too monstrous for belief. We
must not forget the encouragement there is in the fact that, bad as
these things are now, we have got beyond the utter shamelessness which
was so often shown in former times.”
* * * * *
_The New York Commission on Prison Reform_--The New York State
Commission on Prison Reform which was appointed by Sulzer a year ago
has just filed the preliminary report of its findings. The commission
of which Thomas Mott Osborne is chairman was authorized to examine and
investigate the management and affairs of the several State prisons
and reformatories, the prison industries, employment of convict labor
and all subjects relating to the proper maintenance and control of the
State prisons of the State. The Commission has made careful study of
these several matters and the report which has been released contains
many interesting and valuable suggestions.
The abolition of the ill-famed Sing Sing prison is recommended and the
erection on its site of a receiving station for the observance and
study of all persons sentenced to imprisonment in a State prison for
medical examination and treatment of those afflicted with diseases
and for weeding out those found to be mentally defective--the latter
to be sent to separate institutions devoted solely to the care of the
mentally defective.
The indeterminate sentence is a further recommendation of the
Commission, which urges that the penal law of the State be so
amended as to make it incumbent on all judges sentencing prisoners
to confinement in a State prison to impose sentences without either
maximum or minimum limit; while for the purpose of investigating all
applications for pardon and parole it is suggested that local advisory
boards of pardon and parole be instituted in connection with each
prison and reformatory of the State.
The Commission places itself on record as favoring the employment
of able bodied male convicts in constructing and repairing the
highways of the State and the several counties in addition to which
farms should be developed at all of the institutions so that as many
convicts as possible may be employed in the open air--all possible
work to be conducted under the so-called honor system, together with a
considerable and increasing measure of self-government.
As a final and essential basis for permanent improvement the
Commission recommends the consolidation and reorganization of the
various offices, boards and commissions which now divide among
them the administration of the prison affairs of the State into a
permanent State Department of Correction, to which the entire penal
administration of the State shall be committed.
* * * * *
_Will Works or Won’t Works?_--An examination of 2000 inmates of the
New York municipal lodging house showed that 63 per cent. of the 2000
were able to do hard work; another 10 per cent. were capable of doing
lighter work, such as gardening or using a broom, and still another
9 per cent. could do extremely light work, but still enough to keep
themselves in food and decent clothing. More light would have been
thrown on the general subject of unemployment if the city had been
able to go further and learn how many of this 2000 would be willing
to do the work they were physically capable of doing, were the chance
actually offered.
* * * * *
_More Privileges at Stillwater_--Prisoners at the penitentiary at
Stillwater demonstrate in many ways their approval of the new rules
inaugurated by Warden Henry Wolfer.
All the men in the third grade have been advanced to the second grade,
and now not a stripe is worn in the new prison.
All convicts will be permitted to talk to their neighbors at meal time
Sundays and holidays.
Each Tuesday and Friday at 4.30 P.M. motion picture shows will be given
in the prison auditorium. The prisoners are given half day off on
Saturday.
* * * * *
_Prisoners Earning Money at Joliet._--Warden Edmund M. Allen of the
Joliet penitentiary announces that for the first time in Illinois
prisoners employed in a penitentiary have become wage earners.
Employees in the reed and rattan department, where furniture is made,
have been given a share in the earnings. There has followed a marked
improvement in efficiency. Each employee earned $5.69 in March--small,
but a beginning.
Prisoners in this work learn a trade which can be followed profitably
upon their obtaining freedom. In March, 1914, with 259 workingmen,
6,595 pieces were made, as against 5,153 in March, 1913, with 288
employees. In April $6.32 per man was earned.
In addition to the share in the profits granted to employees in the
reed and rattan shop, the warden has given the prisoners the privilege
of making any articles which they are capable of manufacturing in their
cells during leisure hours. Materials are supplied where the supplies
of the prison permit, and the articles made are sold by the prison and
the money given to the convicts.
Joliet convicts to the number of 500 were back at their work peacefully
recently following a night of fire-fighting when flames destroyed a
portion of the rattan shop of the State penitentiary. Convicts, from
embezzlers to life termers, fought side by side with the prison guards
and members of the Joliet fire department. None tried to make their
escape, and when the fire companies withdrew from the blackened ruins
the men quietly returned to their cells.
Warden Allen says that he believes the introduction of the “honor
system” during his administration had much to do with the action of
the prisoners. For a long time the big east gate leading to the prison
stood open, and he has yet to learn of any prisoner that made any
attempt to get away.
* * * * *
_Harmless “Pirates.”_--At the State Reformatory for Women in
Massachusetts, on June 6th, before an audience of 300 guests, friends
of the institution, the “Pirates of Penzance” was given by the women
inmates. About 60 of the women took part on the stage. The excellent
work and good voices were a surprise and gratification, and this
performance, which was heartily applauded, was, undoubtedly, the most
elaborate and successful ever given by inmates of any penal institution
in the country.
The costumes, stage arrangements and decorations, were the work of the
women. All winter long the work has been an uplifting and engaging
employment for all the inmates, giving them new tasks outside the daily
prison routine.
At the rehearsals, the 350 inmates have gathered in the large hall,
and watched the performance of the 50 to 60 women on the platform. The
study and work has benefited every inmate, and especially inspired all
who took part.
The work is an indication of the broad scheme of Mrs. Jessie D. Hodder
and her staff in renewing the lives of the women in her charge.
* * * * *
_New Prison Training Effective_--So says the Buffalo Inquirer: Of the
1,639 convicts in the Ohio State prison at Columbus, 1,331 are first
termers. Of the 784 discharged and the 743 received in the last year
only fourteen were second termers.
“Such figures indicate that the Ohio prison management is doing
something to lessen the number of repeaters. Apparently the training
the prisoners receive is doing something to work up the ability and
will to lead to the life that saves them from being sent back again.
“It is related that the 500 Ohio prisoners who were allowed to work in
the open last year on their promise not to run away only twenty-four
escaped. That is to say, ninety-five per cent. showed the stamina to
stay on the prison job and five per cent. yielded to the temptation to
make a break for liberty. The ninety-five per cent. capable of staying
in prison when they might have escaped should be capable of keeping
out of prison after their release. Every statistical table showing a
diminished proportion of ‘repeaters’ is evidence that the new training
is really accomplishing in the way of abolishing the ‘comebacks.’”
* * * * *
_The Situation in New Jersey_--The Plainfield (N.J.) Courier outlines
it as follows:
It is claimed that politics interferes with the harmonious solution of
the new labor system in the State Prison, replacing the prison labor
contract system. The interruption has created an annoyance, because
all the present labor contracts at the State Prison expire on July
1, and a serious condition will be presented for the majority of the
1,400 convicts will be thrown into lives of idleness. State Prison
Keeper Thomas B. Madden regards the prospect as menacing. On July
1 all the prison contractors will cease their work and will remove
their machinery from the prison shops where so long the prisoners
were kept busy manufacturing shoes, clothing, brooms, brushes, caps,
handkerchiefs, overalls, etc., will be closed until the new prison
labor methods can be put into operation. It will take at least six
months to get the new system fully installed.
No definite plans exist for an immediate resumption of labor in the
prison, although the act abolished the prison labor contract system
and substituting the “State use” method under which the convicts
manufactures articles for use in all the State institutions, was passed
in 1911, three years ago. The new Commission is composed of Cook
Conklin, of Bergen county, president; Commissioner of Charities and
Corrections Joseph P. Byers, of Trenton, secretary; Joseph M. Dear, of
Jersey City, representing the Board of State Prison Inspectors; Freeman
Woodbridge, of Middlesex county, representing the Board of Managers of
the Rahway Reformatory; Richard H. More, of Bridgeton, and Henry Isleib
of Paterson.
“The condition is a serious one,” said Prison Keeper Madden today,
“and I do not know what we are going to do after July 1 when all the
prison shops must be closed. I know what it means to have a big lot of
prisoners idle, for I was here back in the hard times of 1873 when one
of the big prison contractors failed and the shops were closed down.
We had trouble then, and there were not nearly so many prisoners as we
have now.”
The act of 1911 abolishing the contract labor system created a Prison
Labor Commission composed of the Commissioner of Charities and
Corrections, the warden of the State prison, the superintendent of
the Rahway Reformatory and two other persons to be appointed by the
Governor. President Wilson was then Governor and his appointments made
the Commission Democratic. It has been claimed that if the original
commission had been let alone something would have been accomplished
ere this. In 1912 the Legislature was Republican. A bill was introduced
changing the Prison Labor Commission so that it would be composed
of six men, three Republicans and three Democrats. This was passed
and Governor Wilson promptly vetoed it as also were many other bills
sent to him by the Republican law makers. This bill was passed over
his veto, together with a lot of others, thus revolutionizing the
Commission. This is the Commission which has just been legislated out
of office.
Prison Keeper Madden does not think the “State use” will employ nearly
all the convicts. For instance, less than ten prisoners now do all
the tailoring work for the 1,400 men in the prison, so that, in his
opinion, all the industrial needs of the various State institutions
will be met without using the labor of anything like all the convicts
in the prison. It has been suggested that more convicts be employed
outside the prison, and that then some of the others be employed in
remodeling the old and unsanitary sections of the prison. This plan
will likely be discussed by the Commissioners next Tuesday. Only about
65 prisoners are now employed on the roads of the State, and it is
proposed that this be increased to 300. The suggestion is that at least
150 convicts be sent to the Prison Farm in Cumberland county, where
only 87 are now at work. There is a law permitting the State to acquire
a prison to mine and crush stone for good road work, and it is urged
that this would be put in operation and 100 convicts employed in this
way. An average of fifteen per cent. of the convicts are employed in
the prison as domestics and general helpers, or are in ill health and
cannot work. This leaves in round numbers, 600 convicts to be utilized
in the prison industrial system.
It would take from six months to a year, however, to put all these
plans into operation. Meanwhile the pressing problem is what to do at
once.
An appropriation of $25,000 is available in the supplemental bill for
immediate use for the establishment of the new prison labor system, but
although the money has been ready since April 15, nothing has been done
about utilizing it to meet the need.
* * * * *
_Shale._--Says the Boston Transcript: Shale is to be no longer the
outcast of the rock and soil families. It is fit to make into brick to
be laid down for the best of highways. In the past to point at a bit
of land and say, “Shale,” meant that the sale for any price above the
waste lot figure was impossible. The shale land farmer never prospered.
The word was good only for the novelist to write into the descriptions
of places where ghosts were found. But shale is about to be respected.
It may be fit punishment for that despised rock and soil derived from
that rock that it should be placed under the feet of men, the hoofs of
horses and the rubber of the auto tires, to be pulverized slowly into
dust, but that does not matter. Shale is making a reputation. Governor
Glynn of New York has announced that the tests of brick made from shale
about the Elmira reformatory have proved that the bricks are right for
laying down for the surface of highways. Samples of the brick sent to
the makers of clay brick machinery have been found to fill all the
requirements of the experts there employed, and that means that shale
almost anywhere may be made into brick with such economy that it is
forthwith regarded as one of the best materials for surface highways.
The advantage of the shale about the Elmira reformatory is that the
convicts there can be employed to collect the material and make the
brick for State roads. The highway commissioner and a scientist are
to direct the construction of buildings at the reformatory for the
manufacture of brick. Convicts are to make the brick and put up the
plant for permanent operations of the same materials. In many reports
of industrial enterprises of late there is used the expression, economy
was the result of finding the building materials on the spot or close
by. The use of shale in many sections is bound to come under that
head. Brick is now made of many materials which in the past have been
tabooed. Sand is considered as good as clay for making brick, and it
is handier to many places. The use of different materials makes a
variety in the building materials of blocks. Cities look better because
of that variety. But one of the best uses for brick appears now to be
the surfacing of roads for the joy machines as well as the business
motors of all kinds, and for horses. In the course of time the country
turnpikes may be generally paved like city streets, at least with hard
brick and that will have been done at reasonable cost to the country
because of the employment of convict labor.
* * * * *
_In Kentucky_: The New York Evening Post says editorially:--“From
Kentucky comes the report of a decision of its Court of Appeals which
appears to be most unfortunate in its effect, but entirely justified
by the facts of the case. The decision declares unconstitutional a
prison-reform act passed by the Legislature in 1910, which provided for
one of the State prisons becoming a reformatory for first offenders,
and the other a penitentiary, for the education of prisoners, and
for the assignment to them of a portion of their earnings under the
prison labor contracts. The decision was not based on any objection
whatever to the provisions of the bill; neither was it grounded on a
“technicality”. The trouble was that the bill, which was in the nature
of an addition of new sections to a pre-existing law, did not set forth
the whole act as it would appear after amendment, as required by the
State Constitution; also the payment of prisoners was not mentioned
in the title. The Court disavowed any desire to interfere with the
freedom of the Legislature except so far as distinctly required by
the Constitution; but the opinion went on, “to say that this act
does not boldly violate section 51 would be to say that the words of
this section have no meaning or effect, and that a section of the
Constitution has no more force than a legislative act.” There is no
getting away from this view of such a matter, unless we are to take
the position that there should be no Constitutions at all. In support
of that position there is room for valid argument; but to have a
Constitution, and yet set it aside when we please, is to invite the
dangers that would go with the abolition of Constitutions without
getting its advantages.”
* * * * *
_The Indeterminate Sentence and “Good Time.”_--According to the
Louisville (Ky.) Courier Journal, “some of the prisoners in the
Frankfort Reformatory are said to be preparing to file a suit to compel
the Prison Commission to carry out the law which gives eighty-four
days’ good time to every convict.
“There is no question as to the existence of such a law, but the Prison
Commission has not seen proper to apply it to those prisoners who were
convicted under the indeterminate sentence law. This seems to have
been in accordance with common sense. A prisoner sent up under the
indeterminate sentence law for a term of, say, one to five years is
eligible to parole after he has served his minimum term of one year.
If the good time allowance also is applied such a prisoner, one of the
commissioners has pointed out, would have to serve only about nine
months to be eligible for parole.
“The absurdity of making a good time allowance to those who are serving
the so-called indeterminate sentence is more apparent when the case of
a prisoner convicted of manslaughter is considered. This prisoner was
sentenced to serve from two to twenty-five years. In the natural course
of events he would be eligible to parole after two years. Given the
benefit of the annual good time allowance he would have to serve only
about eighteen months before being eligible for parole.
“The Attorney General has given an opinion to the effect that the
prisoners convicted under the indeterminate sentence law are entitled
to the good time allowance. Evidently there has been a good deal of
legislative bungling in connection with these prison laws. With a few
more amendments it is much to be feared the State will be unable to
keep anybody at all in the penitentiary longer than the time required
for hearing a mandamus suit.”
* * * * *
_How Newspapers Err._--The Providence (R.I.) News says that:
“There was a queer mix-up over a sentence passed by the district court
of Minnesota on a youth of twenty years. Two New York state papers
had the story that the youth was sentenced to forty years in prison
for robbing a man of $1.85. One paper used the sentence as a text for
a general cry down of Wisconsin’s very progressive, although what a
sentence passed in St. Paul had to do with the laws of Wisconsin,
progressive or otherwise, was not clear. The other paper commented on
the affair under the caption: ‘The Crime of a Court.’
“It appears by a letter from Judge Orr, who sentenced the youth, that
he was not sentenced to forty years in prison, but was sentenced under
the indeterminate law, and can, after two years, apply for a parole. It
is true that in robbery cases the maximum sentence is forty years, but
it is up to the board of parole and to the youth himself, very largely
to the youth, as to how long he will stay in prison. As the young man
had been a waif and pleaded guilty, the story, if true, was one that
could not fail to cause indignation. There was very little truth about
it, fortunately, and Judge Orr, speaking for his state says:
‘Minnesota is in the front rank in the matter of legislation
recognizing the principles of modern penology and criminology,
including the indeterminate sentence all cases, limited suspension of
sentence, etc., and the administration of justice in the courts of this
state is in full sympathy and accord with the statutes. Such blunders
as these are apt to do courts everywhere an injury, so the truth
should be known.’”
* * * * *
_Convicts make Brick and do other Work in Ohio._--Shipments have
been started from the brick plant established by the State board of
administration for the employment of penitentiary prisoners at Junction
City, Perry county, Ohio. Mason Chilcote of East Liverpool, is the
superintendent of the plant. Fifty prisoners are employed at the plant
and as soon as a new dormitory is completed another fifty will be
sent there. The plant can turn out 40,000 bricks daily. State Highway
Commissioner James R. Marker says that his department can use the
entire output of the plant for road building.
By using the convicts the State board of administration saved the State
more than $2,000 in tearing down old buildings and excavating for
the new administration structure at the Institution for the Blind in
Columbus.
It required 24 convicts 8274 hours to do the work. They were paid three
cents an hour by the State. The total was $248.22. The same number of
hours paid for at 27-1/2 cents an hour, the prevailing rate of wages,
would have cost the State $2,275.35.
Besides saving the money to the State the board furnished outdoor labor
for the prisoners.
Work on the foundation of the new structure which is to house the board
of administration, has been commenced. It is expected to have the
building ready for occupancy by early fall.
* * * * *
_Board of City Magistrates of the City of New York (First
Division)._--The annual report giving the work of magistrates in
Manhattan and the Bronx in the City of New York is always anticipated
with great interest, and is read with an increasing amount of
satisfaction both in general progress recorded and in the improvement
of form and statistical method. It is a great pity as Chief Magistrate
McAdoo remarks, that the important strides toward significant criminal
statistics that are being made in the magistrates’ courts can not be
combined and developed, together with data from the higher criminal
courts. There should be, in any event, a centralized statistical
bureau, covering all the courts concerned with the criminal bar in
Greater New York. “What was done with the man I held for keeping a
gambling house, a disorderly house, or maintaining a public nuisance
last month or the month before. I don’t know----.” We might add,
“Nor does any one else know.” The report presents the work of eight
district courts, a night court for men, and a night court for women,
and two domestic relations courts. There is no end of interesting
material in it. Perhaps the most interesting facts, however, relate to
the extension of the use of the finger-prints to cases of disorderly
conduct, “jostling” and “mashing,” with prospects of soon including
automobile speeders; and the increase of the percentage of convicted
among those arranged. The former will make it difficult for real
lawbreakers to escape punishment after arrest, while the latter shows
that the number of arrests of innocent persons is fast diminishing.
A remarkable fact is also the diminution of the number of defendants
placed on probation, directly attributable to the greater frequency of
preliminary investigations of such cases by probation officers.
STATEMENT OF THE OWNERSHIP, MANAGEMENT, ETC. of THE DELINQUENT.
Published monthly at New York, N. Y., required by the Act of August
24th, 1912.
NAME OF POST OFFICE ADDRESS
Editor, O. F. Lewis, 135 East 15th St.,
New York City
Managing Editor, O. F. Lewis, 135 East 15th St.,
New York City
Business Manager, O. F. Lewis, 135 East 15th St.,
New York City
Publisher, The National Prisoners’ Aid Association, 135 East 15th St.,
New York City
Owners, The National Prisoners’ Aid Association, 135 East 15th St.,
New York City
There are no bondholders, mortgages, or other security holders.
O. F. LEWIS, Editor and Business Manager.
Sworn to and subscribed before me this 27th day of March, 1914.
H. L. McCORMICK, Notary Public No. 6, Kings County.
My Commission expires March 31, 1914.