THE CAUSES OF CRIME.
In investigating the causes of crime we have first to understand what we
mean by the word "Crime," and also what we describe by the term
"Criminal."
Crime may be regarded both objectively and also subjectively, i.e., as
regards the deed itself and as regards the doer of the deed. In the past
it was customary to consider the crime only and to punish the doer, or
the criminal, according to the enormity of his deed. Scientific methods
require, however, that we should study the criminal and ask ourselves
"what is he?" and "of what forces is he the product?" If these questions
can be satisfactorily answered, then society is better enabled to arm
herself against his invasion, in fact having successfully diagnosed his
case she may be led on to discover the means whereby criminals may be
reduced to their irreducible minimum, both as regards number and as
regards their capacity for doing harm.
Man has two natures, the animal and the spiritual. The animal is the
passive product of Nature, the forces of his development being guided
and restricted by the condition of the life in which he is born and
reared. To this animal nature belongs the natural appetites, passions,
faculties and senses. This nature is not sufficient in itself, and its
realisation cannot be accomplished until it is brought into complete
subordination to the higher or spiritual nature. The function of this
spiritual nature is to subordinate the animal nature by harmonising and
controlling it, and it finds its partial realisation in the institutions
of family, church and state; and its ultimate realisation in the
heavenly counterparts of these. Thus subordinating the animal nature, it
develops the powers of man's natural inheritance along their true line
of advance and brings him steadily nearer the goal of perfect manhood.
When, however, the spiritual influence is not exercised and man resigns
himself to the uncontrolled influences which spring from his lower
nature, he rapidly degenerates. Socially, this degeneracy is noticed by
its process of gradually loosening, and finally severing the ties which
bind man to his race. He becomes an unsocial being and ceases to
contribute to the wealth, peace or establishment of society. His desire
for society is regulated by his capacity to draw from it the
satisfaction of the abnormal appetite of unregulated passion. In this
mood he totally disregards the laws of society and seizes every
opportunity that presents itself to prey upon it and he thus becomes an
anti-social being. Through all ages up to the present, society has at
the cost of much effort and suffering been progressing, stage by stage,
towards a higher order. Each advance purchased at such a price, becomes
a free gift, by inheritance, to the next generation, and from this
inheritance still further progress may be made. It is quite possible
that in a dissolute age retrogression may set in and the ground be lost,
in which case its recovery becomes the arduous task of a succeeding
regenerate age.
With each advance that it makes society embodies in its institution the
principles of social life such as it has been able to discover them.
These principles being finally accepted, we must assume that they are
eternal or else we are compelled to admit that society may be for ever
at fault, that its development does not correspond with the true
development of man, and that this present life is in no wise preparatory
for a future. Though we declare that the principles of society are
eternal, the social institutions which embody them are merely temporal,
and may change with time and circumstances. They are, nevertheless,
binding upon our allegiance, and any attempt to overthrow them becomes
the anti-social act of the criminal and is a punishable offence. The
criminal is an enemy to social advance. He profanes that which society
holds sacred, he scatters that which society, at great cost has
acquired, and he attacks society at its most vulnerable points.
What, then it may be asked, are the causes that produce this anti-social
being? In the case of the sane criminal, an immoral basis underlies all
causes, and without this they would each and all be impotent. Some
causes, as e.g. alcoholism, are the result of the individual's
immorality; others again are independent.
The principal causes are:--A bad ancestry (heredity), bad domestic and
social conditions, alcoholism, imitation, and stress of circumstances.
=Heredity.=--Among unscientific people there are many extravagant
theories held, some even affirming that from the moment of conception a
child's character may be determined as criminal, as if character
underlay habit instead of habit evolving character.
It is therefore necessary that we should endeavour to discover if
possible how far the influence of heredity extends, and especially to
disclose its powers as a factor influencing conduct. A man may be seen
to have the same peculiar carriage and gait as his father; but to argue
from that, that he will in obedience to a naturally transmitted impulse,
follow in his father's footsteps as a thief or a forger is to step
entirely out of the bounds of science. Gait and carriage belong to a
different sphere altogether from morals and conduct. But let it be at
once acknowledged that the morals and conduct of any given ancestry show
a tendency to be reproduced in the posterity. The drunkard is the father
of drunkards; the suicide is the father of suicides, and the parent's
crime is repeated by the child. Not in all cases is this by any means a
fact: but in a sufficient number to exclude the possibility of
coincidence accounting for them all, and to demonstrate conclusively
that some influence must be at work connecting the deeds of the
progenitor with those of his offspring. What is this influence? Can it
be at once declared to be the influence of heredity? The most usual way
of determining this question is by the process of exclusion. If
environment, education, imitation and other causes do not account for
the phenomena, then heredity must. Heredity thus becomes a convenient
name by which to denominate the insolvable. Sometimes the denomination
is correct and sometimes incorrect, and very often, even when correct,
it conveys a wrong impression. The impression being that the influence
of heredity is altogether irresistible and also ineradicable.
Now, whatever the influence of heredity may be, it must be determined
scientifically and not merely guessed at. Nor must the failure to find
an adequate cause for a certain crime be a sufficient reason for
accounting heredity as responsible. Heredity has limits to its range of
influence as well as any other cause for crime, and it may be found that
there are certain fears which it can never invade. For instance, one
sphere wherein its influence is manifestly great, is in the structure of
the nervous, osseous, muscular, circulatory and vascular systems. Again,
what is more common than to find intellectual ability running in
families? Ribot, in his work on heredity, gives long lists of the
world's most famous poets, artists, musicians, statesmen and soldiers,
all showing the tendency of ability, in these various directions, to be
transmitted from one generation to another. Not always to the generation
immediately succeeding, for sometimes these various qualities disappear
in the son to reappear in the grandson or great-grandson. However,
convincing the evidence for transmission in these cases may be, it gives
no warrant whatever for the conclusion that heredity may exercise an
influence upon the MORAL conduct of man.
Let it here be observed that the Moral Law is fundamental to all law. No
laws in Nature ever contradict the Moral Law, but are always found
acting in obedience to it. All the works of God are in accord with this
Law; God is the Moral Governor of the Universe. Therefore whatever may
hold good with all other laws, does not necessarily hold good with this
Law. That a man should inherit his father's intellectual qualities is
then no argument that he should also inherit his father's immorality.
Nothing less will suffice than distinct evidence that he HAS inherited
his father's immorality.
A further observation is necessary, and that is, that morality is not
absolute but relative. Strictly speaking, no man is moral. God alone is
absolutely moral. Nor can we compare the morality of one man with the
average morality of mankind in general. To estimate a certain man's
morality of conduct we must compare his conduct with the degree of the
sense of responsibility which exists within him, and also his power of
control over his conduct. The murderous act of a lunatic for instance is
an immoral act, because we compare the act with morality in the
abstract; but it would be a mistake to call the lunatic an immoral man,
for the simple reason that he had no control over his conduct and was
therefore not responsible for it.
Take the case of the drunkard. A certain drunken father has several
drunken sons. The influence of environment, of education, or of
imitation, we will suppose to be excluded. Is heredity the cause, and if
so, has it invaded the moral sphere? The influence of the father's
drunkenness is first made manifest in his own nervous system. The nerve
centres become clogged and poisoned and fail to discharge their
functions with the same healthy activity as formerly. The nervous system
degenerates, and the consequence of this degeneracy is the production of
that form of irritation within the system which we call the craving for
drink, and which requires alcohol for its immediate satisfaction. The
man will admit that he has no liking for the taste of drink; but
declares that he is in a certain state of unsettlement which can only be
overcome by the use of liquor. A temporary calm is induced, only to be
followed by a more intense irritation or unsettlement afterwards, and
thus a circle of cause and effect is at once described.
This is then the degenerate state of the father's nervous system. Now,
it is undoubted that he may transmit this same degenerate nervous system
to his offspring and thus as his children grow up it is not to be
wondered at if the same craving for drink is to be found in them as was
existing in their parent. The influence of heredity has been at work
upon the nervous system. Has its influence been restricted to this
system, or has it invaded the moral sphere? The children's conduct is
immoral, for no amount of argument can determine drunkenness to be
anything else: but are the children themselves immoral? They are not
immoral so far as they are acting in obedience to an impulse which is
irresistible. The drunkard who is himself responsible for his habit, is,
strictly speaking, an alcoholic and is vicious and degraded. The
drunkard who drinks in spite of himself is, strictly speaking, a
dipsomaniac, and is diseased and insane. The alcoholic may become the
dipsomaniac; but the child who is the victim of a transmitted taint is
without doubt a dipsomaniac and not an alcoholic. He is insane. It may
not be an incurable form of insanity; nor need it be a very acute form;
but insanity it is, and therefore he cannot be called an immoral man
because he drinks, although he is guilty of immoral conduct. Heredity
has not invaded the moral sphere. It has given the man a diseased
nervous system, which, while weakening his will, has not perverted it.
Thus it is seen then that if any effort is to be made for the reform of
the dipsomaniac, the direct influence of heredity must be overcome by a
course of treatment which would be addressed to the nervous system.
Treatment which shall draw out the alcoholic poison and which shall
quicken and invigorate the nerve centres. When the influence of heredity
is discovered to be restricted within these limits, the case of the
hereditary dipsomaniac becomes far less hopeless than it appeared at
first sight, and it is for this reason that the causes of crime should
be thoroughly investigated. To moralise to the dipsomanic is but lost
effort, one may as well abuse a driver for not stopping his bolting
horses. Some reformatory schemes have trusted entirely to moral
agencies, and their failure has been quoted as evidence that all such
schemes are futile. But their failure has been due to an entirely wrong
conception of the cause of crime. The primary cause is undoubtedly a
reprobate will: but this cause is not found in every case. Where the
consequences of the parent's conduct has been inherited we find not the
primary, but a secondary cause, such as e.g. a diseased nervous system.
Sometimes both the primary and the secondary causes exist side by side,
and then treatment must be addressed to both the will and to the
physical system. In fact whatever methods of treatment are employed, the
moral temperament must not be neglected, for even if the will be not
perverted, it is considerably weakened and needs strengthening.
The case of the sensualist is somewhat similar to that of the drunkard.
Ribot quoting Prosper Lucas, gives the example of a "man cook, of great
talent in his calling, has had all his life, and has still at the age of
sixty years, a passion for women. To this he adds unnatural crime. One
of his natural sons living apart from him does not even know his father,
and though not yet quite nineteen, has from his childhood given all the
signs of extreme lust, and strange to say, he, like his father, is
equally addicted to either sex." (Ribot; Heredity p. 89.)
The fact that this son imitated his father's vices at an early age, is
not sufficient in itself to assign the cause to heredity. Nor does the
fact that he was separated from his father's influence or example,
strengthen the assignment beyond dispute. The causes for such conduct
are so common that very few men escape from their influence, and
whosever does not resist them, falls and becomes a victim. But probably
this was a case in which an inherited influence pressed itself so
strongly upon him as to become irresistible. What, we ask was inherited?
A perverted will? That is absolutely impossible. A perverted will is the
outcome of a deliberate choice of evil when the choice of virtue is
equally possible. A weakened will, or a will subject to heavy stress is
a different thing. There must be some stress upon the will. What is it?
It is a well known fact that the exercise of the members of our body
results in a great facility of movement being attained. The pianist can,
after long practice, execute rapid and complex performances of
fingering, which in the early stages of education were absolutely
impossible. It is because the nerve centres controlling the muscles
employed have been brought to such a high state of activity that they
operate almost independently of the will. The nerve centres controlling
certain of our functions DO operate independently of the will. Breathing
is an example, and although an effort of the will is required to
correct bad breathing, yet when once the habit of correct breathing is
established, the directing influence of the mind ceases, and the nerve
centres discharge their functions automatically.
In the normal man the sexual instinct is inherited but the passion is
submissive to the control of the will. The will is supreme and
self-restraint is always possible. The immoral man has refused to
exercise this restraining power, he has, in fact, by his immoral
thoughts, lent his mind to the strengthening of the passion until it has
gained an ascendancy. Continual sexual excitement has resulted in the
nervous centres controlling the sexual organs becoming so powerfully
developed as to act almost automatically, and independently of the will.
In the normal man, sexual excitement results upon the mental vision; in
the sensualist the excitement precedes the vision. Another effect is
noticed in the physiognomy which changes in accordance with the
development of the nerve centres and presents all the appearances of the
typical sensualist or prostitute.
In some cases the sensualist transmits this highly organised or
disordered nervous system to his descendants, and consequently when they
arrive at a certain age they find their bodies invaded by a passion over
which they have small, and sometimes no, control. It is distinctly a
case of functional insanity with them. Their will power is weak because
of undue stress, but it has not been perverted. Perversion may follow;
but may also be avoided, and even the will sufficiently strengthened so
that it may re-assume control and subject the passion to control. The
influence of heredity is here also confined to the nervous system. That
is, the direct influence, the influence which was first felt and before
it received any support which the mind of the victim may give it. The
cases of hereditary suicides, murderers and assassins afford a very
large field for investigation, and we cannot do more than suggest some
causes which seem to give strong evidence of their existence. These
causes if their existence be allowed, and we see every reason that it
should, will restrict the influence of heredity to a much narrower
sphere than is popularly supposed. The old story of the devil preaching
upon the horrors of hell serves somewhat to illustrate our meaning. When
the abbot enquired whether it was not contrary to his interests to draw
so vivid and terrible a picture he replied in the negative and gave as
his reason that the man who contemplated the horrors of hell was the man
who was bound to find his way there.
The contemplation of criminal acts effects a strange fascination upon
the mind and very often induces imitation of the same acts. When a
suicide or murder, in fact any crime, is committed by a member of a
family the other members either, according to their moral disposition,
experience a greater or lesser repulsion for the deed than they formerly
possessed. The enormity of the deed is either stronger or lesser in
their eyes than before. In the latter case, murder or suicide does not
seem nearly so heinous a crime when it is brought so closely under their
notice. The very knowledge that a father or uncle or any other near
relative, or even friends for that matter, committed suicide, makes the
act appear far less terrible, and also far less impossible for
themselves. Most men have at some time or another an impulse to destroy
themselves, it may not be very strong; but if it is felt at a time when
the circumstances of life are unfavourable and, if added to this, there
is presented the example of a suicide very near at home, the impulse is
undoubtedly strengthened. The whole chain of circumstances seem to
direct the vision upon the rash act of the friend or relative, until at
last the vision becomes fascinating, and the act is imitated. To use a
concise expression one may call this the "hypnotic power of
circumstances." It is not an absolute cause in itself; but, strictly
speaking, may we call any cause absolute? It is not a cause which would
influence a man of strong will or of sound morality. But a sentimental
person, one of morbid ideas, weak will, or overcome by the thought of
detection, or the fear of misfortune, might easily fall a victim to its
influences. It will not account for all the cases of hereditary suicide,
for a mental disease may be transmitted which would account for the
suicide of both father and son or whatever the combination may be. It,
however, does account, we believe, for the majority of the cases, and
the similarity of the method employed strengthens this belief, for it
indicates that the mind is dwelling upon the actual vision of the
relative's suicide, and is not merely contemplating suicide in the
abstract. This theory would imply that any case of suicide, upon which
the mind would dwell and concentrate itself, would exercise the same
influence, and this is the case. A few years ago in Dunedin an
accountant who was involved in financial difficulties, shot himself with
a pistol. His executor, against the advice of friends, took charge of
the pistol. Becoming involved in financial difficulties himself, he too
committed suicide by shooting himself with the same weapon! Almost,
without a doubt, we may say that the circumstances of the first suicide
exerted upon the mind of the trustee a hypnotic influence which combined
with and gave the final impulse to the other contributing causes of his
act.
Another instance is that of a young man who, contemplating suicide,
carried a revolver about with him for a whole day. He spoke of suicide
to his friends, occasionally discharged shots into the ground, and
finally, during the evening, blew his brains out. That he contemplated
suicide was evident from his conversation, but that his mind was not
made up, is also evident from the delay he occasioned. In fact, his
whole behaviour indicates a faint desire to cling to something stronger
than himself in order to brace himself against his haunting fears. The
revolver fascinated him. He dallied with it, made up his mind, changed
it again, and finally the influence became supreme for a moment, and he
fired the fatal shot. Throughout the day, he very probably thought of
the grief of his relatives and of the young woman he was soon to marry,
he pictured the consternation of his friends, read the newspaper
accounts of his act, saw his funeral, and let his mind run altogether in
morbid channels. Thus it was that the vision of his own act exerted an
hypnotic influence upon him which became at the critical moment supreme
and irresistible.
When the picture is real and not imaginary, and when the circumstances
of a parent's or brother's or friend's suicide may easily be recalled
and the mind allowed to dwell upon them, how much greater would the
influence become, especially when the same example has served to
diminish the idea of the enormity of the act. Where persons lend
themselves to the idea that an hereditary influence exists and may
spring upon them at any moment, they are almost sure either to destroy
themselves or else to develop some form of insanity. There are cases of
murder and assassination (apparently hereditary crime) where the
conditions are so similar that the hypnotic power of circumstances may
likewise be urged as sufficient cause.
So far, an attempt has been made to show that whatever the influence of
heredity may be, it is restricted outside the sphere of morality. It
cannot transmit an IMMORAL IDEA. So far as certain forms of
vice and crime are concerned it most probably is limited entirely to its
effect upon the physical structure of man. Combined with family
tradition and working upon a diseased, or weakened will, it accounts for
similarities of conduct. Suicides, murderers and assassins do not then
receive by transmission from their ancestry any taint or tendency which
may be called the direct cause of their crime. Another factor is
present, a hypnotising power, and this is the final and directing power.
It is a different influence to imitation, although its first result is
the same, viz: the lowering of the moral idea. But crimes where the act
is the imitation of another person's act are generally committed from
the desire to become notorious and to be the centre of observation. The
spirit of vanity, very strong in the low type, is appealed to and
aroused. Or perhaps, the example of another's crime affords a suggestion
for the method of accomplishing a certain desired end. On the other
hand, the ancestral example, after having broken down the moral barrier
depends entirely upon its power to fascinate. Those of weak will or
guilty conscience, alone succumb to its influence. If we consider the
cases of thieves, vagabonds and paupers we find their crimes and vices
likewise running in families. It is nevertheless quite a mistake to jump
at the conclusion that heredity accounts for all these coincidencies.
Exempting all cases of transmitted mental alienation and observing only
those who are quite responsible for their action, it is impossible to
suppose that there is, somewhere in their organism, a power which will
direct their lives into the channels of vice or crime just as
irresistibly as the influence which makes the hair grow on the crown of
their heads. It is unthinkable. It supposes a responsible person who
cannot control himself. Which is a contradiction.
M. Moleschott, at the International Congress of Criminal Anthropology
held in Paris in 1889, "mentioned an influence towards crime that had
not been noticed, to wit, the hereditary social influence, or that is,
the tradition which is instilled into the mind of every child before he
knows the difference between right and wrong, that by which he obtains
the rudiments of his knowledge of right and wrong. Whether it be correct
or not it is the child's standard. He gets it not from any knowledge of
theory of justice, but from the tradition of his own neighbourhood, as
it is taught by his parents and associates by the people, and as is
believed by them." (Criminal Anthropology; the Smithsonian Report for
1891.)
It will be understood that the influences of which M. Moleschott speaks
are not of an hereditary nature, that is, they are not transmitted
through the blood; but they are influences which are present from the
first moment of consciousness. They are quite sufficient to account for
the criminal type being found in the physiognomy of a person born and
reared among such surroundings. It is a very popular error to suppose
that a person's physiognomy never changes, and therefore that if the
criminal cast of countenance is seen it must be a faithful witness to
some innate depravity transmitted from an ancestry. The expression plays
such an important part in the moulding of the countenance, that of two
brothers very much alike in youth, one, afterwards given to crime, will
still retain his resemblance to his brother; but will display the
criminal type as well. It is thus that we have the different types in
murderers, assassins, thieves, swindlers and sensualists. They are all
criminal or vicious but their forms of criminality and vice are so
diverse that a different expression results from the different kinds of
thought passing through their minds. In their theories, few people
acknowledge that the symmetry of the facial features may change, and yet
it is a matter of common observance that they do. In the cases of
persons becoming insane or persons who have suffered from long and
painful illnesses it is very remarkable. Likewise in the case of the man
who has fallen into crime, it is also most noticeable. Of course there
are limits to the changes which the expression may produce, but these
changes are nevertheless very great and sufficiently so, not perhaps to
produce Lombroso's type in any given face, but to give that face at
least a distinctly criminal cast.
The appearance then of this criminal cast upon the features is not
sufficient evidence to account for an inherited tendency towards crime.
Dr Manouvrier insists that Lombroso's theory that the criminal is born
and not made is based upon the exploded science of phrenology, and
declares that all the anatomical distinctions and physicological
characteristics quoted by Lombroso are to be found among honest men as
well as among criminals. The fact that a greater proportion are found
among criminals to his mind proves nothing.
[There is not vast difference between normal and abnormal persons
possessing these peculiarities. In Lombroso's work "The Female Offender"
he notices:--
Normal Women Criminal Women
Receding foreheads 8 per cent. 11 per cent.
Enormous lower jaws 9 " 15 "
Projecting cheek bones 14 " 19.9 "
Murderesses 30 "
" ears 6 " 9.2 "
Flat nose 40 " Thieves 20 "
Gradenigo (quoted by Lombroso) gives the following table showing the
peculiarities of the ears of 245 criminals as compared with 14,000
normal women:--
Normal Criminal
Regular external ear 65 per cent. 54 per cent.
Sessile ear 12 " 20 "
Scaphoid fossa prolonged
to lobe 8.2 " 21.2 "
Projecting ears 3.1 " 5.3 "
Prominent anti-helix 11.5 " 14.2 "
Darwin's tubercle 3 " 2.9 "
Other anthropometrists notice different proportions.]
If Lombroso's theory, that a man was born a criminal, was to be taken as
the rule, Manouvrier declares that it must then be universal, and that
men thus born must inevitably commit crime. If it be a rule then it must
operate in all classes, and since it does not so operate, proof is given
that it is not the rule. Manouvrier declares that the man possessed of
characteristics the very opposite of Lombroso's criminal, if subjected
to the conditions, influences, and temptations, which lead to crime
would as likely commit crime as he who possessed all the characteristics
which Lombroso describes as typical. Manouvrier regards the social life
of a person from childhood as being the most important factor in
moulding character. He emphatically denies that there is in the embryo a
predisposition to crime. Dr Magnan likewise refuses his assent to this
theory.
It may be rather daring to suggest a theory which would reconcile the
differences between these eminent men: but as the facts presented by
each side are indisputable, some such reconciliation must exist.
Possibly if we interpret Lombroso's phrase, "inherited tendency towards
crime" or "predisposition towards crime" in the same way as we interpret
the term ("predisposition towards disease") when speaking of tubercular
persons (or, as Mercier speaks of the insane), that is as persons, who
in a given favourable environment, are more likely to commit crime than
persons without that inherited tendency, we may find these theories to
be more in accord with one another. Lombroso insists that there must be
an inherited tendency, Manouvrier insists that there must be
environment. As in the case of tubercular persons (of tubercular
ancestry) these two causes are complementary, may it not be also the
case with criminals of criminal ancestry? The INHERITED IMMORAL
IDEA seems to be really what Manouvrier rejects. A vicious
conception of life which makes the man inevitably, incurably, and
irresistibly a criminal, is apparently the interpretation he puts on
Lombroso's theory. But from Lombroso's works and speeches, the
interpretation does not appear to be at all a necessary one. The
transmission of a disordered nervous system with its consequences, as
one cause, the "hypnotic influence of circumstances" as another cause,
and these two causes acting sometimes separately and sometimes
conjointly, will very possibly account for the phenomena Lombroso
observes. A most important factor, and one which cannot be disregarded,
compels the acceptance of some such theory. This factor is the success
resulting from reformatory effort. It is not only Lombroso and
Manouvrier that need to be reconciled, but Lombroso, Manouvrier and
Brockway. This latter gentleman is the founder of the famous Elmira
Reformatory which has reformed 82 per cent. of 12,000 felons which have
been committed to it for treatment.
We come then to this conclusion that heredity plays an important part in
the production of the criminal; but that there are other very important
factors which are often confused with it and when separated from it
reduce the popular estimate of its influence to the scientific one,
which is considerably the lesser one. Furthermore, as a consequence of
this investigation, the true foundations upon which reformatory science
is to be built are clearly indicated.
This statement, that heredity plays an important part in the production
of the criminal, needs to be carefully guarded. It means precisely this
and nothing more:--That where an hereditary influence (such as above
described) making crime easier, has been transmitted, there that
influence is an important factor in the production of the criminal. It
does NOT mean that this influence is invariably transmitted by the
criminal parent, neither does it mean that the majority of criminals are
"born" criminals.
The following is an extract from a letter upon this subject which the
author has received from Dr. Arthur MacDonald, one of the leading
criminologists of to-day:--"There is no proof of any scientific value
that criminality is inherited." By criminality we understand "the moral
basis of crime."
The famous "Jukes" family that lived in the State of New York, afford
one of the most interesting studies in heredity to be found in the
annals of criminology. Of this numerous family (some 709 persons of
which were clearly traced in five generations) the elder sons took to
crime and the younger sons to vagabondage. There was indeed a proportion
of honest and industrious persons among them. Of the women 52 per cent.
were prostitutes. That a proportion of honest men among the sons, and a
fair number of virtuous women among the daughters is recorded, clearly
proves that an hereditary taint is not, in all cases, necessarily
transmitted from parent to child. Latency in one generation, with
activity in the next, is frequently observed in the transmission of
disease; but in the case of crime, as distinguished from vice, this is
rarely so.
That the younger sons of the "Jukes" family fell into habits of
vagabondage (leaving it to the elder sons to carry on the criminal
traditions of the family) is also worthy of notice. It serves to show
that whatever the influence of heredity may be, as a factor disposing
towards crime, it cannot be an independent and final factor. In families
living after a primitive manner of life, as this family did, the elder
sons are invariably the companions of their fathers and accompany them
on their depredatory raids. The younger sons are left to the milder
environment of their mother's society. Thus from a criminal point of
view, the environment of the elder sons is more intense than that of the
younger sons. The difference in environment accounts for the difference
in character formed; the more intense environment accounting for
criminals and the milder environment for vagabonds. Sometimes the
influence of environment is overcome, and we noticed that among the
"Jukes" a proportion of the family was honest and industrious.
Acknowledging the transmission of a physical defect from a criminal
ancestry, we must bear in mind that the conditions of the criminal's
life are such as are calculated to produce in himself that defect which
he transmits. His body becomes weakened, his nervous system disordered,
and the physical substratum of his mind diseased. These defects he
transmits to his offspring and thus handicaps them in the effort that is
required from the individual to adapt himself to the conditions of
society.
This is the criminal "taint" or handicap that makes it more likely that
the individual should fall into crime than the normal man. Although
society regards this hereditary criminal as a monster, it has been made
clear that he is really more deserving of compassion than one not so
handicapped. To secure society from his injurious acts, our courts
frequently take the illogical and unjust course of imposing a more
severe punishment upon him. This is in itself a clear evidence of the
demand that exists for penological reform.
=Environment.=--By environment we understand bad homes, bad
associations, and generally bad conditions.
Of the condition of the 12,000 persons who passed through the Elmira
Reformatory between the years 1876-1902, only 1.47 per cent. came from
good homes and 37.4 per cent. from fair homes. Of the character of the
men's associations, 56.6 per cent. was positively bad; 41.9 per cent.
was "not good;" .9 per cent. was doubtful, and 1.6 per cent. was good.
It is scarcely necessary from a practical point of view to enquire into
the actual amount of crime which results from a bad environment, for it
is only too obvious that none but those of the strongest wills and of
the highest morality can resist the influence of bad surroundings when
these are constant. Our enquiry should rather be directed to ascertain
what constitutes a bad environment and what are the causes that produce
it. It should also seek to discover by what means its evil influence may
be checked and how to eradicate these influences when present. The
attitude of our law-courts towards the criminal is practically
this:--"You have been reared amidst evil surroundings whose influence
you could not resist, you are a criminal, an outcast from society, you
must be punished by being locked up in a school of crime in the hope
that it may inspire you to live a better life. The sentence of the court
is ..." And society endorses this attitude!
The evil influence of bad surroundings is well exemplified by an
instance recorded by Viscount D'Haussonville in his work "L'Enfance a
Paris":--"Some years ago a band of criminals were brought before the
jury of the Seine charged with a terrible crime, the assassination of an
aged widow, with details of ferocity which the pen refuses to describe.
The president of the court having asked the principal, Maillot, called
'the yellow,' how he had been brought to commit such a crime, he
replied:--What do you wish that I should tell you Mr President? Since
the age of seven years I have been found only on the streets of Paris. I
have never met anyone who was interested in me. When a child, I was
abandoned to every vicissitude--and I am lost. I have always been
unfortunate. My life has been passed in prisons and gaols. That is all.
It is my fate. I have reached--you know where. I will not say that I
have committed the crime under circumstances independent of my own will,
but finally--(here the voice of Maillot trembled) I never had a person
to advise me. I had in view only robbery. I committed robbery but I
ended with murder."
The following description of the manner in which parents may defeat the
work of the juvenile reformatory or industrial school was given by
Senator Roussel at the Fourth International Prison Congress:--"The
pernicious influence of parents relative to minors is manifest in two
ways and at two periods of the child's life. First in extreme youth,
when he is only a burden, his parents neglect him. He is left without
proper care, often without proper food and subjected to all the hazards
of the streets; he is forced to be a vagabond and a beggar, and this
situation continues until a violation of the law places the little
unfortunate in the hands of justice. Later, everything is changed. When
by maturity of age and good effects of penitentiary education, the child
instead of being a burden can be a source of profit, we see those same
parents, who had abandoned him in his infancy, and apparently had
forgotten him altogether, go to him and win him back to them by their
entreaties, and finally on his discharge regain him by virtue of
parental authority. This indiscretion of evil parents ... is the way
that the first-fruits of correctional or charitable education are
corrupted and that a great many minors who would have become useful
members of society, are definitely lost to it."
It may be heresy to criticise our public school system but it is more
than an open question whether we are not producing a generation of badly
educated people who are not aware of their own ignorance, who see no
dignity in labour and who prefer to make their living by speculation
rather than by work. The fault largely consists in estimating the
efficiency of a school or a teacher solely by the results obtained at
examination and making the children work for this end and this end only.
Their memories are taxed to the uttermost but no attempt is made to
develop them into reasoning, enquiring and labour loving beings. The
difficulty with which children in the sixth and seventh standards follow
the simplest arguments is simply amazing. The teachers, moreover, have
no opportunity for cultivating the art of pedagogy. Their whole time is
taken up preparing matter to pour into the child's mind. The bad
salaries that are paid can also have but one result, viz., the depriving
the State of the services of the most manly and most noble teachers and
having the work committed to those of the genus prig.
Bad homes, bad schools and playgrounds only once removed from cattle
yards, will be, in this country, the most potent factors in producing
crime.
=Alcohol.=--The influence of alcohol in the commission of crime is both
direct and indirect. We see its direct influence in those crimes which
are committed whilst the culprit is either in a state of intoxication or
else just recovering from such a state. To detect and trace its indirect
influence a much closer study is required. The inconsequent, lazy and
thriftless life of the criminal demands some sort of stimulant, and this
is found readily at hand in alcohol. Alcohol is not the cause of the
crimes of these people but it is closely associated with such cause. The
man who stabs another in a saloon is not then guilty of his first crime.
Under the influence of intoxication he has lost his power of
self-control and he commits a deed for which he may in a sober moment
have still a degree of moral abhorrence or be perhaps too much of a
coward to perform.
Many criminals, whose crime requires a certain amount of nerve and
calculation, as e.g. assassinations, murders, robberies, swindlings,
etc., will not touch alcohol until their crime has been completed and
they have satisfied themselves that they covered up all trace of it.
They then often indulge in a debauch.
In the lower courts, offenders will frequently plead as an extenuation
that they were intoxicated at the time when they committed their
offence. This is often done in order to escape the full penalty, and
such pleas are not to be relied upon in estimating the real influence of
alcohol. In the higher courts, for the same reason, criminals often
feign insanity, and in not a few of such cases they become their own
dupes by actually losing the possession of their senses. Drunkenness and
crime go together, although the increase in the consumption of alcohol
does not necessarily mean that crime has increased. Neither does the
reverse hold good. When crime appears first it is not long before all
forms of animal indulgence follow. Sometimes drunkeness appears first,
and when the home has been reduced to beggary, crime results.
Under the immediate influence of drink, the crimes most commonly
committed are those against morality and the person. In countries where
the saloon is an institution, it is invariably the home of criminals and
the scene of many murders and deeds of blood. In France, e.g. out of
10,000 murders committed, 2,374 occurred in saloons. The indirect
influence of alcohol is perhaps more terrible than its direct influence.
There is this sad feature about it also that the greatest sufferers are
the victims, not of their own abuse, but of that of others. Many a
criminal tells the story, which is easily corroborated, of the days of
his childhood when his father came home drunk and the children for very
fear had to hide themselves or run out into the streets, often to sleep
wherever they could, and perhaps steal to satisfy the pangs of hunger.
Such children are quickly absorbed, the girls into the ranks of
prostitution, the boys into those of crime. Many too, by reason of their
parents' intemperance, are weaklings and unable to take their stand in
the ranks of honest labourers. Unless they are rescued by philanthropic
effort they very soon take to crime, and physically and psychically
present all the features of the "instinctive criminal."
Of 12,000 criminals at Elmira, in nearly 36 per cent, was a drunken
ancestry to be clearly traced.
To state exactly the influence of alcohol as a cause of crime will, from
the nature of the case, never be possible; but this much is certain,
that EVERY cause finds in it a strengthening contributary of
considerable potentiality.
=Imitation.=--One of the principal characteristics of the criminal is
his excessive vanity. His great ambition is to gain notoriety and to be
talked about by the public. Almost every criminal has his hero in crime
whose deed he tries to emulate as nearly as possible; or, better still,
to outshine. Thus we find, that when some daring deed has been
perpetrated, there are not wanting others who quickly make an attempt to
imitate it. A prisoner tried to kill his comrade because a third man,
who was standing his trial for murder, was receiving in his estimation
too much attention from the public and especially "too many bouquets." A
murderer in New Zealand declared that the notorious bushranger Ned Kelly
was his ideal of a man. A certain priest, beloved by all, was found
murdered. None could account for the crime; afterwards it was discovered
to have been the act of a young criminal who performed it merely as an
act of bravado. Instances of this sort might be multiplied all tending
to show that the vanity of the criminal leads him, as far as his courage
will permit, to imitate the most daring deeds in crime. The witnessing
of executions and reading the accounts of fictitious and real crimes
often leads many into crime. As a deterrent to crime, it was once the
custom in England to conduct executions in public. Lombroso records it
as being his conviction that such publicity does, by the law of
imitation, lead more into crime than it turns from it. This he considers
is one of the most powerful arguments in favour of abolishing the death
penalty. Out of 167 persons condemned to death in England, 164 had been
present at executions. The reading of sensational novels or the
descriptive accounts of great crimes has a most alarming effect upon
those who are of an impressionable nature. These persons are to
themselves the heroes of an imaginary world. They will put on an air of
bravado, adopt a "swagger" style of attire, carry sharp knives and pose
before their companions as dare-devils. If not sufficiently courageous
to perform deeds of daring they will constantly be recounting imaginary
ones for which they will claim the authorship; or else they will be for
ever threatening to do something of a staggering nature. The more
courageous of these frequently become dangerous criminals while the
more timid descend into sneak thieves, or the assaulters and violators
of the persons of the defenceless. This inflammatory reading matter also
exerts an hypnotic influence over some which is almost irresistible. Dr
MacDonald ("Criminology" p. 131), gives the instance of a woman who
after having read of the dreadful crime of a Parisian mother, came to Dr
Esquirol and pleaded with him to admit her into his hospital, declaring
that since reading of this crime she was tormented by the devil to kill
her youngest child. Reading of the crime and vividly picturing to
herself the details of it, had resulted in the woman's mind being laid
hold of by a fascinating power which continually prompted her to kill
her own child. Her wish was granted and she recovered.
In this case we have another instance of the "hypnotic influence of
circumstances." Firstly, the picture is deeply impressed on the mind;
next the moral sensibilities are hardened, and lastly the overt act is
committed. Tropmann who murdered a whole family of eight, confessed that
his demoralisation was due to the reading of sensational novels. The
publication of the details of crimes and the circulation of inflammatory
fiction is a most fruitful cause of further crime. One of the most
efficient safe-guards against crime and scandal is a sensitive public
moral tone. This is undoubtedly hardened by the publicity given to
sordid and gruesome details. One fails to see what good purpose can
possibly be served. Knowledge is power, but in this case, it is a power
for evil. The weak-willed readily obey the law of imitation, the
criminal is gratified at seeing the big headlines in the newspapers and
impelled to further crime, and some neurotics are positively hypnotised.
Any serious attempt to suppress the increase of crime must take these
matters into consideration, and it will unquestionably prove abortive
unless a much stricter censorship is exercised over the publication of
the gruesome details of crimes and scandals and also over the sale of
the type of literature referred to.