PRISON REFORM
N THE
UNIITED
PROCEEDINGS OF A CONFERENCE
tEI AT
NEWPORT,
AUGUST 1sT AND 2D, 1877.
NEW YORK:
NATIONAL PRINTING COMPANY,
13 CHAMBERS STREET,
1877.
STATES.
RHODE
ISLAND, 
The National Printing Company,
Printers and Stereotypers,
13 Chambers Street. 
)
PROCEEDINGS OF THE CONFERENCE.
~B     IN response to an invitation issued by the Hon. Richard
Vaux, of Pennsylvania, and the Rev. Dr.'Wines, of New York,
jointly with the Board of State Charities of Ohio, a number
of gentlemen, interested in the matter of prison discipline and
reform, met in conference in the city of Newport, R. I., at 10
a. m., Wednesday, August 1, 1877. The Conference was held
in the State House, by invitation of the state authorities.  It
was strictly private, the general public not being admitted,
and the discussions were of an informal and conversational
character.
On motion of the' Hon. J. W. Andrews, of Ohio, Dr. Wines
was called to the Chair; and the Rev. J. L. Milligan, of Penn   sylvania, and the Rev. T. D. Howard, of Massachusetts, were
appointed Secretaries.
The sessions of the Conference were opened by prayer, in
which the assembly was led by the Rev. A. G. Byers, of
Ohio.
The Conference was composed of the following persons,
viz.:
E. C. WINES, D. D., LL.D., Sec. Nat. Pris. Ass'n,.
SAMUEL ALLINSON, Pres. Bd. Mans.State Ref. School,
HON. J. W. ANDREWS, Meem. Bd. State Charities,.
HION. JOSEPII PERKINS, 
MURRAY SHlPLEY,
REV. A. G. BYERS, Secretary "           4
HON. FREDERICK SMYTH, Ex-Governor,....
EDEN WENTWORTIH, Sup't State Reform School,.
F. B. SANBORN, Secretary Am. Social Science Ass'n,.
H. W. B. WIGHTM N, Member Bd. of Pris. Com'rs,
REV. T. D. HOWARD, Secretary'"       "
BUINHAM WARDWVELL,........
. New York.
,. New Jersey.
. Ohio.
, N.IEampshire
. Aaiiie.
. Mass.
44
o4
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I 
PRISON REFORM
JAMES B. CONGDON,............   ].....                faSS.
CAPTAIN M. L. ELDRIDGE, Sup't Prov. Ref. School,. R. Island.
E. M. Show, Pres. Bd. for building new State Prison.
COL. T. W. HIGGINSON..........
E. B. HEWES, Warden State Prison,....... Connecticut.
HON. IsAAc T. ROGERS, Merm. Bd. State Pris. Directors,      "
HON. GEo. W. HALL, Ch. Joint Leg. Corn. Pris. Labor,. Pennsylvania
HON. H. J. FISHER, Metn.        "       "       ". 
HON. A. J. HERR, "l
S. B. COLLINS, Stenographer, 
REV. J. L. MILLIGAN, Chaplain Western Penitentiary,
J. G. ROSENGARTEN Member Phil. Prison Society,.
HON. T. S. WILK NSON, Warden State Prison,... Maryland.
J. T. FORD, Member Bd. Directors      "   
C. FAIRBANK,.................. Virginia.
REV. FRED. H. WINES, Sec. Bd. State Charities,.. Illinois.
MAJOR R. W. MCCLAUGHRY, Warden State Prison,. 
The Hon. Mr. Vaux was detained at home, and unable to
be present, by reason of sickness in his family.
The Chairman read letters of apology for non-attendance
from Governors Rice of Massachusetts, Hubbard of Connecticut, Bedle of New Jersey, aild McCreary of Kentucky; also
from Hon. C. I. Walker of Michigan, chancellor Hammond of
the Law School of Iowa University, Rev. Wm. Clarke, D. D. of
New Hampshire, Gen. Eaton, U. S. Commissioner of Education, Hon. Geo. L. Harrison and T. H. Nevin, of Pennsylvania,
Hon. Ezra Graves and Z. R. Brockway, of New York, and
others, expressing sympathy with the objects of the Conference
and regret at not being able to be present. Dr. Wines, of
New York, submitted to the Conference a Syllabus of Propositions embodying, in outline, the draft of a complete system
of preventive, reformatory and penitentiary institutions and
discipline for a state. This paper was, on motion of Dr. Byers,
made the basis of the informal discussions of the Conference,
and, during successive sessions, its several points engaged the
body in animated, interesting and instructive conversation,
in which all the members, more or less, participated.
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IN THE UNITED STATES.
After discussion, on motion of MSr. Sanborn, the paper was
referred to a Committee of three, for the introduction therein
of such modifications as had been already indicated as the
sense of the Conference, and of such others as the Committee,
on a closer examination of the document, might deem advisable.  The Chair named, on the proposed Committee, Messrs.
Sauborn, Allinson, andl Hall.  Subsequently the Committee reported( back the Syllabus with a number of amendments, which
were further discussed and amended. Whereupon the following resolutions, reported by the Committee, were unanimously
adopted, to wit:
Resolved: That this Conference has listened with deep
interest to the Syllabus containing a summary of prin  ciples, lying at the foundation of a reformed prison dis  cipline, and the outline of a prison system for a state, and
hereby expresses its concurrence with the general views
therein contained.
Resolved: That the Syllabus be adopted as the sense of
the Conference, with the modifications voted,* and that
it be recommended to the careful and earnest considera  tion of the Legislatures of the several States of the Union?
especially such as are seeking to introduce improved sys  tems of prison management.
After listening to a statement by Mrs. S. L. Little, of Rhode
Island, President of the Prisoners' Aid Association of that State,
in reference to the plan of a Temporary Industrial Shelter for
Discharged Prisoners who desire to live an honest life, and
the progress made therein, the Conference, on motion of Dr.
Byers, passed the following vote, viz.,
Resolved: That this Conference has heard with great in  terest the statement of MVrs. S. L. Little, of Newport,
R. I., President of the Prisoners' Aid Association of that
* These modifications are incorporated in the text.
5
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PRISON REFORM
State, and we hereby desire to express our sympathy in
this work, and would heartily commend the enterprise of
the Association in providing a temporary industrial shelter for discharged prisoners; but in doing so, the Conference desires to place upon record its conviction that
such institutions should be looked upon as transitional
in their character; that the prisoner's stay in them should
be the shortest possible, and that permanent work should
be provided for him at the earliest practicable moment.
Dr. Snow stated that it had been the intention of Professor
Chase, President of the Rhode Island Board of State Charities,
to be present to-day, but, being unavoidably prevented, he had
commissioned him to invite the Conference, in the name of the
Board, to visit the public institutions of Rhode Island. On motion of Mr. Milligan, the invitation was accepted with thanks.
Messrs. Wines, Milligan, and Sanb)Qrn were appointed a
Committee to superintend the printing of the proceedings.
Mr. Andrews moved, and it was voted, that the thanks of
the Conference be given to the Chairman, for his work in organizing the Conference, for his preparation of the able and
admirable paper offered to its consideration, and for the acceptable manner in which he had discharged the duties of presiding
officer.
Thanks were also voted to the authorities of the state for
the use of the State House.
MIr. Sanborn iinvited the members of the Conference to attend and take part in the meeting of the American Social Science Association, to be held in Saratoga, Sept. 4th, ensuing.
On motion, the Conference adjourned without day.
E. C. WINES,
Chairman.
J. L. MILLIGAN  S cretaries.
T. D. HOWARD,
NErPOR% l. rI., AUGUST 2 1877.
1EPR  R. 
6
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PRISON REFORM IN THE UNITED STATES.
OUTLINE DRAFT of a System of Preventive, Reformatory, and
Penitentiary Institutions and Discipline, adopted by the
Prison Refbrm Coinerence of Newport, August 2nd, 1877, and
recontmntended to the Legislatures and People of the several
States, for their Study and Adoption, so far as approved.*
SECTION FIRST.
The problem submitted to the examination of this Conference is the minimization of crime-how to bring it down to the
narrowest possible limits.  This problem has three terms:
* On presenting to the Conference his Syllabus of Propositions, DR. WINES
prefaced the reading with the following remarks:
MR. CHAIRMAN AND GENTLEMEN:-Before I proceed to the reading of this
paper, a word of explanation and apology may not be inappropriate.  It may be
thought presumptuous in me to offer to the Conference a document of this kind,
when there are others as well or better qualified for such a service. But as the
Conference has been called together on the sudden, without preparation, and is
intended to be quite informal and even conversational in its character, not supposing that any other person would be likely to undertake a labor of this sort;
yet, believing that it would tend to facilitate the work in hand to have a kind of
nucleus around which our thoughts and discussions might gather, I have ventured
to prepare this Syllabus of Propositions, embodying, in outline, something like a
general system of preventive, reformatory, and penitentiary institutions and discipline for a state. The paper is both longer and shorter than I could have wished:
longer of necessity, because the field is so broad; shorter of necessity, because
the argument on each point had to be compressed into so narrow a compass. Yet
I have sought to realize, as far as possible, the juste ntilieu between length and
brevity; and I have, especially, endeavored to so frame my propositions, that
the simple statement of them should carry with it an argument in their support.
With what success, the members of the Conference will judge. One word further:-My aim has been truth, rather than originality. Consequently, I have
not hesitated to draw upon my own previous writings; upon the tran-3atious of
our several National Prison Reform Congresses-particularly the last, in NewYork;
and, to some extent, upon the productions of the man whom I regard as the
wisest as well as the profoundest of all thinkers and writers on the penitentiary
question -ALEXANDER MACONOCHIE. 
'PRISON REFORM
1. How to secure a suitable education to all the children of the
state. 2. How to save homeless, destitute, neglected, and
vicious children from a first fall; or, if they have fallen, how to
lift them up again, and rescue them from a criminal career.
3. How to bring adult criminals to a better mind and a better
life, through agencies applied to them during their imprisonment.  When these three questions are correctly answered,
the whole problem of the prevention and repression of crime
will have been solved. It is a problem that may well engage
the interest and study of the highest statesmanship, since
it concerns the order and safety of society, and the lives and
property of men. As it unfolds itself in all its length and
breadth, it will be seen to be among the foremost problems of
the day. Happily, it has now, almost everywhere, taken a
strong hold of the public mind. Baron von Billow, Minister
of Foreign Affairs for the German Empire, in aconversation with
a member of this Conference, made the striking remark: "This
question of the prevention and repression of crime is infinitely
more worthy to engage the interest and study of statesmen
than nine-tenths of the little every-day politics that occupy s(
much of the time and attention of cabinets."  Ex-President
Thiers of France, in a letter to the same gentleman, said
"Prison reform is a work in which all civilized nationt
have an interest. To punish men, with a view to their reformation, is the best of social labors, and the one whose success is
most to be desired."
SECTION SECOND.
The two master forces which have heretofore opposed, and
do still oppose, the progress of prison discipline and reform
in our country, are political influence and instability of administration. In many states the prisons have formed, and
do form, a part of the political machinery of the state.
The interest of politicians has mainly controlled their management; while the interest of the people and the interest of the prisoners, which are really the same, have been
practically ignored. With every turn of the political wheel
there is a clean sweep of the officers in charge; the adherents
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IN THE UNITED STATES.
of the defeated party marching out, and those of the victorious
party marching in to fill their places, with the regularity of
clock-work. The prison systems of the Old World are not bur dened with this weight, nor impeded by this obstruction; nor is
there anything so incomprehensible to gentlemen connected
with prison affairs in those countries as this state of things
among us. Under such a system-that is to say, a system of po litical appointments-the whole theory of ourpenal andpeniten tiary legislation becomes well nigh a nullity; and, while inspection may correct isolated abuses and philanthropy relieve isola ted case of distress, broad, thorough, systematic, and above all,
permanentreform, is impossible. To such reformit is absolutely
essential that political control be eliminated from our prison
administration, and that a character of greater stability be
impressed thereupon. But how? That is the important practical question: and its difficulty is equal to its gravity.  In 1864
the Prison Association of New York, in view of an approaching
Convention for the revision of the Constitution of that state,
appointed a Committee of its most experienced and able members, to prepare the draft of an amendment to be submitted to
the Convention.   The draft, thus prepared, embodied substantially the following propositions:
1. The appointment of a Board of five Managers of State
Prisons, to serve for ten years; one membner to go out every two
years, but to be eligible to reappointment.
2. The Board to be appointed by the Governor and Senate,
and to serve without pay, but to appoint a salaried Secretary,
who should give his whole time to the work.
3. The Board to appoint the wardens, chaplains, medical
officers and clerks of the several State Prisous, who should hold
office during good behaviour, and be removable only for cause,
after being heard in their own defence.
4. The subordinate officers-keepers and guards-to be appointed by the wardens and to be removable by them, subject
to their responsibility to the Board.
5. The Board to possess such powers and discharge such
duties in respect to the county jails and penitentiaries, reformatory institutions, and all establishments looking to  the
sot*     - *       *g
9
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PRISON REFORM
prevention and repression of crime, as the Legislature might,
from time to time, prescribe.
The amendment was adopted by the Convention, but the
revised Constitution, as a whole, was rejected by the people,
and of course the prison article shared the same fate. The
provisions cited above appear to this Conference to neutralize
political influence in prison management, and to give to it a
character of stability, as far as these things are attainable under a popular government. While, therefore, we do not recommend the measure above cited in all its details-admitting
that these might possibly be improved, or perhaps replaced by
better-we do recommend, with emphasis, the two great principles which underlie it-the removal of our prisons from the
domain of party politics, and the imparting to their government
and administration a higher degree of permanence.
In Pennsylvania, the Boards of Prison Managers are appointed by the Supreme Court, which has proved an effectual
defence against the controlling influence of partisan politics
in the government and administration of the prisons.
SECTION THIRD.
As the work of minimizing crime, whether by way of prevention or repression, is one, so it is the conviction of this Oonference that no prison system of a state can be perfect or
successlfl, to the most desirable extent, without some central
and supreme authority moderating, guiding, controlling, unifying and vitalizing the whole. it is our opinion, therefore,
that the board of prison commissioners or prison managers
suggested in the preceding section, should be invested with the
general oversight and control of all places of detention-jails,
state prisons, houses of correction, detention prisons, police
stations, reformatories, preventive institutions, etc., except
such as may be exempt by special enactment.  We  further
venture the suggestion, but do not insist upon this point, that
the general board should have power to appoint all the chief
officers of the state institutions referred to in this section, such
officers being removable only for incompetency or misconduct;
and that it also give its sanction to the appointment, by local
10 
IN THE UNITED STATES.
authorities, of the chief officers in county jails or reformatories, and all places of legal detention under voluntary management, such officers'being removable only for cause.
SECTION FOURTH.
The work of preventing and repressing crime should be organized in a gradation of institutions, extending, so to speak,
from the cradle to the grave-viz., the common school; the preventive institution, under whatever name and of whatever
grade; the reform school; the police station; the detention
prison; the prison for young criminals; the house of correction; the woman's prison; and the state prison.
SECTION FIFTH.
The Contmmon School. -This, though not, in its primary
intent, an institution preventive of crime, is, nevertheless,
in its operation and effect, eminently so.  Ignorance,  as a
crime-cause, proximate if not ultimate, is conspicuously shown
in the statistics collected and published by the late International Penitentiary Congress of London.   Carefully compiled statistics for the state of New York show that onethird of the crime is committed by one-fiftieth of the population: in other words, that the criminality of the illiterate, as
compared with that of the educated, is as sixteen to one; so
that the man with some education is sixteen times less likely
to be convicted of crime titan he who has none.   Now it is the
interest-that is, the duty - of the state, to furnish the needful
education to all her children. This is a duty which the state
owes to her children; owes to herself; owes to posterity.
Charity, prudence, statesmanship and public policy, all demand
it.  But when the needful education  has been provided, not
all the children, nor all the parents, choose to avail themselves
of the opportunity thus held out. The question arises, What
is to be done in such case? The answer is, Establish compulsory education, and, by adequate agencies, enforce it.  It
is far better to force education upon the people than to force
11 
PRISON REFORM
them into prisons, to pay the penalty of crimes, of which
neglect of education has been a chief cause.
SECTION SIXTH.
Institutions Preventive of Crifle by Express Intent.-It is a
maxim, trite but true, that the prevention of evil is easier and
better than its cure; and in nothing is this maxim more true
than in relation to crime.  To destroy the seeds of crime, to
dry up its sources, to kill it in the egg, is better than
repression-better even than reformation of the criminal.
But after all that the best organized and best administered
system of public instruction can accomplish, there will remain
a considerable residuum of children (it cannot be, to-day, in the
United States, less than half a, million, and is probably much
more), whom these systems will not reach. Their destitution,
their vagrant life, their depraved habits, their ragged and
filthy condition, forbid their reception into the ordinary
schools of the people.  It is from this class that the ranks of
crime are continually recruited, and will be, so long as it is permitted to exist.  They are born to crime, brought up for it.
All this little world-and it forms a world of itself-is borne
along by a current that rushes ever towards the deep sea.
Shall we let it go on till it reaches the abyss, or shall we draw
it to the shore? Wlhat shall be done with these waifs of society,
these "street arabs," as they are often not unfitly called?
We answer: Gather them; shelter them; care for them; elevate them; educate them.  Prevent evil by teaching good.
Give them the notion of the just and the unjust.  Teach them
honesty, as well as reading; trades, as well as figures. Impart
to them the knowledge and love of duty, justice, and respect
for law, as you impart to them the knowledge and love of
letters. But how is this to be done? A whole series of preventive institutions is required for the work:-the infant
nursery (cr~che, as it is beautifully called in France); the
infant or kindergarten school; the orphan asylum; homes for
the destitute; industrial schools, in which food and instruction
only are suLpplied; industrial schools, in which lodging and
clothing are added to these; apprentice schools; and patronage
12 
IN THE UNITED STATES.
societies in aid of apprentices.  Institutions of this kind should
be multiplied tenfold. Into these shelters and retreats should
they be gathered to receive that mental, moral, religious, and
industrial training, not otherwise attainable by them, and thence
to be sent out, in due time, to good places, on tarius or in
workshops, where they will grow into virtuous and useful citizens; thus adding to, instead of preying upon, the productive
industry of the country.
The Conference desires to emphasize the high importance
it attaches to the industrial or professional training of the
classes of children referred to in the preceding paragraph.
Among the most fruitful of crime-causes is, beyond all question, the lack of just such technical training; in other words,
the want of a trade. The creation of apprentice-schlools to this
end, cannot be too much encouraged.  They ought to share
largely in the attention of the legislature. Legislators cannot,
without a dereliction of duty, refuse to interest themselves
in the trade-education of the children of the poor, whose labor
must be their sole source of support, and their only, or at
least their chief, defence against crimne.  If it is the duty
of society to establish the primary school, that all may have
an opportunity to learn to read and write, is it less its
duty to see that at least all destitute, homeless, and neglected
children be taught some trade or business? If it is just to
inscribe, among the obligatory expenses of the state, those of
primary instruction, it seems to this Conference no less just to
place there the cost of trade instruction, where it is necessary
to secure such instruction to the unfortulate child. Apprenticeschools should therefore be established in sufficient numbers
to insure the professional education of all such children as are
included in the present reference. Charity must watch over
all such children, and the law must fulrnish it the means of
accomplishing its work, in spite of the indifference or even the
opposition of parents, and of all other adverse circumstances.
Is it said that all this will cost money? It will, no doubt;
but not a tithe of what it would to let them grow up into criminals to prey upon the community by their thefts, to swell the
cost of criminal prosecutions and to increase taxation by the
building of prisons for them, and their maintenance therein.
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PRISON REFORM
During a period of 120 years, Pennsylvania has expended
the aggregate sum of $377,000 in aid of efforts for the pre,en tio)t of crime, while the first cost of one of her penitentiaries
for the relpression of crime exceeded a million and a half of
dollars.  There is a condensed volume of statesmanship and
common sense in the answer given by a Swede to an English man, to the question whether the care of the children picked
up in thie streets was not costly? " Yes," said he, " it is costly,
but not dear; we Swedtles are not rich enough to let a child
grow up in ignorance, misery and crime, to become afterwards
a scourge to society, as well as a disgrace to himself." It thus
appears that every state has a profound interest in the good
education of all its citizens; that it is at once its rilght and its
duty to enforce this principle with respect to all its children;
that neither the misfortune nor the fault of parents ought to
shut the door of the school against their offspring; that both
the right and the duty are, above all, imperative in countries
where all the citizens, without distinction, are admitted, through
universal suffrage, to a participation in public affairs; that the
child badly brought up must necessarily become a cause of
trouble to society, since the idler and the vagrant soon pass
into the criminal; that if the state ignores its right, or neglects
its duty towards these children, it cannot, in fairness, hold
them to a strict account for their acts; that, as we do not wait
till.i plant is well grown to water it, but begin our care even
before it appears above the surface, so the soul from the
moment it commences its existence, demands an active and
enlighltened solicitude; and that to aid parents, and when
necessary, to replace them, in the accomplishment of their
obligations, is an imperative duty of the state
The question arises here, whether the state should itself
fulfill this task, by  centralizing, in the hands of its official
agents, the aid and instruction to be given to destitute and
deserted children?  This question must be answered in the
negative; for something more than money is wanted in a
work of this kind, viz., the sympathy of loving hearts and the
zeal of private charity, whose activity the state only needs,
by moderate subsidies, to stimulate and encourage.
This last is the plan on which the whole vast system of in
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IN THE UNITED STATES.
dustrial and reformatory schools (some 200 in all) is organized
and managed in Great Britain-orga,nized and managed with
such admirable skill and etlciency, that there has been, during
the last twenty years, throughout the whole of England, a
gradual but sensible diminution of crime, which has been most
apparentin Gloucester county, where to-day they have one gaol
in place of the seven with which the county was supplied thirty
years ago, and an average daily aggregate of 170 prisoners,
against 870 at the earlier date. The sort of institution now
under consideration is, generally, in England, the outcome of
private benevolence.  Individual citizens or a charitable association establish the school, and have it examined by the government inspector.  If the requisite conditions have been complied with, the school is " certified" by the administration, which
thenceforth pays a fixed sum per week for each child; the land,
buildings, furniture, and all other needful appointments having been previously provided by private charity.
In other words, the government, LaTaving a grave duty to perform in respect to certain classes of children, makes use, to that
end, of an agency  by which it can do its work both cheaper
and better than it could acconl)lishl the same thing by any official action of its ownv; the agencyv that is to say, of private
charity and zeal.  The state does not supervene to modify or
direct, in any manner or degree, the conduct of the school, but restricts itself to such inspection and supervision as may insure
compliance with the conditions on which its grants of money are
made.
To sum up this article, then, and conclude the present sec
tion:
1. The state should assume the control of all young persons
under the age of fourteen, who are without proper guardianship.
2. The state should delegate the guardianship of  all such
children either to individuals who undertake to adopt them into
a family, or to corporate bodies selected by the citizens, who
undertake the charge of these youIng persons in home institutions, known as industrial schools, asylunms, retreats, homes for
neglected children, or by whatever other designation they
may be called.
3. The state, while delegating parental authority to such
/
15 
PRISON REFORM
persons or bodies, will lay down the conditions which are to be
fulfilled by them, and will exercise such inspection as will enable it to judge, whether the required conditions have been
complied with.
4. These conditions having been ftilfilled,the state will make
such allowance for each child as may be agreed upon as necessary.
5. All industrial schools, by whatever name called, should
develop, as far as possible, the conditions of a home.
6. The normal place of education for such children is the
country - the fields.  Whatever the world may say, make as
many tillers of the soil as you can.  Farm work is more healthful to the soul than shop work. Let such institutions, then,
as far as possible, be in the country, and be entirely disconnected from institutions for the treatment of pauperism and
crime.  Let them be adapted to prepare their inmates to be respectable, self-supporting citizens; and let different departments
be arranged for infants, for girls, and for boys.
7. It will be preferable to have a number of small institutiois, having from 40 to 60 inmates each, in different localities, instead of a few of monster proportions.  Alore voluntary
effort, more individual interest, more sympathy and zeal, will
thus be called forth.
8. The infant schools should be entirely under female management, and the industrial schools for boys should have matrons. Ladies, as well as gentlemen, should be on the boards
and on the executive committees.
SECTION SEVENTH.
Tle Reform School.-The juvenile reformatory is intended,
lot, like the preceding class of institutions, for children who
are in danger of becoming criminals, but for those who have
actually committed criminal acts. Nevertheless, with the exception that the persons committed to them must, in all cases
be held night and day till some legal disposition has been
made of them, they are to be organized and managed on sub
stantially the same principles as industrial schools.   There
are three methods of organizing such institutions, viz., as
16 
IN THE UNITED STATES.
a work of private charity exclusively; as a work done by
state agency exclusively; and as a work in which private
initiative and management are combined with state aid and
supervision.
The first was the form universally adopted at the beginning
of such efforts, and is extensively practised to-day on the continent of Europe. The second is the prevalent form in the
United States.  The third is the form adopted and practised in
England, with absolute uniformity, or with exceptions so rare
(two only in the whole kingdom) as to be of no practical account.  We have one example of this form of organization in
the United States-the Girls' Reform School, at Middletown,
Connecticut, whose condition and success afford to the authorities in charge unqualified satisfaction. Preference is given to
such institutions over purely state schools for these among
other reasons:
1. This principle places the control of the school in the
hands of its tried and best friends.
2. It shuts the door against all outside interference in the
management, except in cases of manifest abuse.
3. It gives greater intensity and power to religious influences.
4. Such institutions will, in the end, be more certainly and
liberally provided with the means of sustenance and growth,
since they will enlist a wider circle of friends; legacies will be
left to them; individuals will erect memorial homes; and associations and families will send their yearly contributions for
festivals, libraries, and prizes.
5. Political influence will be little felt, and the needful freedom from change in the administration will be secured.
6. The union of public and private action offers strong inducements for the multiplication of such schools.  Let it once
be known that it is the policy of the state to encourage private
gifts by apledged stipend, sufficient to support, wholly or in part,
any well-managed reform school, and benevolent individuals, religious bodies, charitable associations, and municipal corporations, will be willing to incur the first cost, wherever a real want
exists for such an institution.
If private bounty is willing to shelter and clothe these in
2
17 
PRISON REFORMi
cipient criminals, shall not the state aid in their reclamation,
by supplying the means to feed andl  educate them?   We
answer by an emnphaLtic yes, and take the ground that where
the want of parental guardianship is supplie(l by private benevolence, the state should do her part in the work of reformation, by making a moderate per capita allowance to reform
schools or houses of refugerestablished by private and philanthropic enterprise.  Such is the plan adopted in England, where
the government interferes as little as possible with the ordinary
superintendence, prescribing certain general regulations, but
leaving the appointment of the officers and the details of the
management to the local boards or committees.   The state
may be said to contract, on certain terms, with the several
institutions, for the work which it wants done; and so long as
the work is fairly performed, the state exercises no further
interference than to satisfy itself of the fact.
SECTION EIGHTH.
Th7e Station-house, or Lock-?l(. —-SWe come now to the treatment of adult criminality.  Here the first institution of the
series is the station-house, or police prison; a class of prisons
whose population exceeds, probably, twice told, if not more,
that of all others put together.   No further statement is required to show their importance and need of attention.
The multitude, perhaps, scarcely realize the existence of such
prisons; and the fewv who do, knowing that the inmates are
put there for a night, or a day, or, it may be, a few hours only,
think it a matter of small moment how they are treated, or
under what circumstances of discomfort placed. It is here,
emphatically, in these primary schools of corruption and degradation, that the first work of prison reform must begin; and
the increased attention they have been receiving of late is a
pleasing token of progress in the humanities of prison discipline.
The right construction and management of lock-ups are
subjects that challenge careful thought and study.  If the principle, obsta p)rintciliis-stop the beginnings of evil-be a law of
moral government, then the lock-up is the point where the prison
is 
IN THIE UNITED STATES.
reformer must commence his work, if hlie would do it well; since
on the moral condition in which hispreviousimnprisonments have
left the culprit will depend, in great measure, the reformatory
action of the house of correction or the state prison; for how
can we raise a man up, ill whom there is nothing  left of
moral stamina, upon which we can lay hold?
The needed reform here requires that these prisons be constrlucted and managed on the following principles:
1. Sutch an enlargement of accommodations, at whatever
cost (for it will be the cheapest in the end), as will furnish a
separate cell for each inmate.
2. A complete fiulfillmient of the laws of sanitary science in
respect to ventilation, cleanliness, etc.
3. A decent degree of physical comfort in plain but wholesome, well-cooked, and well-served food.
4. The avoidance of all unnecessary publicity and disgrace.
5. A provision of humane, respectable and comnpetent
keepers.
6. The footfall of the city missionary, the members of
young men's Christian Associations, and other judicious persons, who are willing to work for Christ and humanity, should
be often heard there. The use of such influences might be
legally recognized, though not provided or enforced by law.
7. Of course, considering the extremely short periods of
detention, the prevention of evil, rather than its correction,
must ever be the aim in establishments of this sort.
SECTION NINTH.
ThUe County Jail.-The whole system of county jails in the
United States is a disgrace to our civilizations It is hopelessly, irremediably bad, and must so remain, as long as it exists
under its present form.  It seeds, not improvement, but revolution; not modification, but reconstruction.  De Tocqueville,
half a century ago, pronounced our county jails "the worst
prisons he had ever seen;" and there has been little marked
improvement since.  The system is wasteful of time, wasteful
of opportunity, wasteful of money; and it does not reform. The
moral atmosphere of these prisons is foul; no fouler exists
19 
PRISON REFORM
anywhere. It is loaded with contagion. The contact of their
inmates is close; their intercourse Iunrestricted; their talk abominable.  The effect of such promiscuous association is to increase the number of criminals, and to develop and intensify their
criminality. T'rhe lessons taught are: contempt for authority,
human and divine; hostility to law and its officers; the dlelights
of vicious indulgence; the duty of revenge upon society for
imaginary wrongs; the necessity of craft, of daring, of violence
if need be, in the coimmission of criminal acts, and of sullen submission to punishment, if caught; the hopelessness of all
efforts at amendment; and the best methods of success in
criminal undertakings. Thus the country has, in its county
jails, about two thousand schools of vice, all supplied with expert and zealous professors. The condemnation of the system
may be pronounced in a single sentence: it is an absurd attempt to cure crime, the offspring of idleness, by making idleness
compulsory; and to teach virtue, the fruit of careflil anld painstaking moral cutlture,by enforced association with those who
scoff at virtue, duty, and religion.
But the essential point is the remedy for a state of things at
once so disgraceful and so pernicious. It may be said, and it
had better be curtly and plainly said, that there is no remedy,
so long as the state ignores and evades its responsibility for the
treatment of all offenders against state laws; for the countiesowing, on the one side, to the smallness and sparseness of their
populations, and, on the other, to their limited resources are
incompetent to discharge this function. This fact explains the
reason for a remark already made, that our county jail system
cannot be itp)roved, but must be reconstructed, revolutionized.
The state has assigned to the counties a task impossible of
execution by them. It must put its own shoulder to the whleel.
The very first step towards a reform of the system must be
the assumption by the state of the custody and control of the
entire body of convicts, of whatever grade-misdemeanants
as well as felons. The county prison proper should be a
simple house of detention for the safe custody of prisoners
awaiting examination or trial, or of prisoners il transittt after
conviction; though there might, perhaps, be superadded the
function of punishment, so far as to give, for a first offence, a
20 
IN THE UNITED STATES.
short, sharp notice against the commission of criminal acts.
Cellular separation is the only re'gimnte proper to prisons of this
sort, and that as regards both classes of prisoners just named:
the latter, because a first punishment ought to be strongly deterrent, a real intimidation; the former, because persons merely
suspected of crime, and not yet proved to be criminals, have a
right to be protected against contamination; and, if they are
really guilty, others have a right to be shielded from their corrupting influence.
This doctrine is as old as the Roman jurisprudence, which
distinguished sharply between the suspected and the convicted, calling the former the h7ostage of justice; the latter the
slave of punish7mentt.  It also distinguished between the places
in which they were detained, naming the prison of the former
career; that of the latter vincula publica; and declaring the carcer to be simply a prison for safe custody, the vin)cula publica
a prison for punishing. Of course, there is the same reason,
only stronger, for throwing around the detention prison all
the moral and material guards which were claimed in the last
section in behalf of the police prison, or lock-up. The indiseriminate association of persons held for trial, we believe to be
a prolific source of crime; and, further, that all prisons used for
the detention and safe custody of such persons, should be constructed and administered in such manner as to prevent such association. The functions now discharged by the county jail-or
rather undertaken by it, and, from necessity, left undischargedmust, in an effective prison system, be assumed by the state, the
only agent competent to their due performance. The new state
establishments to be created for replacing the county jails, in
every thing but their function of safe custody, will therefore be
transferred for treatment to subsequent sections.
SECTION TENTH.
Prisons for punishment, as well as their inmates, should be
classified, or graded; so that there shall be prisons for young
criminals; prisons for men guilty of minor offences; prisons
for women; andprisons for men guilty of the highercrimes. But
before proceeding to a detail of the principles and methods on
21 
PRISON REFORM
which theseinstitutions should be severally organized and managed, it will be proper to offer a general idea of the bases on
which aprison system should be constructed, and the agencies by
which it shouldbe worked, as repetition will thereby be avoided,
and the whole subject be presented in a clearer and more satisfactory light.
SECTION ELEVETTH.
In the reaction which has taken place against the system
of cellular separation in this country, it is the belief of this
Conference that the pendulum has swung far over to the opposite extreme. We believe that the cell has an important
place and function in every wise and good system of prison
discipline.  We believe that absolute isolation should never
be resorted to in the case of children, except for purposes of disciplinary punishment; that it should be exclusively employed
in prisons of preliminary detention, except when otherwise orderedcl on medical grounds; and thwt it should form the initial
stage in all punitive imprisonment, with a wide range between
the minimum and maximum terms of its duration-never, however, terminating in less than  two or three months  nor
continuing beyond twelve monthlis. We believe that here is a
common ground, on which the friends of cellularism and the
friends of association may meet as brethren of the same household, and "d dwell together in unity," to the great and manifold
advantage of both systems.
SECTION TWELFTH.
The protection of society by the prevention and repression
of crime, is the supreme object of all child-saving as of all
penal institutions; but inasmuch as so)ciety is best protected by
the reformation of its culprits, this is declared, in the penal
codes of most, if not all, of our states, to be a primary endl of
public punishment and prison discipline.  Whether criminals
are susceptible to reformatory influences and may be lifted out
of the abyss into which they have fallen, is no longer an open
question.   Experience has demonstratetl the fact; and all
22
N 
IN THE UNITED STATES.
authority, worthy of the name. utters its voice to the same
effect.
SECTION THRTEENTH.
The L'sseiitial Bases of a -Reforntatory Prison Discillite.-1.
Such a system must work with nature, not against it. The Creator has impressed, indelibly, upon the human soul certain great
liinciples.  Of these the most deeply rooted, the most active,
the most potent, and the most beneficent, are HOPE  and SoCIABILITY. We must not crush out of the mant, by)v our modes
of prison discipline, these primal and essential elements of
humanity; but rather seek to guide, control, and mould them
to our purpose.
Hope is the master-spring of human action.  Without it,
even the good could scarcely retain their goodness; with
out it, the bad cannot possibly regain their virtue.  It must be
implanted in the breast of the prisoner the first hour of his
incarceration, and kept there as an ever-present and living force
Hope is the great inspiration and impulse to exertion in free
life.  Why should it not be made to fulfill the same benign
office in prison life? Can anything else supply its place? HIope
is just as truly, just as vitally, just as essentially, at the root of
all right prison discipline, as it is of all vigorous and successful
effort in free life.  Undoubtedly, the first stage in a criminal's
imprisonment ought to be made intensely penal; it should be
such as to produce in him a profound impression that " the way
of the transgressor is hard."  Cellular separation is the mode
of imprisonment best adapted to this stage; but even amid the
stern discipline of isolation, justice must be tempered  with
mercy, and hope made to shed its cheering and invigorating
light on the prisoner. Amid these rigors, it should be impressed
and re-impressed upon him, that his destiny is placed, to a
great extent, in his own hands; and this assurance he should
find, on emerging from his solitary cell, to be, not an illusion
but a reality.  Maniifold inducements to industry, lesson-learning, and obedience should be held out in this second stage of
his imprisonment-shortening of sentence, increased percentage of earnings, improved dress and dietary, a gradual lifting
of restraint, a gradual enlargement of privilege, etc., etc., with
23 
PRISON REFORM
the intermediate stage of moral imprisonment, almost indeed
of absolute liberty, looming up before him. Thus would the
bracing stimulus of hope be kept ever active, and the prisoner
would be encouraged and quickened in a course of vigorous
self-restraint, self-conquest, and self-culture.
Sociability is the second of the principles named. It is
among the strongest instincts of humanity. It constitutes one
of the vital forces of society; a main-spring of its progress in
civilization.  Why may it not, under proper regulation, be made
equally beneficial to prisoners? It was Maconochie, the most
plhi]osophical of writers on penal subjects, who said: "Man is a
social being; his duties are social; and only in society can he be
adequately trained for society." Thus only, it would seem, can
a suitable field be provided for the voluntary cultivation of active social virtues, and the voluntary restraint of active social
vices. To prepare men for society in society appears to be just
as necessary as to prepare them to be seamen on the sea, or engineers in the woods. Moral lessons, like navigation and engineering, require a field of progressive experimental application. Books, counsels, exhortations, are not enough. There
must be friction; the contact with temptation; and the toning
up and hardening of the character, which result from the habitual and successful resistance of temptation. It is objected
that the intercourse of prisoners is corrupting. Not necessarily so. The nature and conditions of that intercourse must
be considered. Promiscuous, unchecked intercourse of prisoners is demoralizing to the last degree. But this corrupting
power of association may be counteracted; nay, such association may be converted into a means of moral amendment, by
being subjected to virtuous direction and control. There are
members of this Convention who have seen such a result accomplished in certain prisons in Switzerland, Germany, and
Scandinavia.
*  The social relations and sentiments, as noticed above are
the inainsprings of human improvement. It is by them that
the heart is stirred. It is by them that warmth and energy
are imparted to the character.  Man droops and pines in solitude, whether that solitude be created by a physical or a moral
<eparation- by walls of granite or a wall of absolute and
24 
IN THE UNITED STATES.
eternal dumbness. No sound excites like that of the voice of
his fellow man.   This imparts strength to dare, to do, and
to suffer; and these three words express the sum of human
duty, so far at least, as citizenship is concerned. Upon the
whole, then, the conclusion is, that the best system of prison
treatment is not one which thwarts nature, but one that employs her as an auxiliary.
. The Conference desires to add that, in what has been said
concerning the advantages of association among prisoners under well considered and well arranged regulations, no condemnation is implied of the cellular system of Pennsylvania, further than that which unavoidably results from sincere difference
of opinion in regard to questions that cannot yet be considered
as definitively settled.
2. The second essential basis of a reformatory prison discipline is a union of wills between the prison keeper and the prison
inmate. It is indispensable that the will of the convict be
gained.  He is to be amended; but how is such a thing possible,
with his mind in a state of hostility? No system, therefore,
can succeed in reforming the criminal, which does not secure
a harmony of wills between officers and prisoners, so that the
prisoner shall choose for himself what his officer chooses for
him.  But such a result can never be attained, except where
the officer really chooses, and wisely and steadily pursues, the
good of the convict.  There must be, not on the lip, but in the
heart, a benevolent consideration of the convict's best interest.
Nor is this at all inconsistent with the conscientious discharge
by the officer of his duties to society, since, in effect, society's
and the convict's interests, instead of being antagonistic, are
identical. The prison may be made, without in the least impairing its discipline, an effective school of reform; for the conviction has a solid basis to rest upon, that society is best served
by saving, not sacrificing, its criminal members.
3. A third essential basis of a reformatory prison discipline is a
system of reliable tests, which may serve asa guaranty to employers of the reality of the reformation, claimed for the liberated
prisoner. The problem is, how to effect the re-absorption of
r e f o r m e d cri-minals                  into virtuous society?  Such re- absor ption
is an indispensable condition of the permanence of even genu
K
25 
PRISONI  REFORM
ine reformation. An army of convicts is every year disbcharged from prison. Society distrusts and refuses to employ them.
How can that distrust be overcome?
There arejust two elements in the solution of this problemthe reformation of the convict and a guaranty of his reformation that shall satisfy the public. IHis reformation is to be
effected by processes to be applied to him during his imprisonment. But the guaranty-how is that to be had? How is
his moral cure to be tested?-for a test there Ainst be. Such test
is indispensable to any general readiness on the part of the
public to take him into its employ. He leaves the prison reformed, but he fails to get work. Why? Society has no confidence in him; and, what is more to the purpose, it has no
guaranty for its confidence.  It is this want of confidence that
builds a wall of granite between the released prisoner and
honest bread.  Conquer the distrust of society, replace it with
confidence, furnish the required guaranty that the man is tmrstivorthy, and all difficulty will vanish. Every work-shop, factory
and farm, all the avenues of honest toil, will be open to his
entrance.
But the question is, Hfow to overcome the dread of him felt
by society; how to quiet its fears; how to conciliate its favor?
There is but one road to this result.  The convict must furnish
proof; during his imprisonment, that it is safe to trust him; his
cure must be tested and shown.  Now this cannot be done
where the system is one of material isolation to the end; nor
can it any more be effected where the system is one of moral
isolation to the end.  There must be some field, some opportunity, for the trial. But such a theatre can be afforded neither
by the cellular system nor the silent system, as now conducted.
Both must be in part retained, in part discarded, in part medified.   They must be  so modified that the passage from
imprisonment to freedom shall no longer be by a single bound,
but in such manner that the former shall gradually, almost
imperceptibly, melt into the latter. The system must be such
that the last part of the imprisonment shall be little more than
moral; in which, so far as may be, all the arrangements shall
be those of ordinary life, with its trusts, its temptations, its
motives, its responsibilities, its victories over self and sin, and
f,
26 
IN THE UNITED STATES.
its silent strengthening of the whole character by the friction
to which the man is subjected.
The three propositions, in which we have stated the essential bases of a reformatory prison discipline, seem self-evident
truths, moral axioms,  as indisputable as the axioms of
geometry, since a perverted nature can never be righted
through a contravention of nature's laws; since a man who
has fallen away froi virtue can never be restored to it against
his will; and since society will not, as a general rule, employ men who have shown themselves untrustworthy, till they
have given evidence of such a change of character as to again
render them trustworthy
SECTION FOURTEENTH.
Special Agencies to be Entployed in the Work of?eforming
Criminals.-1. The first is a hearty desire and intention, on the
part of the officers, to accomp]ish this result.  Such desire and
purpose, really entertained and acted upon by all prison officials, wouldrevoluitionizeprison management.  It would change
the whole spirit and tone of prison administration.  This accomplished, the fit processes will follow as a matter of course.
It is not so much any specific apparatus that is wanted, as it
is the introduction of a really benevolent spirit and of common
sense into our prison work. Once let prison officers understand
and feel that their business is to reform and not merely to
punish their prisoners, and let their desire and purpose be conformed to that conviction, and they will speedily become inventive of the methods conducive to that end. Right processes
will follow right principles as naturally as the harvest follows
the sowing.
2. Equally essential is a serious conviction, on the
part of prison officers, that prisoners are capable of being
reformed. This belief is indispensable to success, for no man
can heartily muaintain a discipline at war with his inwardbeliefs.
No man can earnestly strive to accomplish what in his heart
he despairs of accomplishing. Doubt is an element of failure;
belief a guaranty of success. Nothing so weakens moral forces
as unbelief; nothing so strengthens them as faith.  "Be it un
27 
PRISON REFORM
to thee according to thy faith," is not a mere dictum in theology; it is equally the statement of a fundamental principle
of success in all human undertakings —especially when our
work lies within the realm of mind and morals.
3. Greater use than heretofore should be made of moral
forces, and less of those which are merely physical.  By physical forces is to be understood whatever is intended to coerce; by
moral forces, whatever offers a choice, and thus strengthens the
will, while guiding it. The essential distinction is that between
force and persuasion; between fettering the body and gaining
the soul. There needs to be introduced into prison discipline
a higher aim-a treatment which seeks to gain the will, and
not merely to coerce the body. What is wanted is, that prisoners be trained to become honest and industrious freemen, and
not merely that they be reduced, for a time, to the condition
of well ordered and obedient bondmen. All past systems of
prison discipline have been, in the main, but modifications
of force. Authority has been their chief, too often their
exclusive, reliance. The result, so far as reforming criminals
is concerned, has been  failure.   Let  organtized persuasion
now have a trial-not coaxing, not pampering, not indulgence, not a dilletaitte system of treatment, which is as
false as it is feeble; but persuasion, with such forces behind
it, resulting from a judicious application of motives, as,
while leaving the will free, will yet, by a sort of moral necessity, determine it to a right choice.
Let us briefly indicate two or three of those moral forces,
whose use would be likely to be attended with good results. (a)
The ability of the prisoner to better his condition while in
prison, through his own exertions, in other words, aregulated
self-interest is one of the mightiest as well as healthiest
of these forces. This can be effected only by a system of progressive classification, whereby the prisoner will be enabled,
during his incarceration, through industry and good conduct, to
raise himself, step by step, to positions of increased freedom,
privilege, and comfort; while idleness and disobedience, on the
other hand, keep him in a state of coercion and restraint. (b)
The cultivation of the prisoner's self-respect developes a, moral
force of great potency. Self-respect is one of the most power
28 
IN THE UNITED STATES.
ful sentiments of the human soul, for the reason that it is the
most intensely personal.  Hence the maxim, " Do not further
degrade in prison the man who has come to it already degraded
by his crimes," should be constantly and carefully aipplied in
prison treatment. Therefore, cast aside the parti-colored dress,
the lock-step, the exhibition of the prisoner for a fee, and call
him by his own name instead of a number, which robs him of
his personality, and reduces him to an abstraction.   No prison
administrator will ever beneficially influence his wards, who
does not seek to strengthen in them this sentiment of manhood
and personal dignity.  (c) "The law of love and love in law "in other words, kindness duly regulated-is a moral force of almost unlimited power. But the kindness suggested is not that
which seeks merely, or mainly, to alleviate present suffering.
It is rather a prudent, forecasting kindness, which seeks to lift
the prisoner up, to strengthen his manly qualities, and to
prepare him for the battle of life. This spirit, once introduced
into our prison management and possessing itself of the hearts
of our prison officers, would prove both inventive and creative
in their hands. It would find or make means to accomplish
the reform of the prisoners, and when one agency proved abortive it would have recourse to others; it would ntot be wholly
baulked. A liberal application of " the law of love and love in
law" to prisoners, is not incompatible with a calm, steady, resolute discipline. Tenderness may be fitly and fruitfully blended with justice. It is not against the rigors of justice that the
prisoner rebels, but rather against capricious harshness, which
vexes and irritates for the very reason that it lacks the element
of justice. Criminals are not much accustomed to kindness,
and therefore they are the more touched by it. Show them that
you have a genuine sympathy, a kindness that has its seat
in the heart, and their sensibility is instantly awakened.
There lies a regenerative and redemptive power just here, which
no degradation can crush and no depravity obliterate.
4. Individualization is an essential agency in a reformatory
prison discipline. To insure the highest improvement of prisoners, they must be, like children of the same house-hol(l, to
a certain extent, treated individually. Though all must be
placed under the same general law, the conduct of each, as di
29 
PRISON REFORM
rected by it, should be specially noted, and his treatment modified, as far as imay be, according to his own individuality.
Each prisoner should be informed, from time to time (and the
intervals ought not to be too long), of the light in which his condnuct is viewed by those placed over himu; for thus only, as his
good purposes strengthen, will hle be enabled to correct that
wherein he may be noted as deficient.  To facilitate the study
of individual character, prisons should not be too large.  In our
opinion (and it was also that of the London Congress), 500 is the
maximtum for effective treatment, and( aless number would he
better. The w arden should be able to know, and should know,
personally, each individual uinder his care.
5. Indefinite sentences, that is, sentences not to run for a
fixed  time, lout till reformation, would, in our jutdgment,
prove  an  effective  agency  in  the  reform  of prisoners.
This proposition  may  have  a  rather startling  solnd to
some minds; but reflection, we think, will modify  anly unifavorable first impression. The principle, as here stated, was first
announced by Mr. Frederic Hill, in one of his reports as government inspector of prisons for Scotland. MAaconobchie's idea was
substantially the same, but formulated in a different manner.
Hie did not propose the imposition of a sentence indefinite in
form, but only in operation and effect.  His sentence took the
shape of marks-so many lhundred or so many thousand good
marks-to be earned by industry, study, and general good conduct, as the sole condition of release. The effect of such a
sentence would be, of course, to destroy fixity as an element
in its duration, and to render it as indefinite in fact, as if it had
been made so in form.  In like manner, Archbishop Whately
recommended that, instead of a certain period of time, the
convict should be sentenced to a certain amount of work, which
also introduced an element of indeterminateness into the duration of the sentence, though far less than either of the other
propositions cited.  The question is: Is the principle of indefinite or reformation sentences fair and just? The question of
its practicability is put aside for the moment, and we are to
consider simply the justice and policy of the principle, assurning it, for argument's, sake, to be practicable. Now, what end do
we propose in public punishment?  The diminution of crime
.30 
IN THE ITNITED STATES.
But this is to be sought, mainly, in the reformation of the
crinminal. It is, therefore, a legitimate, not to say necessary
exercise of human authority, to detain him till that effect is accomiplished.  Dr. Despine of France, one of the deepest and
safest thinkers on penal and penitentiary science, goes so far
as to say that the use of this principle will become a necessity,
whenever a really reformatory  system of prison  discipline
comes to be generally introduced, and pursued in sober carnest.  Another view: A criminal is a man who has committed
an offence, and deserves punishment.  But he is also a man
morally diseased, and needs a cure.  The prison is intended to
effect both these ends-the punishment and the cure; nay, to
effect the cure by means of the punishment.   Now, as it is
clearly impossible to predict the date of a sick man's restoration to bodily health, so it is no less impossible to foretell the
day when a moral patient will be restored to moral soundness.
So that, by fixing the duration of the sentence in this latter
case, we run a double risk, viz., on the one hand, of turning the
criminal loose on society before he is cured, and, onl the otller,
of detaining him after he is cured; so that by making his release
depend on the mere lapse of time, we are almost sure of committing a wrong on one side or the other - a wrong to society
or a wrong to the prisoner. Still another view: The protection of society is at once the end and the justification of
imprisonment.  But society is not protected by the  criminal's imprisonment, unless he is reformed by it. There - is
the same reason, therefore, for keeping as for putting him
in prison, until there is a moral certainty that, if set at
liberty, he will not go out to prey upon honest people, and
despoil them of their property.  In such a case, the end for
which he was imprisoned (the protection of society) fails utterly; the state is cheated of its due benefit, and receives
absolutely nothing for all the trouble and expense it has incurred in his apprehension, trial, conviction, and incarceration.
Once more:  Experience has shown that it is impossible to
adjust penalties to degrees of guilt, and that standards of
punishment are more easy to imagine than to realize.  In what
principle, then, can we find relief; but in that of reformation,
or cure? But since a cure cannot, in any case, be predicted
31 
PRISON REFORM
with absolute certainty; and since, if it could, the time
required for its accomplishment cannot be measured in advance, no alternative seems left, except that of sentences
undefined ill extent. We do not set the madman free till he
is cured of his madness; neither can we safely, or even justly,
set the criminal free till he is cured of his proclivity to crime.
As the safety of society and the good of the lunatic require
that his confinement should be regulated upon this principle,
so, equally, do the safety of society and the good of the criminal require that his detention should be adjusted upon the
same principle.  Indeed, the justness of the principle must, it
would seenim, strike every mind the moment it is announced.
The difficulty felt by all is as to the possibility of applying
it. Certainly, this could not be done while politics govern our
prisons, nor until their administration is placed permanently
in the hands of competent men. Still, we are of the number
of those who believe that God never made a truth into which
he did not put a power, that sooner or later would cause it to
prevail. The directors of the Ohio Penitentiary have given
the principle an emphatic endorsement, and have declared
their belief that its general adoption is only a question of
time. But it is not likely that so great a change as that of
determinate to wholly indeterminate sentences can be made
on the sudden; nor would it be desirable, if it could. The
principle  must first be applied  (perhaps always)  under
limitations.  The courts must assign a maximum duration to
the punishment, and, within that term, leave the time of
release discretionary, just as is now done in the case of
juvenile offenders sentenced to reformatory institutions. This
is what has been done in the act regulating discharges fitom
the new State Industrial Reformator, at Elmira, New York.
But it may be fairly asked, how is le fact of cure to be ascertained? There cannot, we think, be mhch more difficulty in
forming a correct judgment of the cure of a criminal than of a
madman, supposing the judges to be, in each case, equally competenit by the possession of the requisite knowledge and experience. At any rate, all that can be aimed at is to secure a strong
presumption in favor of reformation before the prisoner shall
go free; and after he is set at liberty, the law must still keep
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IN THE UNITED STATES.
its grasp upon him, till the maximum period of his detention
is exhausted. This strong presumption is the only proof of
which the case admits with respect to either the insane or the
criminal. Indeed, on careful analysis, all moral certainty
resolves itself into a high degree of probability; such a probability, says Beccaria, as justifies us in acting upon it.
After all, the method of Maconochie has much to recommend it, since, on that plan, the sentence is in marks to be
earned, and is therefore indefinite only in effect, and not in
form; an indefiniteness further increased by the fact that the
marks are made to perform the function of money in paying
for all the prisoner requires- food, clothing, schooling, etc.,
etc.; and only the surplus that remains - the savings, so to
speak, after meeting all these expenses - cant towards his
liberation. Under this system, the prison becomes, to a certain extent, of necessity, an image of real life. It is a system
which gives to the prisoner an object of pursuit, worthy of his
best ambition and his best efforts, by making his release
depend on the conduct and character evinced by him, on his
diligence in labor and learning, and on his self-command and
self-culture; and he is thus lifted into a moral atmosphere
higher, purer, and more bracing. In the presence of such an
object, all the manly energies are called out. Time which,
under the old system of determinate sentences, was his greatest enemy, now becomes his best friend and ally. Idleness is
shunned. Distractions are repressed. Industry is courted.
Evasion of duty brings its own punishment by lengthening
his term of sentence. And it is a consideration of the highest
moment that the impulse to exertion is thus moral, instead of
physical; that it comes from within, rather than from without.
This accustoms the prisoner to act for himself, instead of
being led or driven by others. It prepares him, moreover, to
meet subsequent temptation in the great world without. And
the habit of self-control and self-guidance thus formed in
prison, will be likely to remain with him after his discharge,
and will, of itself, more than compensate for all the sacrifices
it may have cost him to acquire it.
6. Of all reformatory agencies religion is first in importance, because most potent in its action on the human heart
3
33 
PRISON REFORM
and life.  To Moses Pilsbury, one of the most distinguished
prison officers of the last generation, this question was put:
" What do you think of a prison without a chapel, where the convicts can be assembled on the Sabbath for worship and Sundayschool instruction; and on week days, for morning and evening prayers?"  His reply was: " It is like a ship laden with
a rich cargo, and sent to sea without rudder, compass, or chart."
This puts the supreme importance of religious teaching in
prisons in a light as clear as it is striking. Religion is the
only power able to calm that restless irritation of vice that
saps the moral forces of these men of powerfiul impulses, whose
neglect of its teachings has been the cause of their being immured within prison walls. Reference is made in the answer
of Mr. Pilsbury to the earlier practice of daily religious services in our prisons- apractice which this Conferencoe  earnestly
believes might, with great fitness and the best results, be
revived and restored. Such is the practice in European porsons,
both English and continental.
7. Education must have a large development in a penitentiary system designed to be reformatory in its action upon the
prisoners. Its effect is, to quicken intellect, give new ideas,
supply food for thought, inspire self-respect, excite honorable
ambition, open new fields of exertion, and thus afford a healthful substitute for low and vicious amusements.< Need more
be said to show its great value in this work?  The work of
the prison keeper is, pre-eminently, a work of education, in
its broad sense of educing, developing, bringing out, what is
in the man.  In pursuing this end, he ought to show himself
an educator full of wisdom, solicitude and zeal, by giving
to each prisoner the special instruction and training of which,
according to his condition and character, he stands in greatest need.
8. Labor is a prime agency in every reformatory system of
prison discipline. It was a favorite maxim with Howard,
" make men diligent, and they will be honest."  Unless prisoners acquire, during their captivity, both the will and the
power to earn honest bread-which can be done only by imparting to them the love and the habit of industry- the chances
34 
IN TIHE UNITED STATES.
will be many of their return to crime after their release. BPut
this is a proposition admitted by all; denied by none
The mode of organizing and managing the labor of a prison
is a question of no little importance, in the study of this subjectPrison labor must not be of the craink or treadmill; not a mere
"grinding of the wind."  Useless labor is as demoralizing to a
prisoner as it would be to a free man.  Further: a free choice
of labor by the prisoner is an essential condition of a reformatory prison discipline. Therefore, as in ]Iaconochie's plan, the
details of the discipline had better be such that, if the prisoner
work, study, and behave himself to the satisfaction of the authorities, he will not only have a comfortable support, but be
able to ley by something against the day of his discharge;
whereas, on the other hand, if he be idle and disobedient, he
will stiffer hunger and other inconveniences, precisely as it
happens to the diligent and the lazy outside.   Now, when a
prisoner, under this sharp but natural spur, begins to exert
himself, he does so by an act of his own will.  It is an inward
impulse, not a mere outward pressure, that moves him.  This
little circumstance-little in al)pearance, not in reality-makes
all the difference between an automaton and a man.   The
process which, under these circumstances, induces in the prisoner habits of labor, is a process by which his self-respect, selfcontrol, and self-reliance are strengthened; and this is precisely
what is wanted to make him a better man and better citizen.
It is to no purpose that he is forced to work by an external
coercion; for when the coercion is withdrawn and he is again
free, he will be what he was before. The force whiclh impels him to labor must be an inward power, that will abide
with him after he leaves the prison, and will control his subsequent life.  It avails little that you force him to work, he
must force himself to work, under the double impulsion of
hunger and self-interest.
While industrial labor in prisons is of the highest utility and value, we regard the contract system of prison
labor as, in general, prejudicial alike to discipline, finance,
and the reformation of the prisoner; but we cannot recommend a change to state management of such labor, so long
as our prisons are made the football of party, and the agents of
35 
PRISON REFORM
their administration are changed almost with every change of
the moon.
9. To secure the spirit and manner of administration sketched in the foregoing detail, the most vigilant inspection and
oversight are required.   "The dark places of the earth are
full of cruelty;" and prisons are exceeding dark places, in
the sense of being screened from observation. Prison walls
are as effectual in keeping critics out, as in keeping culprits in.
The class of officials, who look upon the inmates of their institutions as mere subjects for discipline and severity, have a thousand ways of evading any real supervision, any searching scrutiny. It is very necessary that the interiors of prisons should
be watched and subjected to perpetual and vigilant observation.
It is very necessary that impartial men, holding office, not
for fee or reward, but from motives of philanthropy, and appointed by an authority possessing the highest repute for wisdom and independence, should be invested with powers of
inspection and oversight which would authorize them to look
into the interiors of the prisons, to scrutinize them closely, and
to make themselves acquainted with the whole economy
of treatment, and with the spirit in which it is conducted.
SECTION FIFTEENTH.
Special Education of Prison Officers.-The need of trained and
thoroughly qualified officials for prison work is coming to be
daily more and more recognized, the world over. The reformation of fallen humanity is a work as complex, as delicate, as
difficult, and demanding qualities of head and heart as high and
as broad as any ever committed to the hand of man, and as
worthy of being raised- to the dignity of a profession as any
other within the wide range of human employment.  If law,
medicine, and divinity; if sculpture, painting, and music
if engineering, military command, and school-keeping; if even
every handicraft that requires manual dexterity, demand a
special technical education in those who devote themselves
to these callings, why not equally the work and calling of a
prison keeper, whose proper business-the regeneration and'
redemption of fallen immortals, the cure of souls all sick and
36 
IN TIIE UNITED STATES.
leprous with sin-is the peer of any of them, and the superior
of most, in the dignity, grandeur, and beneficence of its aims?
M. Demetz, the founder and for nearly forty years the head of
the agricultural penitentiary colony of Mettray, in France, and
the highest authority in the world on'this subject-for he founds
e1 his training school before he opened his penitentiary, and
continued it to the day of his death- has declared his opinion
in these words: " As there is no good penitentiary systen with out aid to discharged convicts so there is no good penitentiary
establishment which does not create a nursery of agents, from
which to recruit its staff. The men who are needed to implant
the love of goodness in vicious natures are not improvised;
and moral transformations are obtained only through persevering efforts and an enlightened zeal." We do not, then, hesitate
to affirm the proposition that whenever, through the elimination of party-politics, the necessary stability shall have been
given to our prison administrations, it will become the duty, as
it will be the interest, of the several states, to organizesome agency for the special education and training of prison officers, from
which the prisons and reform schools of every grade may replenish their respective staffs. Such agency wll be likely to
be most effective, as well as practical and practicable, if established in connection with some good prison. It will then,
also, become necessary to so increase the salaries of this class
of public serv ants as to secure constant supplies of able and
well qualified men for this most important and useful service.
At the same time the subordinate officers- the overseers or
keepers-ought to be skilled mechanics, so that they may
discharge the function of trade instructors to the prisoners.
By giving to prison officers and employ6s a special education for their work-by impressing a character of stability and
permanence on the prison administration and the tenure of
office, by making the beepers trade-instructors, and by gradually increasing the salaries of the officials till they reach a maximum sum sufficient to insure an independent living to men
honest, devoted, and of a certain intellectual value, the result
of the penitentiary system will become as certain as things
human can ordinarily be made.
3 t' 
PRITSON REFORM
SECTION SIXTEENTH.
Care of Discharged Prisorers.-The London Congress declared that the prisoner, on his discharge, should be systematically aided to obtain employment.  This is the demand at once
of justice and policy; of justice, because it is the state's duty
not simply to raise the fallen man, but to help hold him up
when on his feet; of policy, because it is cheaper to care for
him as a discharged prisoner, than it is to care for him when
re-imprisoned for a new crime.  The state may discharge this
duty by an agent of its own, or through the instrumentality of
a prisoners' aid society. This latter we look upon as the best
moode, because the work will be done more heartily, more broadly, more. effectively, and more cheaply:-more heartily, because
private charity is more sympathetic than official duty; more
broadly, because the aid associations for the state would have
branches, or committees, wherever there was a prison; more
effectively, because a larger number of workers would be enlisted; more cheaply, because the moderate subsidies granted
by the state, would be largely supplemented by private benevolence.
SECTION SEVENTEENTH.
We resume, at this point, our exposition of the machinery-of
our preventive, reformatory, and punitive systems-if that is
the right word by which to designate the series of institutions
designed to effect a diminution of crime.  We  have given
our opinion as to preventive institutions, reformatories for
children and youths, and police and detention prisons; that
is, prisons intended for the confinemnent of adult  criminials
prior to their convietion and sentence.  We now proceed to
give our views as regards the system and series of prisons
designed for the treatment of persons convicted and under
sentence.
SECTION EIGHTEENTIH.
The,Tuven,ile Prisoit. — From the statistics of our state prisons,
it appears that fully one-fifthl of their inmates are minors, and
38 
IN THE UNITED WATES.
that more than one-half are under thirty  years of age.
The tendency of crime seems to have been, of late years, youthward. Precocity is, indeed, a characteristic of the times; and
it is not strange that it should show itself in this direction.
Accordingly, thieves, burglars, murderers even, average manr
years younger now than they did a half-century ago; and the
same is true of drunkards. This is a state of things well suited
to awaken alarm and anxiety. It has attracted the attention
of the heads of a number of our state penitentiaries (who have
noticed it in their annual reports), as well as that of other benevolent ahd thinking persons, to the question of instituting
separate prisons for those who are too old for reform schools and
too young to be shut up with practised offenders, without peril of
greater contamination-prisons where greater attention can be
given to education than would be practicable, or perhaps desirable, in institutions for criminals of a more advanced age
and more hardened character.  This Conference is in entire
sympathy with this view of the question.
But we are of the opinion that, although the persons to be
committed to the proposed institution are such as have been
convicted of state prison offeinces, it should not bear the name
of prison, but rather that of Rleformatory, with some suitable
prefix, as " State Reformatory;" or, better still, " State Industrial Reformatory." There is a large class of persons-more than
half of those convicted of felonies by the courts, if the age of
admission is fixed, as probably would be best, at between sixteen and thirty years-who are fit subjects for such institutions
The design of the treatment should be reformatory as distinguished from penal, though not, by any means, to the excltusion of punishment, either in fact or by name; for the young
transgressor should be made to feel that the commission of
crime is invariably attended with penalty, privation, and suffering. Hence, in the outset, like all other convicted felons
and misdemeanarts, he should be subjected to a term of solitary confinement, from which he may learn this salutary lesson.  Here, also, he will be fuilly informed of the character,
methods, and designed effect of the treatment to be applied
to him. He will learn that his destiny will be measurably
placed in his own hands, both as regards the removal of burden
39
. ,'i 
PRISON REFORM
some restrictions and the concession of coveted privileges
In this way the inmate of the reformatory will be placed in
a situation resembling, more or less completely, that in which
one finds himself in ordinary life. In the approval which he
daily receives for a life of merit, he will have a continual tonic
to brace him against the assaults of temptation and a relapse
into crime. It is proposed to carry this principle so far in the
juvenile prison, as to make the sentences substantially " reformation sentences."  A  sentence for so short a term as one
or two years, with the commutation laws now generally in
force, is not long enough for the efficient action of reformatory
agencies. We therefore propose that, when the sentence of a
criminal is less than five years by existing law, the sentence to
the juvenile prison shall be until reformation, not exceeding five
years. There will thus be no inmate of the institution on
whom the forces of reformation cannot be made to act for that
period, if need be; whereas the time may be much shorter, if
the circumstances are sufficiently hopeful to warrant it. On
its part, the state should give to these young criminals every
facility to improve, and put forth all effort to that end. It
should definitively abandon the idea that the main consideration is to make the institution yield a profit, or even to be selfsupporting. Labor ought of course to be required, and the aim
may and should be to make the industries as remunerative as
may be consistent with the improvement of the inmates.
If a prison does not reduce the criminal class, it has no
ratson de'tre-no right to be sustained. If it does, then its existence is more than justified, though it shows no balance of
profits. The main interest, then, being to reform, the industries must be selected and practised with that endc in view
Should it appear that agriculture, as has been widely found to
be the case in Europe, is the most powerftiul agent in producing
reform, it should be largely resorted to; though not, certainly,
to the exclusion of mechanical industry.
In the same spirit, the ignorant (and nearly all will be
ignorant) should receive the rudiments of education.  These
prisons, being at the same time and chiefly reformatories, should
be rather schools for instruction than places of punishment;
and especially should they assure a careful and kindly inculca
40 
IN THE UNITED STATES
tion of moral and religious principles. Interesting and instruc  tive lectures-conversational rather than rhetorical in style and
delivery —should be given from time to time, and all legitimate
means be adopted to rouse and fix attention on worthy objects
of study and contemplation, and to draw the thoughts away
from those unworthy subjects which had previously attracted
and engaged them. The discipline should be strict and firm,
but at the same time of a character to conciliate as well as to sub due. Let the officers, without yielding a tittle of the authority
with which they are clothed or the respect which is their due,
show themselves the friends of the prisoner, and his antagonism
will be allayed, and even replaced with love. He may and surely
will come to consider them as his best friends, stern and unyield ing in correcting his misconduct, but quick to see and warm to
approve his every meritorious act.
No contractor should be permitted to obtain a footing in
this class of institutions. The superintendent must have the
supreme control of the discipline and the industries; and he can
not, ordinarily, have the former without the latter. Indeed, the
great objection to the contract system ofprison labor everywhere,
is, that it tends to interfere with and subvert the discipline.
It introduces into prisons an outside disturbing element which
may possibly be controlled and its injurious influence neutralized by a skillful and able head, but which it is extremely difficult
to control, and which nine out of every ten prison governors
fail utterly in the attempt to master and counteract.   In that
proportion of cases, at least, it has hitherto gained the mastery,
instead of yielding it; or, if it has not absolutely secured tlhe
upper hand, it has held the balance so evenly poised, that I 4
amounts practically to much the same thing. While we believe contract labor to be open to other objections, we urge only,
now, that the system does not, and practically cannot, in the
vast majority of cases, co-exist with a considerate, firm, and
equable reformatory discipline. The interest of the contractor
is one thing; that of the state and the prisoner is often quite
another. It is unjust to a warden, and oft-times destructive
of his influence and self-respect, to place him in a position in
which he must have a daily struggle between his convictions
of duty and the c' aims, the importunities, perhaps even the men
41
4 
PRTSON REFOPRM
aces, ofcontractors. Thelate General Pilsblry, though claiming
for himself a complete control of the system in his own prison,
has been heard to say that there was not a state prison in
New York, whose warden could not and would not be removed
in twenty-four hours, if the contractors willed it.
However, the Conference desires to record its belief that,
when the reforms indicated in Section Second of this Syllabus
shall have been accomplished, contract labor in prisons may
be so regulated and controlled as not seriously to interfere
with the discipline of the prisoners, and certainly not with the
interests of free labor.
It remains only to say that, in the smaller states, one
prison of this kind would be sufficient, while the larger
states will require two or more, if they are kept down
to the proper maximum; further, that there should exist
a power of removal from the juvenile prison to the state
prison proper, in case of a necessity arising, and, alternatively,
from the state to the juvenile prison, where unusually hopeful
cases appear among the younger class of prisoners in the former; and finally, that the institution should keep its grasp
upon the prisoners, provisionally released, until the expiration
of their full term of sentence.
SECTION NINETEENTH.
The District Prison, or House of Correction) for Adult Ma,tle
Prisoners.-To this should ibe committed all males sentenced
to terms of less then five years, except such as, for a slight first
offence, shall be sentenced, for the purpose of a vigorous
notice, to a short, sharp imprisonment in the county detentionprison.  The house of correction will hold  a middle place
between the prison now knowii as the county jail and the
state prison, and will serve to discharge, in part, the functions
of both; that is to say, it will be the place of punishment for
all now sentenced to the county jail, except the small class of
offenders just referred to, and for all the younger and less
criminal convicts now sentenced to the state prison, except
those who shall hereafter be committed to the juvenile prison,
as recommended in the immediately preceding section. Much
42 
IN THE UNITED STATES.
of what has been said touching the organization and management of the juvenile prison is applicable here, and need not
be repeated. It goes without saying, that the number of these
district prisons, or houses of correction, needed in any given
state, will depend upon the number of its criminal population.
The Conference would make a very special recommendation in
favor of this class of prisons: such prisons to l)e subject to state
inspection or control - our preference being for state control
rather than for simply state inspection. The benefits to be
expected from the establ)lishment of this class of prisons are: 1.
The organization of each, with a full staff of officers, and with
all the other appointments necessary for an effective performance of the work assigned them. 2. The arrangement of buildings, cells, workshops, chapels, school-rooms, libraries-in a
word, the entire premises-in a manner suited to a complete
penitentiary system. 3. The introduction of a comprehensive,
well-adjuLsted system of industrial labor.  4. Diminished cost
of maintenance, despite the increase of officers-owing in part
to the earnings of the prisoners, and in part to greater economy in the administration. 5. The opportunity thereby afforded
of a complete reconstruction of the existing common-jail
system; that is, its destruction, and the subl)stitution therefor of
a system of simple detention prisons. 6. The relief of the state
prisons by punishing, in houses of correction, the younger and
less criminal of their inmates.  7. The crowning recommendation of the system lies in the reformatory character to be
impressed upon it.
SECTION TWENTIETH.
Prisons for WTomen.-It is the decided belief of this Conference that entirely separate prisons should be provided for
criminal women; and that for them, as for men, there should be,
wherever the population of the state is large enough to require
it, two female prisons-one for young women, who are nevertheless too old or too vicious to be placed in a girl's reformatory;
the other for those of a more advanced age and a deeper
criminality.  We further think that, where; the population is
..;
43 
PRISON REFORM
not sufficient to warrant the erection of two prisons, these two
classes of women should be treated in separate wards.
Female prisoners should, as a rule, be under female treatment; and although we do not undertake to say that, under
certain circumstances, the head of a female prison may not fitly
be of the other sex, yet, ordinarily, we think the contrary
plan better; and, at all events, the care-takers who are constantly in close contact with the inmates, should be always of
the same sex. This is the dictate of reason and common sense,
since woman alone understands woman, and since she alone can
enter into her weaknesses, temptations, and difficulties; nay,
into the very recesses of her being, and fitly minister thlereunto.
The principle of progressive classification should have place
here the same as in the prisons for men, with all the healthful
stimulants to self-denial, self-control, and self-culture, which
that system supplies.
SECTION TWENTY-FIRST.
State Prisons for Men.-Next and last in the series of establishments which make up the preventive, reformatory, and
penal system of a state, is the state prison proper -called in
England convict prison, and on the Continent central prisonthe receptacle for criminals convicted of the gravest offences
against society and its laws, punishable by imprisonment.
The adoption of the preceding part of the system proposed in
this Syllabus will make it easy, as it is every way desirable, to
give to the shortest sentence to the state prison a duration of
five years; which will afford, with reference to the whole body
of prisoners, large scope for the effective action of reformatory
processes.  Now, however fit, necessary, and useful may be
the special agencies employed to this end-the exhortations of
the chaplain, the lessons of the school-master, the instruction
of the Sunday-school teacher, and the pages of the librarybook- they must all, in their power of securing from the convict those sustained exertions which alone will give him back
his lost place in virtuous society, prove feeble and inefficacious,
in comparison with a fixed, legally established, uniform, everpresent, ever-operative SYSTEM OF AGENCIES, which act upon
44 
IN THE UNITED STATES.
him with their silent but living and abiding forces, in his dai ly and hourly work and thinking, inspiring him with confidence
in himself, with faith in his fellow-men, and with hope for
the future, which a long course of crime had dulled but
not obliterated, obscured but not extinguished.
There exists such a system, conceived ill the spirit of the
purest benevolence, and based on a profound knowledge of
the principles and needs of human nature. It was originally
devised by Alexanider Maconochie and was partially, yet with
marvelous results, carried into execution in the penal colony
of Norfolk Island.  It has already been shortly described, but
with as much fulness as the nature of this paper will permit.
The principle of MIaconochie's method underlies, must underlie, every wise system of government. It is the linking of unalterably certain rewards to good conduct, and equally sure
punishments to bad. This is God's method of dealing with
His rational creatures  and we cannot go far astray in our
treatment of criminals, by imitating, however feebly, the
method by which the moral universe is held to its moorings.
A modification of this system was inaugurated in Ireland
by Sir WValter (Crofton, a quarter of a century ago, and has
been practised there ever since. It has three prisons for as
many stages, through which each convict passes. The first is
penal, with cellular separation. The second is reformatory,
with a division into classes, where each prisoner earns his advances by good marks. The majority earn their maximum of
marks and win their promotion from class to class within the
minimum time admissible. The third prison is no prison, but
an open farm, where there is neither bolt nor bar-the detention
being virtually that of moral influence. Yet, in all these years,
scarcely a dozen escapes have been made; nor has there been
a single complaint from any farmer in the vicinage, though
there is neither restraint nor discipline beyond that maintained
over ordinary farm laborers, with the sole exception that the
prisoners are not permitted to leave the premises, and are at
night locked in common dormitories, with a warder sleeping
in an adjoining room.
Is not all this a clear proof of the wisdom of appealing
to the higher elements of manhood in our dealing even
45 
PRISON REFORM
with the degraded and the vile?  Treat the evil-doer as a
fellow-man, and it is more than probable that he Will respond
in that relation; treat him like a dog, and he will behave like
a dog. We cannot, therefore, hesitate to recommend the
adoption of the Crofton system in all the states of our Union,
more especially as it affords common standing ground to the
friends of both the cellular and associated systems.  The Conference adds an expression of its belief that the third or intermediate testing stage should be made part and parcel of every
state prison system, also of the district prison system, and
indeed of all prisons for punishing.
SECTION TWENTY-SECOND.
Miscellaneous Points.-1. It is worth while to inquire whether
society has not made a mistake in its warfare against crime.
Has it not failed to recognize the fact that habitual criminality
is a craft, not carried on solely by individuals, but by a virtual
organization, comprehending various grades and divisions
of work, and requiring the combined action of capital and labor7
just as other crafts do, and, like them, dependent for its continued existence on this union?  There are two well-defined
classes enlisted in criminal operations, the capitalists and operatives-those who fuirnish the means, and those who work the
machinery; and the former are absolutely essential to the
latter.  The crime-capitalists include the owners of houses
and dens that afford to criminals habitations and places for
carousal; the receivers of stolen goods; the pawnbrokers
who lend money on such goods; and the makers of instruments needed by burglars and counterfeiters. Now, the crimecapitalists are few; the operative plunderers many. The law
now strikes at the many operatives, one by one; would it not
be better to strike at the few capitalists, as a class? Let it direct
its blows against the nefarious connection between capital
and labor-ordinarily a beneficent one, but in this case evil,
and only evil-nor-forbear its assaults, till it has wholly broken
and dissolved the bond. When this baleful union has been
pierced in a vital part, it will perish.  When the corner-stone
of the leprous fabric shall be removed, the whole building will
46 
IN THE UNITED STATES.
tumble into ruins.  A member of this Conference once asked
a professional thief, what most helped him in his business of
stealing. His prompt reply was: " To know all the' fences'
within a circuit of thirty miles" - " fence" being the cant
name given by thieves to the receivers of stolen goods.
2. A large number of persons are every year arrested
and committed to prison on suspicion of crime, where they
are confined for longer or shorter periods, who, either on their
first hearing or their trial, are acquitted and set free as
innocent.  Yet they receive no indemnity for their loss of time,
whether it has been for a day or a year. On this state of things,
the question arises whether personal liberty is not a right
as respectable as the right of property? If this question is
answered in the affirmnative, a second instantly arises, viz., Is
it not the duty of society to indemnify the citizen whom it
has wrongfully imprisoned, as it indemnifies the citizen from
whom it takes his house or his field for some public use? This
principle is applied every day ill other cases. The witness and
the juryman receive each a piece of money for the loss of time
thus incurred. To one of them, who) makes perhaps his thousands
a year, it is but a symbol of justice; to another, it is the
daily bread of himself and his family. Can any reason be
assigned why the same principle should not be applied in the
case of the man whom the judicial authority itself, speaking
from the seat of justice, has declared to have been imprisoned
and "held in durance vile" without adequate cause?  Two incidental advantages, of no inconsiderable moment, additional
to that of meeting a demand of justice, might be expected
from the introduction of this principle into the administration
of criminal law, viz., greater caution in making arrests, and
more speedy trials after arrest.
3. The identification of prisoners who have been previously
convicted, is a matter of grave importance in the administration of penaljustice. The first Napoleon-the greatest organizer
of modern times-desired that his Minister of Justice should
have always at hand "the biography of all criminals;" a most
natural wish, since, of all the elements of a judgment as to the:
moral curability of an offender, the most important is a knowledge of his past. How to attain this knowledge? MIuch usec
47 
PRISON REFORM
is made of photography in England; but the most perfect
scheme for securing trustworthy knowledge on this point is the
criminal registers (casiers judiciaires), devised by MI. Bonneville de Marsangy, a Frenchjurist of great eminence, who has
lived to see the complete and triumphant success of his invention in his own country, where it has been in use since 1850having, also, since, been introduced into Italy, Portugal,
Denmark, and some other countries. The knowledge afforded
by these registers is precisely that desired by Napoleon; they
fuilly meet his demand for a complete criminal biography of
every man in France, who has been under the arrests of justice.
A careful study of the most effective means of identifying
persons previously convicted of crime is worthy of the best
minds of our country, and especially of those who are called
to make or to execute the criminal laws.
4. A general system of penitentiary statistics for the whole
country, a thing utterly lacking among us at the present time,
is- a great desideratum. Indeed, it may be said to be almost
essential to broad and solid progress in this department of social
science and of the public service. The laws of social phenomena
can be ascertained only through the accumulation of facts.
Returns of such facts, carefully gathered from a wide field of
observation and skilfully tabulated, are indispensable to enable
us to judge of the effect of any law or system of laws, which
may lhve been to put in operation. What we want to know is
the facts; but a knowledge of the facts relating to so complex
a subject as that of crime and criminal administration, implies
a mass of figures collected from all quarters and  arranged
with reference to some well defined end. The local and the
special are to little purpose here. It is the general only that
has value; that is to say, returns so numerous, so manifold,
and drawn from so wide a field and amid such diversified
circumstances, as to give real significance to the results. It is
such returns alone that will lay the foundation for inferences
of practical value. We want to get an average; but in order
to do this, we must have scope and variety enough, both in the
range and character of the returns, to be enabled to eliminate
-from them whatever is local and accidental, and to retain only
what is general and permanent. Only on this condition will
48 
IN THE UNITED STATES.
our inferences be sound and sabfe. Only on this condition shall
we be able to feel that our conclusions rest, not upon mere
incidents of the phenomena, which may be partial, casual,
and immaterial, but upon the phenomena themselves, apart
from variations which are temporary or adventitious.
5. In order to secure the best results from a reformatory
prison discipline, it should be divided into two distinct periods —
the periods of punishment and of reformation. Both these processes-the object beingreform-are equally benevolent,because
both are equally necessary to the end in view. There can as
little be true reform without true penitence, as there can be the
growth of the man without the birth of the child. But the
necessity for each is not, of itself, equally clear to criminals.
All criminals would, if possible, escape from restrictions imposed as mere punishment; but many would willingly submit
to them, if they were understood to be a necessary antecedent
of reformation, and especially of release as conditioned upon
rcformation; for nothing is counted a hardship which tends to
this latter issue. As a fever must be reduced before its ravages
can be repaired, and as a wound must be probed and cleansed
before it can be properly healed, so, in the moral cure of a
criminal, a punishing stage must precede the reformatory
stage. To do one thing at a time, and each well, is the rule in
all nice operations; and, surely, the recovery of a fellow-nman
from crime to virtue is worthy of an equally methodical and
careful procedure, and is not likely to be accomplished by one
less scientific or delicate.
6. Severe suffering, consequent on conviction of crime, by
way of example and warning, has not hitherto been very effective in preventing its recurrence; it would be worth while to
try the example of necessary reform, or at least of sustained
submission and self-commnand through a period of probation,
determined by the results of voluntary exertion, as the sole
condition of release. If we are not mistaken, it would be likely
to prove more deterrent than severity. It should never be forgotten, but rather strongly insisted on, that the principle of
deterrent example and the principle of reformation may and
should be made to concur. If the purpose and process of prison
discipline wereso changed as to make reformation the specific
4
49 
PRISON REFORM
end, and suffering only a necessary means to that end, there
would still be enough of suffering, since it is not simply by the
application of fire, but by its proper application, that gold is
purified; and it is the same in moral purifications. There may be
such an application of fire to gold as will merely scorch and
deface the precious metal; in like manner, there may be such
an application of suffering to the prisoner as will only deform
and harden him the more.
Too much importance is attached to mere force, as an agent
in the production of moral effects in prison management. The
very nature of that on which our efforts are expended is thus
habitually mistaken or ignored. We improve the mechanical
appliances of our prisons, their means of coercion, the precision of their movements, and all the clock-work of their arrangements, and we persuade ourselves that this is an improvement in their discipline; whereas, in truth, the more there is
of all this, the more is true discipline-the discipline of the mind
and will-impeded; for the process which moves, directs, and
strengthens these high intellectual and moral powers, is illimitably different from any that makes or guides an automaton.
7. The coercive system of managing men appears to be an
essentially vicious one, insomuch that precisely where most
perfect, it will in the end be found, so far as the true aim of
prison discipline is concerned, most unsuccessful. Mind can
be gained only by appealing to mind. Fettering the body is
absolutely opposed to this. It has its immediate and apparent advantages, but they are too dearly purchased. If we
will actively employ our prisoners; if we will fill and feed
their minds with hope; if by suitable means we cultivate
in them the daily practice of the manly and social virtues,
they will protect themselves from degrading and ruinous vices
much better than we can protect them by walls and bolts.
And the moral triumph thus achieved will be as improving
and strengthening to them as the physical triumph, even
when effected, is humiliating and enfeebling.
8. The discipline in prisons, ill this country and in other
countries, has been and is far too military in its whole conception and character. The objects of military and of prison disalpline are diametrically opposite; yet the latter has been,
'50 
IN THE UNITED STATES.
and is, very much modeled on the former. The object of
military discipline is to train men to act together; that of
prison discipline is to prepare them to act each for himself..
The purpose of the former is to absorb individuality; of the
latter, to bring it out and intensify it. The object of the one
is to make each man a fit part of a well-adjusted machine; of
the other, to make each prisoner a good citizen, with a distinct and strongly marked personality of his own. The aim
of military discipline is to teach all to look to orders, of prison
discipline, to train all to look to principles, as the guides and
-regulators of their actions. Criminals are to be reformed.
To compass their reformation, we must quit the intense
military type, and seek an arrangement better suited to the
end in view.
A military barrack, despite the high sense of honor studiously cultivated in it, for which no substitute can be found in
a prison, yet, by the testimony of high military authorities, notoriously demoralizes. Is it possible, then, that a similar
organization can reclaim criminals I Instead, we must rather
copy the incidents of that frugal, honest, self-denying, laborious poverty, to which we wish to restore our convicts,
and for which, therefore, it should be our earnest endeaver
to qualify them. No more hot meals, without previous toil to
earn them; no more undervaluing of time, nor consequent
stirnz~lus to skulking or evasion; no more interest in idleness;
no more advantages, except such as are won by industry; no
more indulgences, save those earned by exertion and selfcommand;  no progress toward liberty, except through diligence in work and the exhibition of all good conduct-all
proved by acts, not words; by a strenuous fulfillment of all duty,
not by mere lip-submission. It is thus, and thus only, that
the stern school of punishment may be made really reformatory; may be made to give back to society citizens instead of
spoliators, and honest men in place of criminals.
9. Unsuitable indulgence in prison management is as pernicious as unsuitable severity. As a rule, reform can be attained
only through a course of long and rigid training. It is in adversity that all the manly virtues are generated.  " Sweet are
its uses," therefore, to prisoners as well as to others, though
51 
PRISON REFORM
they, like others, would gladly shun its hard school. - All the
ends of public punishment will, in this way, be the more surely
gained. We reform and deter at the same time, and by the
same process.  The judicious pursuit of the first object will give
us also the second.  The true principle, then, is that the man
who has incurred punishment should, like one who has fallen
into a pit, be required to struggle out of it, and not be allowed,
as now, to endure out of it. In the one case, his more active
and better qualities are called into play, and thereby necessarily
improved; in the other, they are all put to sleep, or, to change
the figure, they are consumed by rust, or replaced by others
equally pernicious to himself and to society.
10. Much has been said and written on the classification of
prisoners, but there appears to  be no little confusion of
thought on this subject; and few, comparatively, seem to have
grasped any really practical principle of convict classification.
Arbitrary classification, by age, crime, similarity of temperament, and the like, is impracticable, and would be useless, if it
were practicable. It is "a delusion and a snare."  There is no
rule by which to regulate it. If -)y offence, that is the mere
accident of conviction; for it often happens that an old and
hardened criminal is convicted of some mere misdemeanor.
If by age, the youngest criminals, born and cradled in sin, and
steeped in it from their birth, are often the most corrupt and
corrupting. If by supposed similarity of temper and antecedent character, no one can pronounce on this with certainty,
and men are as often, perhaps oftener, improved by associating
with their opposites, as with those who resemble them.   It is
impossible to obtain real benefit by such means.   The only
rational classification of prisoners, other than that which is
effected by graded prisons-the only really useful classification-is one based on character, conduct, and merit, as shown
in the daily routine of prison life, and is moral rather than
physical.
11. It is a question whether the employment of prisoners as
a kind of sub-officers, or monitors, is admissible, and would
afford beneficial results. It was an opinion strongly held both
by Maconochie and Montesinos, that where a prison discipline is
intended to be reformatory, where the object is the moral
52 
IN THE UNITED STATES.
amendment of the person subjected to it-the employment of
these as under-officers is attended with excellent effects. In this
case all the prisoners feel elevated in the elevation of their
companion, and the self-respect of the whole body is thus
lifted to a higher plan.   Those who are thus trusted and honored, serve both as an example and an encouragement to the
rest. But when the discipline is arbitrary, coercive, and despotic, nothing can be more injurious than such a practice; for
these convict-officers will always exceed and abuse their petty
power, so that theirfellow-prisoners are then doubly crushed, first
under the tyranny of the government official, and then under
that of merely another but favored slave. Captain Maconochie
attests that he could not have got on at all on Norfolk Island,
if he had not largely employed prisoners in his management.
But by having a host of persuaders (and it was as such that he
chiefly sought to use them) distributed constantly among the
convict population, he was able to prevent much of the evil
previously existing and almost made matter of boasting, and
strongly to direct public opinion against what remained of it.
He found them like the petty and non-commissioned officers of
a ship or a regiment, who are also equally selected from the
ranks sought to be controlled.
12. The correspondence of prisoners and the visits to be received by them from outside, with the restrictions to be imposed
upon these, are points to be carefully considered; and they are
not unattended with difficulty.  The uniform answer given by
governments, at the Congress of London, to the question put
to them on these points, was that, under due limitations, both
letters and visits were found to exert a beneficial moral influence upon the prisoners.  But the difficulty is to find these
due limitations.  It goes without saying, that the correspondence must be inspected both ways-that which goes out and
that which comes in; and that the visits must be restricted to
persons whose character is properly authenticated, and chiefly
to members of the prisoner's own family. The point of difficulty is the frequency of both. At present, the usage varies
in the several states and prisons, ranging from one month
(possibly in some prisons less) to three months, which latter
period is not uncommon. These long intervals are injurious
53 
PRISON PREFORM
to the convict, often impairing and sometimes nearly obliteriating whatever of good feeling still survives.  A wife, a mother,
a sister, a clhild, ought not to be  debarred from communicating, as often as they wish, by letter or visit, their
griefs and distresses to the author of them, nor from thus
directing to him whatever monitions, counsels, or exhortations
may to them seem fitting and necessary. Can it be true wisdom,
can it be to the interest of society, to screen prisoners from the
knowledge in detail of the shame, the sorrow, and the suffering,
into which their climes have plunged those dearest to them, or
to weaken, if not to sever, those ties which, if maintained,
would most facilitate their return to society, and most stimulate their exertions when restored to it?
The regulation is intended as an aggravation to suffering,
but, in most cases, it operates rather as a relief; and, not unfrequently, it punishes the visitor much more than it does the
prisoner.  The privilege of writing letters might be converted
into a wholesome agent of discipline, if it were made conditional upon good conduct, and especially if uniform good conduct gave the right as often as it might be desired. Under
Maconochie's plan, where the sentence is given in marks and
the marks are used as money, the whole matter might be easily
and most beneficially arranged, by imposing a charge on every
prisoner receiving a letter or visit, the reception or non-reception of either being entirely in his own choice. Writing
himself, he would have to pay for paper and stamps; but beyond these checks, there should be none, except the exaction
of a proper guaranty for the fitness of the letter to be sent or
received, and a proper authentication of the character and relationship of the visitor.
13. The degree of supervision or watching to be maintained over the prisoners is another point which merits
serious attention. It is at least to be considered whether
the constant and rigid surveillance, so much insisted on,
however plausibly it may be defended, does not generate
and foster that habit of eye-service which so unfits a prisoner for the task of self-guidance after his release? Whether
the minute supervision and regulation maintained in our larger
and more important prisons, might not be beneficially replaced
54 
IN THE UNITED STATES.
by a considerable measure of self-guidance, reinforced l)y a
strong motive to give it a right direction? Whether, in strictness, such argus-eyed watching is not rather unfavorable than
favorable to the reform of prisoners? Whether in giving perhaps the desire of amendment, it may not, in some degree, take
away the power? Whether, in short, its tendency is not to
enfeeble character, to make it too dependent on direction,
and to deliver it up bound, as it were, hand and foot, to
subsequent temptation?
14. There is a class of endless " revolvers," committed to the
minor prisons as " drunk and disorderly," over and over and
over again, usually on an alternative sentence of " ten days
or a fine of ten dollars" till, as one of them said, " the times of
commitment are uncountable." It is a very serious question
how to deal with these persons.   That the present mode is
worse than useless, is beyond dispute. It is often productive
of great evil to the families of the victims of this vice, while it
rends neither to suppress intemperance nor to reform the drunkard. These persons, though slaves to a degrading vice, are not
criminals in the ordinary meaning of that term; and their confinement in prisons, with thieves, burglars, and other hardened
criminals, seems to us impolitic as well as unnecessary, since
its result is, almost always, to cestroy the prisoner's self-respect,
and take from him all hope of future amendment.    The law
should clearly define what a habitual drunkard is; and the persons falling under that designation should, in our judgment,
be confined only in asylums or reformatories, and kept there,
under mild but efficient treatment, until there is a reasonable
assurance that permanent reformation has been effected. Inebriates of different sexes should be confined in different establishments.
SECTION TWENTY-THIRD.
Criminal Law Reform. - We  have not introduced this
heading in the present Syllabus for the purpose of laying
down any propositions in regard to it, further than to express
the conviction that there is urgent need of action in this direction, and to suggest whether it may not be practicable to
.,51*,
a 
PRISON BEF ORLM
create a commission of learned criminal jurists, to be composed of one member from every state that is willing to conme
into the measure, which commission shall be charged with the
duty of drawing up the project of an improved penal code, to
be recommended to the adoption of all the states, with such
modifications, if any, as each may see fit to make with a view
to adapt it to any special circumstances or exigencies that
may therein be thought to require such change. A consideratble degree of similarity, if not an absolute uniformity, in the
penal codes of the different states, appears to us highly desirable, to the end that the criminal may know that he will have
to suffer substantially the same penalty, in one state as in
another, for any offence he may commit.
SECTION TWENTY-FOURTH.
With penitentiary systems based on the principles and
worked by the methods outlined in the foregoing Syllabus,
with penal codes framed in the same spirit, with our prisons
removed from the domain of party politics, and a character of
absolute stabilityand permanence impressed on their admin:istration, and with prison officers trained to their work and
secure in their places as long as they show themselves competent and faithful, it is the belief of this Conference that
there is no point to which the improvement of prison discipline
may not be carried, but that which is imposed by the imperfection of human virtue, the fallibility of human wisdom, and
the limitations of human power.
56 
NOTICE RESPECTING THE INTERlNATIONAL PENITEN
TIARY CONGRESS OF STOCKHIOLM.
Action of the American Social Science Association and of the Con    ference of the Boards of State Charities, at their respective
meetings in Saratoga, September 4th-7th, 1877.
SOCIAL SCIENCE ASSOCIATION,
In Session at Saratoj, N. Y., Sept. 7th, 1S77.
The Secretary, Mr. Sanborn, read a communication from Dr. E
C. Wines, on " The International Prison Congress," whereupon the
following preamble and resolutions were unanimously adopted, the
same having been, on the previous day, in like manner, unanimously adopted by the Conference on Public Charities:
Whereas, The Government of Sweden and Norway has addressed
an official invitation to all iforeign Governments to take part in the
International Prison Congress at Stockholm, during the second half
of August, in the year 1878, in compliance with which invitation, Dr.
Wines, President of the International Penitentiary Commission and
U.S. Commissioner to the Congress, proposes that each of the several States should contribute information and send delegates to the
Stockholm Congress; therefore
Resolved, That the Social Science Association, now in session at
Saratoga, N. Y., hear with satisfaction of the steps taken by the
Swedish Government, and by the British Government, through its Sec retary of State for the Colonies, the Right Honorable, theEarl of Carnar von, to promote the usefulness and success of the International Prison
Congress in 1878; and that this Association desires to do its part
toward the collection and transmission of information concerning
Prisons, Reformatories, etc., in the United States.
Resolved, That this Association declares its earnest hope that the
Governors of the several States will take effective measures to secure
for the Congress, through competent persons, information on theprison question within their several States, similar to that collected by the
British Colonies in their respective jurisdictions, and that they will
also take measures to have their States duly represented in the
Congress.
Pesolved, That we have learned with much pleasure that Dr.
Wines is preparing a work on "The State of Prisons and Prison
Discipline and Reform throughout the Civilized World," to be completed and printed before the Congress meets, believing that such a
work will be of great interest to the friends of this cause, and also
greatly helpful to the cause itself.