Punishment awarded to Criminals.—Capital Punishments.—Plea of
Insanity.—Penitentiaries.—Houses of Correction.—Improvement in
Laws.—Periodical Publications.—Editors of Newspapers.—State of
Literature.
The travellers proceeded to ask some further questions, which had been
suggested to them by what they had observed in the course of the trials
they had witnessed.
“We perceived,” said they, “that the punishment most frequently awarded
was that of confinement in a penitentiary; instead, however, of naming
the period of confinement, it was generally announced that the terms of
confinement would be determined subsequently. We wish to know the reason
of this procedure.”
“We do not,” replied Sir Peter, “in most cases regulate the confinement
by time, but in another way. We require that each man should perform a
certain quantity of daily labour, as a compensation—though, of course,
often a very inadequate one—for his maintenance; and whatever he can
earn above this, is placed in a bank for him. Each man is sentenced to
earn a sum, regulated according to his trade, state of health, and other
circumstances. When he has earned this sum, he is set at liberty. We
think this has a double advantage: it encourages him to labour, because
he is made aware that his own industry will affect the period of his
confinement; and this has a tendency to create in him a permanent habit
of industry. Again, the sum of money he has earned being given to him
when released, he is not thrown on the world as a pauper, exposed by his
very destitution to fresh temptation, but has the means of carrying on
some species of industry.
“We have also as a punishment _secret_ branding (usually on the back),
performed in the way of tattooing, as your sailors do. Every culprit is
examined as to whether he had been thus branded; in which case, the
punishment for any subsequent crime is always the more severe. At the
same time, as the brand is secret, the individual is not exposed on that
account to the scoffs of his neighbours, which might make him regardless
of character and produce a hardness of disposition. These are our most
ordinary punishments.
“In case of murder, however, and some few other crimes, we resort to
capital punishments. This is restricted, as I have intimated, to very
few species of delinquency; but when those are perpetrated, the
punishment of death is rigidly enforced and speedily inflicted. In any
punishment prompt execution adds greatly to the terror; but in this more
particularly, because death, _some time or other_, is a sentence passed
by nature upon all men.”
[Here occurs, as a marginal note to Mr. Sibthorpe’s memoranda, a
quotation from Shakspeare’s dialogue of Pistol and Fluellin:—
_Pistol._—Base caitiff! _thou shalt die_.
_Fluellin._—You say fery true, scald knave, _when Cot’s coot pleasure
is._]
The infliction of all punishments, including capital, is private; that
is, is in the presence only of certain official persons, appointed to
witness and certify the due execution of the sentence. The travellers
could not but acknowledge the brutalising and noxiously hardening
effects of our public executions.
“To show you the strictness,” observed Sir Peter, “with which our penal
code is administered, I must mention to you that we do not allow the
plea of insanity, in any case, as a ground of acquittal, unless that
insanity is of such a nature as to warrant the opinion that the
individual did not intend to inflict the injury for which he is tried.
And in case any degree of insanity appears to have actuated the
individual, we inquire whether this disposition had ever been previously
displayed; for in this case we hold the relatives or friends, or persons
with whom he has lived, as accountable for not having given the
magistrates due warning of his state of mind, so as that he should be
put into confinement.”
The travellers pressed in objection the various topics commonly urged
respecting greater or lesser degrees of moral responsibility, capability
of discerning good from evil, &c.; all which considerations the
Southlanders, it appears, are accustomed to regard as entirely
irrelevant. They maintain that criminal legislation has nothing
whatsoever to do with moral retribution; the sole object of human laws
being the prevention of crime, which can take place in all those cases,
and in those only, where the intention of the agent (no matter how that
intention originates) is directed towards the action to be prevented.
On the travellers expressing a strong desire to see their penitentiary,
and examine its system of management; “We have many penitentiaries,”
said Sir Peter, “and in each of them the system adopted differs in some
respects from that of others; for we hold it to be a subject of constant
experiment to ascertain what mode of discipline may be the best fitted
to secure the ultimate object at which we aim, which is, as I have just
said, not the infliction of vengeance on the guilty, but the prevention
of crime. I shall enable you, however, to judge of our system in this
respect by taking you to visit our penitentiaries, according as you can
command leisure.
“The systems pursued in some of our houses of correction,” he added,
“need, and, I trust, will receive alteration; but I hope you will not
think me unduly partial in considering the very worst of our modes of
secondary punishment far preferable to yours. Be assured we shall never
undertake to found a new nation from the sweepings of our jails;
receiving additional corruption—those of them who are capable of it—by
unrestricted intercourse with each other during a four months’ voyage,
and their moral degradation completed by being reduced to a state of
slavery; that is, by being consigned, as in your colony, to masters for
whose benefit they are compelled to labour.”
[The manuscript of the travellers did not contain very full information
on the subject of penitentiaries, as there were many which they were
still designing to visit. It would appear, however, that in some
penitentiaries solitary confinement was the practice; in others, the
culprits worked in companies; but, as in some of the American
penitentiaries, total silence was enforced. Every man was made to work
in a mask, in order that he should remain unknown to the rest, and thus
escape the hardening effects which are the consequences of exposure of
character.]
“There is one part of our system,” said Sir Peter, “which I should
mention to you, because it will serve to show you the diligence with
which we apply ourselves to the continual improvement both of our civil
and penal code. We hold it as a duty belonging to our judges and chief
law officers, that they should discuss amongst themselves, from time to
time, whatever alteration their experience in the administration of our
laws may suggest to any of them as desirable. Whatever report is sent in
by their united wisdom to parliament, is received with the utmost
deference; and should any doubt remain as to the expediency of adopting
their proposal, we invite some of the judges or law officers to assist
us in our deliberations, by stating publicly the grounds of their
recommendation. We allow them to debate freely, as if they were members
of parliament; but of course we do not give them, as they are not
members, any vote in the final decision. Indeed,” he observed, “whenever
we appoint (as we very constantly do) a commission empowered to collect
information on any particular subject, and draw up a report recommending
any new laws or practices, we allow the members of that commission to
attend our parliamentary meetings and explain their own reasons. We
conceive this can be best done by the same individuals whom we appoint
to deliberate. We regard them as members of parliament in fact, _pro hac
vice_, except that we do not give them a power of voting.”
* * * * *
Newspapers, magazines, and other periodical publications are abundant
and cheap in this country.
In the early part of the traveller’s visit, Lieutenant R. Smith, having
accidentally taken up a newspaper which lay on the table, was much
interested in its perusal. The leading articles appeared to have been
written with considerable discretion and good sense. He asked whether he
might regard that paper as a fair specimen of the degree of talent which
their newspapers generally presented.
The gentleman of the house replied that, in his estimation, that paper
was rather the best of the day. Its conductor was a person of very high
character and great attainments.
“You just saw him,” he said, “riding by with our leading minister. We
have several papers,—besides magazines and other periodicals,—conducted
also with various degrees of talent, and of every shade and variety of
political sentiment.”
“In our country,” said Lieutenant Smith, “conductors are not on such
familiar terms with our statesmen; indeed they are seldom to be met in
cultivated society. We think it the lowest department of literature. In
fact, we scarcely deem the editor of a newspaper a literary man, or even
a gentleman.”
“I suppose then,” said Mr. Bruce (their host), “that your papers are
nothing more than a record of events and advertisements; and that they
exercise no influence upon the general sentiments of the country.”
“Quite the reverse,” said the English travellers. “The newspapers
produce a very decided influence; so much so that each party in the
state takes care to hold some of them in pay, as advocates of the
opinions which that party is anxious to maintain: and the editor of a
paper not unfrequently prescribes the opinions or conduct which each
party should adopt, many confining their reading almost exclusively to
papers on their own side.”
“This is very strange to us,” said Mr. Sibthorpe, “and it appears
perfectly inconsistent. Your refusal to associate with the conductors as
gentlemen of reputation, must make them unworthy to be received into
good society; most emphatically and particularly unworthy, not merely as
unfitted for the company of gentry, but as undeserving of the respect of
reputable people. Such, at least, seems to us to be the tendency of a
ban of exclusion fixed on a class of persons such as these writers. A
small shopkeeper indeed, or mechanic, though not admitted into the
social circles of the higher classes, may be a worthy and respectable
man in his way, and may well be content to associate with those who are
in every respect his own equals; but not so a man of such education,
knowledge, and talent as are requisite for the successful conduct of a
newspaper. A man so qualified will seldom, we should think, be found
consenting to follow an employment which excludes him from the society
of gentlemen, unless there be, in some way or other, something of moral
inferiority about him. Exceptions there may be; but we should fully
expect this to be at least the general rule. We take care, therefore,
since newspapers cannot but influence public opinion, to induce men of
reputation to engage in this department, by showing that we regard it as
a most honourable employment. To act otherwise, would seem to us like
proclaiming that we were determined to be rogue-led.”
The English travellers asked if the newspapers had to pay a tax to the
state. They were informed, that in this particular state no tax was
exacted, but that in other states of the union the practice was
different. “We observe,” said they, “a vast number of advertisements of
all kinds; and, amongst the rest, that a great variety of books were
announced as in the press.”
“Our press,” said one of the company, “is very active; but you can best
judge of the state of our literature by examining hereafter our public
libraries. To some of these we shall have great pleasure in conducting
you.”