SUNDAY'S JOURNAL
September 28, 1913. 9.30 P. M.
All is ready for my great adventure. Indeed the first steps have been
taken. This morning I went down to the Prison to speak at the chapel
exercises as planned; but arrived early, about nine o'clock, at Warden
Rattigan's request, in order to inform the Chaplain as to what I am
proposing to do. He seemed very much surprised and pleased. The Warden
also explained the matter to the Principal Keeper; but I shall not attempt
to venture a guess at his feelings, for I was not present. I can imagine,
however, that the official view may not be one altogether in sympathy with
my experiment. The official mind, as a rule, prefers to have things viewed
strictly from the "congregation side"; it does not approve of interlopers
behind the scenes; which is not, perhaps, altogether unnatural.
When the prisoners are all assembled, the Chaplain leads the way and we
walk down the aisle of the chapel or assembly room--the latter name seems
more appropriate, as there is very little there to suggest religion.
Ascending the platform, we are greeted by a cordial round of applause; the
men have apparently not forgotten my talk to them in the yard last July,
when I explained what our Prison Reform Commission hopes to accomplish,
and asked their assistance.
I take my seat upon the platform and, while awaiting my turn to speak,
endeavor to listen to the service. Before me sit rows and rows of men in
gray trousers and faded shirts, upward of 1,300--not a full house, for a
considerable number are out in the road-building camps. Gray
predominates--not only in the gray clothes but in the heads and faces.
There are a few bright spots of youth and manly vigor, and some black
negro heads, but the general impression is gray; gray, and faded, and
prematurely old. It is a sad audience, to which a sinister aspect is given
by the sight of the guards--silent, alert, blue-clothed figures, youthful
for the most part, seated with watchful eyes and weapons handy, each in a
raised chair near his own particular company.
But, although a sad audience to look upon, it is, as I have found on
previous occasions, a most wonderfully sensitive and responsive audience
to address. Each point of the discourse is caught with extraordinary
quickness; every slight attempt at humor is seized upon with pathetic
avidity. The speaker soon finds himself stimulated and carried along, as
by a strange and powerful force he has never felt before. It is an
exciting and exhilarating experience to talk to a prison audience; but one
must take good care not to be a bore, nor to try any cheap oratorical
tricks; for it is not only a keen and critical audience, it is a merciless
one.
This morning I am not at all afraid of boring the hearers; but I do wonder
whether they will fully take in my meaning; and how those who do
understand will like the idea of my coming among them; and if some of them
understand and sympathize, will it be a few only, or a majority; and if a
majority, how large; and will the minority resent it sufficiently to be
disagreeable?
These are some of the questions which go buzzing through my mind as I sit
trying in vain to listen to the singing of the prison choir and the
Scripture lesson which the Chaplain is reading. Finally I am called upon
to speak; and as I advance to the front of the stage another round of
applause comes from the audience. It has rather a startling effect upon
one, for applause in the prison chapel has always somewhat the character
of an explosion--an explosion of pent-up feelings denied any ordinary
freedom of expression. Hand-clapping is the only form permitted, and it
sounds like the snapping of firecrackers.
I advance to the front of the stage and stumble through the first words of
explanation as to the reasons for having my speech carefully written
out--in order to avoid any possible misunderstanding afterward as to what
I really have said. Then I clear my throat and read the address which
follows.
The Superintendent of Prisons and Warden Rattigan have kindly given
me permission to carry out a plan which has been in my mind for some
time; and to carry it out successfully I need your cooperation--both
officials and prisoners.
As most of you doubtless know, I am chairman of the Commission on
Prison Reform appointed by Governor Sulzer to examine into the Prison
System of New York State, determine what changes would be desirable
and formulate legislation necessary to bring about such changes. The
members of the Commission since their appointment have been quietly
at work informing themselves as to the manner in which the present
System works out, its effect upon prisoners, the measure of its
success as a means of reducing crime throughout the state.
It must be evident that any such examination, seriously undertaken,
is an extremely complex and difficult matter. Not only are
trustworthy statistics absolutely lacking by which to determine the
more obvious facts, but statistics are manifestly impossible to
secure regarding the deepest and most important parts of the
problem--for instance, as to the psychological effect on the
prisoners themselves of the Prison System, both as a whole and as to
certain specific rules and regulations.
For much of the most important work of the Commission, therefore, we
must fall back on such experience of life and knowledge of human
nature as its members may possess. And it is with a desire to extend
my own knowledge and experience in the service of the Commission that
I ask your help in carrying out the plan to which I have referred.
When a man wishes to understand as fully as possible the temper and
character of the people of a foreign country--England or France, Germany,
India, China--he can consult a great deal of printed matter; but he will
not be satisfied until he has made a personal visit to the country itself.
For instance, I have but the merest smattering of the French language, and
I have been privileged to know socially but very few Frenchmen, yet my
visits to France have given me an infinitely better idea of the country
and people than I could ever have received from books. The actual sights
and sounds of a country seem to provide the foundation for a far better
understanding of its history, a more thorough appreciation of all that can
be read and heard of it thereafter.
If this sympathy and understanding, coming from a vivid personal
experience, is desirable in the case of a foreign country, it is even more
necessary in the case of a group of men set apart by society, such as this
community of the prison; for in your case the conditions under which you
live are more unnatural and less easy for most people to grasp than those
of a foreign country. Moreover, most of the books that have been written
about you by so-called penologists and other "experts" are written, so far
as I can determine, from such an outside standpoint and with so little
intelligent sympathy and vital understanding that I am inclined to the
belief that very few of them are of any particular value. Indeed many are
positively harmful; for they are based upon the false and cruel assumption
that the prisoner is not a human being like the rest of us, but a strange
sort of animal called a "criminal"--wholly different in his instincts,
feelings and actions from the rest of mankind.
I am curious to find out, therefore, whether I am right; whether our
Prison System is as unintelligent as I think it is; whether it flies in
the face of all common sense and all human nature, as I think it does;
whether, guided by sympathy and experience, we cannot find something far
better to take its place, as I believe we can.
So by permission of the authorities and with your help, I am coming here
to learn what I can at first hand. I have put myself on trial in the court
of conscience and a verdict has been rendered of "guilty"--guilty of
having lived for many years of my life indifferent to and ignorant of what
was going on behind these walls. For this crime I have sentenced myself to
a short term at hard labor in Auburn Prison (with commutation, of course,
for good behavior). I expect to begin serving my sentence this week. I am
coming here to live your life; to be housed, clothed, fed, treated in all
respects like one of you. I want to see for myself exactly what your life
is like, not as viewed from the outside looking in, but from the inside
looking out.
Of course I am not so foolish as to think that I can see it from exactly
your point of view. Manifestly a man cannot be a real prisoner when he may
at any moment let down the bars and walk out; and spending a few hours or
days in a cell is quite a different thing from a weary round of weeks,
months, years. Nor is prison a mere matter of clothes, they cannot make a
convict any more than they can make a gentleman. I realize perfectly that
my point of view cannot be yours; but neither when I go to Paris is my
point of view that of a Frenchman. Just as an American may perhaps
understand some things about Paris which are not so clear to the average
Frenchman, so perhaps a short residence among you here may enable me to
judge some things about the Prison System more accurately than those who
live too close to the problem to see it in its true perspective.
A word to the officials. My plan will not altogether succeed unless I am
treated exactly like these other men. I ask you, therefore, to aid me by
making no discrimination in my favor. Relax your regular discipline not a
jot because I am here. Give me the same guidance as these others--but no
more. If I offend against the rules, deal out to me the same punishment--I
shall expect it.
Here again I do not deceive myself; I realize perfectly that I shall not
see the Prison System in quite its normal running order. Things can
hardly, with the best intentions, keep going exactly the same while I am
here. Long ago when I was a very young school commissioner I found out
that neither teachers nor scholars can behave quite naturally when a
member of the school board is present. But let me assure you that I come
not on any errand of official investigation. I come in no sense as a spy
upon officers or inmates; I come not to discover anything; I come solely
to test, so far as I can, the effect of the system upon the mind of the
prisoner. I shall study myself, rather than you; or rather, I shall study
you through myself.
Perhaps many of you will think, as many outside the walls will think, that
at best this action is quixotic--another "fool's errand, by one of the
fools." I shall not argue the matter further. I believe that I fully
realize the shortcomings which will attend the experience, yet still I
shall undertake it. For somehow, deep down, I have the feeling that after
I have really lived among you, marched in your lines, shared your food,
gone to the same cells at night, and in the morning looked out at the
pieces of God's sunlight through the same iron bars--that then, and not
until then, can I feel the knowledge which will break down the barriers
between my soul and the souls of my brothers.
A final word to you all. When I come among you do your best to forget who
I am. Think of me only as a new and quite uninteresting arrival. Think of
me not as a member of the Prison Reform Commission, nor as the fellow
townsman of you officers, but as plain Tom Brown or Jones or Robinson,
sent by the courts for some breach of the law and who is no more to you
for the present than any other Tom, Dick or Harry. Some day in the future,
after I have done my time, perhaps my experience may be of service to you
and to the State, but of that we will talk later. In the meantime, help me
to learn the truth.
I have already attempted to describe my state of mind at the commencement
of this talk. As I went on, there came the feeling that, keen as they
usually are, the men were having some difficulty in grasping my full
meaning; were in doubt whether I really did intend to carry out in all
sincerity the plan of actually living their life. But as they began to
comprehend the full significance of the idea, their applause increased in
volume and heartiness.[1]
I have spoken of the sensitive quickness of the prison audience; I
experienced an instance. When the next to the last paragraph of my address
was first written, I used the words, "and in the morning looked out at
God's sunlight through the same iron bars." Then there had come into my
mind the picture made by the grated window, and I added three words so as
to read, "looked out at the pieces of God's sunlight." As I spoke those
words a burst of hearty laughter at the touch of irony came so quickly
that I had to wait before finishing the clause; at the close of the
sentence, with its note of brotherhood, all laughter ceased at once; and
the loudest applause of the morning showed me that what I had said had
struck just the right note, and that the help I wanted from the prisoners
would not be lacking.
After my address I leave the Prison and proceed to my office where I am
interviewed by representatives of the press. This is a disagreeable duty
which I had up to this last moment hoped to escape; for even after giving
up the notion of disguise I had still cherished the idea that it was
possible, with the aid of the Warden, to keep my adventure from being made
public until it was all over. But in our talk this morning the Warden very
quickly convinced me that secrecy is impossible.
"Can't you give instructions to all the officers to say nothing about it
outside?" I ask.
"Certainly I can," is the Warden's reply; "and you know as well as I just
how much good it would do. Here are a hundred officers; they might have
the best intentions, but each one would have to confide it to his wife,
and she to her dearest friend; and it would be all over town in less than
two hours. You must remember that this is a very interesting performance,
and you can't keep it quiet. I'll try it if you say so, but my belief is
that it would be a mistake. You might better see to it that it gets into
the newspapers in the shape you want, rather than let it leak out and be
misrepresented, intentionally or otherwise."
The Warden has the old newspaper man's instinct, and reluctantly I have to
admit that his view is correct. So without more ado I turn my attention to
aiding the press to get what there is, and if possible get it straight.
Fortunately the local representative of many important papers is more than
usually careful and intelligent. I hand him a copy of my address of this
morning and he gets to work. If we cannot have secrecy then let us have
all the publicity we can. After all, the newspapers may interest people in
my adventure, and thus stimulate an interest in Prison Reform. I am
willing to waive my personal preferences if by so doing I can help forward
the cause; especially as the satisfaction of my personal preferences is
manifestly impossible.
After this I give attention to my private affairs which are arranged for
the coming week. Strict orders are issued that no attempt be made to reach
me with personal matters of any sort, except in a case of the most extreme
importance. I am to be as completely shut off from the world, from my
family and friends, as any regular prisoner. So when it comes to this
point I begin to feel rather serious. I am aware of a certain sinking at
the heart, doubtless a form of fear; the unknown always has terrors.
The plan determined upon with the Warden is that I shall be placed with
the Idle Company for the first day or two--those poor fellows whom I have
often seen in the prison yard during the past summer, taking their
melancholy exercise by marching aimlessly up and down, and occasionally
resting by sitting on their buckets; then along about the third day to go
to one of the shops--which one to be determined later. But the Warden told
me this afternoon that upon mentioning this plan to one of the officials
he had protested. "I shouldn't like to have Mr. Osborne put with that Idle
Company. They're the toughest bunch of fellows in the Prison."
"That's just what he wants," was the Warden's reply.
It is true, I do want to make acquaintance with the worst as well as the
best; but I can't help feeling just a trifle uneasy at the prospect of
close relations with the toughest bunch in the Prison; to say nothing of
my query as to just how the toughest bunch in the Prison is going to meet
me. What will they be like at close range? And, if they do not look with
favor upon my action, in what way will their resentment be shown? These
questions keep rising to the surface. At the same time, I begin to be
aware of an ache in one of my teeth where a filling came out some time
ago. Luckily I did not say on just what day my term would begin, although
of course I've had to-morrow in mind right along. If my toothache gets
worse, I can wait over another day and have it attended to. Perhaps, on
the whole it would be best to wait over another day. On the other hand, I
have an idea that the toothache is nothing but plain cowardice.
As we sit down to dinner, I attempt to be jocular with my youngest. "Well,
Golfer," I remark; "this is my last good meal. To-morrow your father goes
to prison for a week!"
"Hm!" responds the interesting youth, "it'll do you good."
I recover myself with some difficulty. "Now what in thunder do you mean by
that?"
"Oh, you won't be so fat when you come out."
I'm inclined to think he's right, but it is evident that I need expect no
sentimental sympathy from my own family.
Here I close my journal for to-night. I feel decidedly solemn. I wonder
how I shall be feeling at this time to-morrow night.
"To-morrow! Why, to-morrow I may be
Myself with yesterday's sev'n thousand years."