The Dorset County Express and Agricultural Gazette.
Dorchester, Dorset, England, 1876-03-28 00:00:00

TILE "LkNCET" ON MORAL INFLUENCES IN
CONVICT PRISON DISCIPLINE.

The Lanai (a leading medical journal, London, March
11th, 1576) says' -" An interesting discussion has taken
place in the columns of the Globs on the treatment of
convicts in penal establishments, and the reformative
results attained. Mr. William Tallack. the zealous
Secretary of the Howard Association, has entered the
lists in the interests of moral discipline and the separate
system. Mr. Tallack does not advocate that extreme
form of inaolation which endangers the sanity of its victims.
He would draw the line at the separation of prisoners
(min each other, and their protection from the evils of
criminal assasiation. We have recently had °maiden to
protest against the mistaken practise of crowding to-
gether casee of mental disease. The obvious objections to
this short-sighted and unscientific sVstern apply with
equal force to the axgregation of minds debauched by
criminality. The evil acquires new power of mischief by
concentration, just as oantagicris or infectious diseases
gain greater virulence Icy the aggregation of cases. The
mi.cherous influences are, so to speak, focussed, and
acting and reacting mutually, they develop with aug-
mented energy, and bear bad fruit multiplied • hundred-
kid. We entirely agree with the opinion that a wise
adoption of the separate system would protect the less
crimin and prove increasingly punitive to the more
depraved. Medical officers, of prisons and workouses are
latter qualified to bear testimony on these points than
governors, who, for the most part, know little or nothing
of the inner life of thedestablishments under their nominal
control, and when they presume to dogmatise must do so
on data supplied to them by subordinates, who are not
to be trusted ; and we are convinced that the concurrent
opinion of medical officers of prisons and workhouses will
bear out the judgment of the Secretary of the Howard
Association in all its more important particulars.
"Another point upon which Mr. Tallack insists strongly
is the importance of personal moral influence. In a Fatter
before us he comdemos the dictum of Captain Griffiths
(Deputy-Governor of Millbank Convict Prison) that moral
influences are of small value Probably no one except •
military disciplinarian would have broached so unreason-
able a theory. As • matter of fact, soldiers are not the
most suitable persons to deal with criminals. They are so
entirely Imbued with the belief theta man is so much raw
material to be kneaded and beaten into a rajuired shape,
+hat Skov overlook the feet of his boinsi • machine workd
by a mind. There is no place for mind in the military
system, and it is left out of the account by military men
it) dealing with convicts. But it is the nand which is at
fault in criminals. To disregard the mind and moral
influeoces, is such • case, is to overlook the pivot upon
which everything turns. It criminals are to be reformed,
a large part of the task must be accomplished by purely
moral forces. Foremost among them is that which acts
milts powerfully en the conscience.

"On scientific grounds, not less than religious and
moral, Mr. Tallack is right; and we trust his efforts to
replace the purely military rigirrie by something more
humane and humanising will awaken a response on the
question where it may be expected to take a practical
shape, and lead to the further reform of our so-called re-
formative prison discipline."