The Sun.
London, England, 1864-02-19 00:00:00

passed in 1857 to the end of 1862, there had been 13,331
sentences of penal servitude punishment ; of these 3,825 were
for three years, and 4,432 were for four years, iiaking to-
gether 8,257, or two-thirds of the whole numb r. In Scot-
land, during the same period, there had been 1,292 sentences
of penal servitude passed, and of these 17 m ere for three
years and 529 for four years, or more than ) • • half. In Ire-
land, during the same period, there had been 2,167 sentences
of penal servitude; and of these 711 were for three years
and 751 for four years, being considerably above two-thirds
of the whole. Her Majesty's Government, coinciding in the
opinion of the commission that those sentences ought not
to be continued, thought that the minimum period of penal
servitude should be increased. The commissioners looked to
the lengthening of the sentences as the beat means of pro-
ducing a salutary effect, and in principle the Government
entirely concurred with that recommendation of the commis-
sioners. But that recommendation was intimately connected
with another, which was, that all male convicts not disquali-
fied for removal to a colony shonld be sent to Western Aus-
tralia during the latter part of their punishment. That re-
commendation was entitled to the greatest weight, and he was
bound to say that although the Government had not been able
to act on it, the commissioners were fully justified in making
it. With the exception of the hon. member for Pontefract
(Mr. Childers), the commissioners were unanimous. The
right hon. gentleman the member for Oxfordshire, who de-
clined to sign the report of the commission, stated his reason,
in which he expressed an opinioa favourable to the removal
from this country to Western Australia of as many male
convicts as the colony was able and willing to receive. The
Lord Chief Justice, though differing in principle from the
rest of the commissioners, stated that the urgent demand for
labour in Western Australia rendered that colony willing to
take a very large proportion of our convicts. He saw the
wisdom of supplying that demand, by which both the mother
country and the colony would be benefited and a new field
opened for the convicts themselves. He (Sir G. Grey)
agreed with every word that the Lord Chief Justice had
written on that subject. He was bound to say that they
could not have anticipated the extreme apprehension and
alarm with which the inhabitants of the Eastern settle-
ments had received the recommendations of the commission.
Those recommendations, however, had created the greatest
alarm, to such an extent, indeed, that it had been thought
prudent not to carry them into effect. Ho thought, on the
other hand, that there had been an exaggerated feeling in
this country as to the benefits likely to accrue from the
adoption of the recommendation, because it would be some
time before it could have been of any practical effect. He
had made a careful calculation of what would be the result
of carrying out the recommendation, and he found that for
the five years ending 1862 there were 2,900 convicts sen-
tenced to penal servitude each year. From these had to be
deducted 1,400 women and juvenile offenders and others
whu were unfit for hard labour, so that there remained 1,500
available to be sent to Western Australia, supposing they
were sentenced to not less than seven years. Against these
being sent to Western Australia, both her Majesty and the
Government had been memorialised and petitioned by the
inhabitants of Eastern Australia. Now, he for one,
admitting the colonists to express their views on the
subject, denied their right of dictating to her Majesty as to
natters affecting the inhabitants of another colony
thousands of miles away, With regard to sending con •
victs to Western Australia, he found that at present as
many as 600 were sent every year. That number the
Government would continue to send, but they would
not carry out the recommendation of the commission.
In fact it would be unjust to Western Australia for the
Government to turn a deaf ear to their wishes and discon-
tinue the practice of sending convicts to that colony.
Another alteration in the law with regard to Western Aus-
tralia would tend to remove the apprehensions of the other
colonists, namely, the conditional pardon with regard to
long sentences. Under the existing system the convict might
receive a pardon, and he could return to any town in Europe
or go to any other colony, if he had the means to do so and
if he so pleased. What the Government proposed now to do
was that one condition of a pardon should be that the
convict should not quit the colony until the expiration of the
term of his sentence, but every inducement would be held
out to him to pursue an honest life, and there would be no
undue interference with his movements. With regard to the
general question of transportation and penal servitude, the
Government had come to the determination of adopting the
term of five years as the minimum of penal ser Itude, and
abolishing the sentence of three and foul years. The next
important recommendation of the commissioners was one on
which there was a difference of opinion. It was that with re-
gard to cone lets sentenced to penal servitude being subjected
to nine months' separate imprisonment, and then to labour
on public works for the remainder of their term, that re-
mainder to depend on their good conduct. That was a very.
important question, and upon it there was a difference et
opinion between the Lord Chief Justice and the commission.
The evidence showed that the hope of re mission of the
sentence was the most powerful inducement that could be
offered for good conduct. Such was the opinion of the direc-
tors of all the convict prisons both in England and Ireland,
The Lord Chief Justice said ;hat if the principle had been a
good one it would apply equally to short as to long sentences.
there was, however, a great difference between them. A
prisoner sentenced to twelve months' or two years' im-
prisonment had the end of his sentence always before him,
and he knew when it would arrive; but a prisoner sentenced
to twenty years' penal servitude became desperate unless
some hope were given him. It had been objected that in this
system there was a want of certainty in the punishment.
Upon this point there had been great popular misapprehen-
Bien. There was no want of certainty in the punishment.
The punishment was fixed at a certain minimum, which
might be reached through the good conduct of the convict.
Say, a man was sentenced to twelve years' penal servitude,
which might by good conduct be reduced to nine years.
That was the minimum punishment, but the punishment
might extend to the twelve years. There was, therefore, no
uncertainty, and the judges, in passing sentence, knew this
and framed the sentences accordingly. The recommendation
of the commissioners was that no lees than three-fourths
of the sentence should be absolute, and that the remission of
the other fourth should depend on the good conduct of the
convict. He thought the house would do well in acting on
that recommendation and adhering to the present system.
The right hon. gentleman, in explaining a recommendation
of the Royal Commissioners that tickets-of-leave should
enable the holder to proceed beyond the limits of this coun-
try, said that a revokable license in its terms carried with
it the necessity of limiting the convict by the terms of his
licence to the jurisdiction within which that licence was
given. Even if given to go to our own colonies, it would
lead to remonstrances from our colonies against the principle.
On the whole therefore it had not been thought possible to
extend the limits of the licence. The bill would therefore
recognise the existing state of things, and not make any
alteration in the practice as regards tickets of leave. Fol-
lowing another recommendation of the commissioners, it
was proposed that when a license was revoked the convict
should undergo the whole term of imprisonment that he had
yet to serve under his sentenee at the time the ticket of leave
was granted, instead merely of the time which was unexpired
at the period of committing the offence, or in other words
that the convict should begin where he left off. It was pro-
posed also to make certain breaches of the licence cognisable
by magistrates, and punishable when of an inferior character
by summary conviction, instead of remission to prison to
serve out the remainder of the original sentence. Under
the provisions of the bill there would be no sentence of penal
servitude for less than five years. If a ticket of leave holder
committed an indictable offence the licence would be revoked,
and if forfeited by a conviction the whole of the original
sentence would be undergone from the date when the licence
was granted ; if the breach of the licence was of a character
cognisable by a magistrate, then the punishment would be
summary conviction. The convict would be called upon to
produce his licence when required, and if he was suspected
of a breach of his licence, then he would be apprehended,
taken before a magistrate, and the case inquired into, and
if coming within the magistrate's jurisdiction, the case
would be punished by imprisonment, but in that case the
conviction was to be reported to the Secretary of State for
the Home Department, who would, according to his discre-
tion, revoke the licence or not. Another recommendation
of the Royal Commissioners was to give to local magistrates
the power of ordering the immediate infliction of corporal
punishment in the case of prisoners guilty of ineuberdina-
tion in convict prisons. As the law at present stood, such
punishment could only he inflicted by the authority of the
directors of the prison. As it was desirable, for the sake of
example, that such punishment should take place at once,
and as it was difficult to communicate with all the directors,
he proposed to embody such recommendation in the bill, and
give power for any two local magistrates to be called in, take
evidence on oath, and exercise the power of ordering corporal
punishment in the case referred to. The right hon gentle-
roan concluded by moving for leave to bring in the bill.
Mr. ADDERL EY submitted the scheme of the Govern-
ment to a rigid and searching scrutiny, contending that it
was based upon an unsoand principle, inasmuch as it pro-
posed to remedy the inefficiency of the existing law by fur-
ther extending a principle which had already failed. The
eight hon. gentleman stated several objections to the mea-
sure, and laid particular stress upon the fact that it pre-
tended to embody the recommendations of the Royal com-
mission, whereas it omitted the moat essential feature of
them. Ile would legislate so as to make punishment the
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measure of that
kind be passed, and it would be an effectual one, The
punishment would be simple and intelligible to all • there'
would be fewer prisoners crowded into the gaols, and, for
the first time in this country for a long period' there would'
be something like terror attached in the mind of the crimi-
nal to the punishment for his misdeeds,
Lord NAAS thought, in reference to the question of
transportation to Western Australia, that the Government
had come to a hasty conclusion, and that a much larger ex •
tension of the system might be adopted. Moreover, he
believed that the inhabitants of the other Australian settle-
ments would become satisfied that that might be done with-
out inflicting any evil upon them. The measure was also
objectionable in not providing an adequate supervision by