[This is the second and concluding article by Mr. Finty.
The first article appeared in the December, 1913,
Delinquent. Mr. Finty’s two articles are an especially
interesting statement.]
In the foregoing I have attempted to outline the situation of the Texas
prison system, to show how a burden of loss and debt has followed
marked financial prosperity, and to indicate why the public is puzzled
over the situation. I shall now endeavor to outline the causes of this
condition, my statement being based not merely upon the conclusions
of the investigating committee of 1913, but also largely upon the
testimony taken by the committee, which testimony I heard and reported.
This statement necessarily will include something of a review of
provisions of the prison reform act of 1910, of criticisms of the same,
and of the revisions which the Legislature recently tried to make.
When the prison reform act of 1910 took effect on January 20, 1911, and
Governor Colquitt appointed his prison commissioners, the system was
clear of debt except as to a small sum in current bills for supplies
just received and on hand. There was also outstanding $100,000 of bonds
secured by a direct lien on the Texas State Railroad. These bonds are
still outstanding, and they are not taken into account in any of the
statements hereinafter made.
The prison population when the new law took effect was 3,578. Of
this number 1,046 were hired out; 831 were working on share farms (a
modification of the hiring-out system), and 1,701 were employed upon
State account, 586 of these within or near the walls, and 1,115 upon
the State farms.
The acreage cultivated on the State farms was 18,097; on share farms
25,363, and on contract farms 18,680; total 62,140.
The prison population on September 30, 1913, was 3,926, all of which
force is employed on State account, 733 of the prisoners being in or
near Rusk and Huntsville prisons and 2,965 on State plantations. These
plantations now include certain rented lands, adjoining the lands
owned by the State. The prison population is classified as follows:
White 1,244, blacks 1,919, mulattoes 335, Mexicans 405 and Indians 3.
The number includes 92 females, 7 of them white, and 85 black.
The acreage cultivated by the 2,965 prisoners on State farms in 1913
was 36,993, as compared with 62,140 acres cultivated by 2,807 persons
at the time the new law took effect.
The reports of the prison commissioners and of chartered accountants
show that in the two years next following the date the act of 1910 took
effect the prison system’s losses from operation were $722,773.41; that
debts aggregating $1,528,458.04 accrued, and that $310,000 appropriated
from the public treasury had been expended.
Marked difference of opinion as to the cause of this fiscal situation
exists. Obviously, the debt is due in part to the operating losses, and
both the debt and the losses were in part caused by lack of operating
capital.
A part of the debt represents outlay for improvements and equipment
necessary to provide housing and employment for the convicts withdrawn
from the hiring-out system. A part of it, as already suggested,
represents lack of operating capital.
When a large proportion of the convict population was hired out, the
men who hired the convicts furnished the land, mules, implements and
houses. When the State withdrew the convicts from hire, it had to
provide all of these things.
When the convicts were hired out, their wages were paid to the State
monthly, regardless of the profits or losses of the contractors. This
income furnished an operating capital for the prison system as a whole.
It was a substantial income: the State received $31 a month for each
first-class convict, making a large profit after it had paid for food
and clothing and for guarding. When the convicts were withdrawn from
hire, this steady and dependable income stopped. Expenditures continued
steadily throughout the year; the bulk of the receipts came at the end
of the crop year, and, of course, the income was as uncertain as is the
weather and the crops.
Thus, much of the indebtedness is explained. However, the wisdom of
the commissioners in abolishing the contract system almost three years
before they were required by law to do so has been questioned. It has
been asserted that if they had permitted the contracts to continue
during the three years, receiving the income therefrom, they would have
been prepared to enter upon a complete State account system with much
better chance for it to succeed. It should be noted, however, for what
it may be worth, that some of the contractors said they did not want
to keep the convicts under the conditions as to hours of labor, etc.
imposed by the act of 1910.
In considering losses from operation of the prison system, it is
readily seen that expenses were increased by requirements of the new
law. The investigating committee says that $379,791.73 was thus added
to the expense account during the first two years. These requirements
were:
1. That 10 cents a day should be paid to each convict who
had earned a diminution of sentence by good behavior.
The commissioners advocated a repeal or modification of
this provision. It is almost generally admitted that the
provision in its present form is not only too sweeping,
but also that it fails of its purpose. It has had little,
if any, effect in the way of encouraging good conduct.
Evidently, however, this negative result is due not so
much to the fact that the per diem was paid as it is
to the fact that the per diem has not been paid. After
the system became involved in debt, and the $310,000
appropriation above mentioned was exhausted, no further
payment of per diem was made, except as convicts were
discharged.
2. That convicts should be paid for overtime. The
comment upon the per diem item applies to this all the
way through. Most of the overtime has gone to cooks,
waiters and flunkers. Suspension of per diem and overtime
payments has caused much dissatisfaction among the
convicts.
3. That certain new offices should be created, teachers
be provided, and that the salaries of guards should be
increased.
4. That better provision should be made for female
convicts.
5. That all new convicts should be brought to Huntsville
prison before being assigned to other parts of the
system. The commissioners recommended the repeal of this
provision, because, they said, medical examination could
be made at the farms as well as at Huntsville. They never
seemed to understand the purposes of the requirement,
which was, briefly, to assign the convicts to proper
industries, to prevent sending to outside work men who
were likely to attempt escape or to foment mutiny, and
to secure to all prisoners some training in prison
discipline. This purpose being misunderstood, prisoners
are sent to the farms on the next train leaving after
their arrival at Huntsville prison.
6. That discharged convicts should be furnished a
railroad ticket to any point in the State, instead, as
formerly, to the place where convicted. The commissioners
recommended the repeal of this provision.
7. That the State should bear the expense of sending the
corpses of convicts to their kinspeople upon request.
Repeal of this also was recommended.
There were two other matters upon which the commissioners were not
in agreement. The first was the requirement of the law that convicts
should not be worked more than ten hours a day, this limit to include
the time spent going to and from work. The second was the abolition of
whipping. This latter was not required by the law, but was enforced by
executive order.
Commissioners Tittle and Brahan attributed the losses from operation
largely to the fact that the convict population upon the whole was
not performing a reasonable amount of labor, as was indicated by the
falling off in acreage cultivated. This condition they ascribed largely
to the statutory limitation upon the hours of labor, and, further, to
the fact that the most effective means of punishment (whipping) had
been interdicted by executive order. The farm managers and sergeants,
and, in fact, very nearly every officer of the system, supported them
in these views.
Chairman Cabell denied the truth of their deductions as to the
abolition of whipping, and he asserted that in his opinion these other
officers exaggerated the influence of the limitation upon the hours of
labor.
Certain of the new officers of the system who testified before the
investigating committee said that most of the officers and guards,
having been trained under the old order, were not in sympathy with the
new law nor with its purposes. This suggestion was reinforced by the
testimony of such officers, as is indicated in the foregoing.
The circumstances attending the abolition of whipping ought also to
be considered. The prison act of 1910 did not prohibit whipping. It
limited it and provided safeguards against abuses. Many of the officers
of the system were not in sympathy with such limitations. In the
early summer of 1912, Chairman Cabell moved that the use of the “bat”
should be discontinued and prohibited. His motion was defeated by the
votes of Commissioners Tittle and Brahan. Thereupon, Governor Colquitt
ordered the commission to adopt Chairman Cabell’s motion. It did so,
unanimously.
It was generally known throughout the system that practically every
officer thereof believed it impossible to control convicts or to make
them work unless the threat of whipping hung over them. Yet the first
news of the change in punishment methods went out through the press
during a political campaign. In many parts of the prison system, so the
investigation disclosed, the convicts got their first information of
the change from new prisoners. The effect was bad. Convicts reasoned
that the authority of officers directly in charge was negligible; that
these officers had said they could not control convicts or make them
work without the “bat,” and, therefore, since the bat has been taken
away, they could safely decline to work.
The reluctance of these prison officers to shape their course to the
new requirements, I believe, was based upon sincere conviction. The
influence of their attitude upon results can only be conjectured. In
this connection it ought to be stated that these officers asserted
that whipping was less inhuman than the substitutes provided. These
substitutes were chaining-up and dark-celling. The former consists of
fettering the convict’s wrists at the end of chains suspended from
above at such height as to cause him to stand erect, but flat-footed,
with his arms extended as high as they will go. There have been some
complaints that convicts have been chained so high as to require them
to stand tip-toe. The possibilities in the use of the dark-cell were
illustrated in the Harlem farm tragedy.
A part of the prison system’s losses from operation were admittedly due
to the following named causes: