The Sun.
London, England, 1856-04-04 00:00:00

away bythe gentleman and his servants armed. It might
Le asked how it was known they w-re ticket-of-leave
men. It was known in this way. They were taken up
the next day for another offeuce, and their shoes corres-
ponded exactly with the foot-prints at the gentleman's
house. ,Wera they then to harbour a system of this sort,
which destroyed every comfort ? Those harJened men
would perpetrate every violence possible in order to
achieve the object they had in view. There were means
of empfoying those men on the public work. and, at
the end.V the period for which they worked, they should
receive ilie surplus doe to them, which would ena`de
them eitilef_to start in some business in this country or
to go tot:the colonies. Under those circuinstaaces he
thought it, behoved the house to m tike some provision to
meet the e*igencies of this case,,an I he hope..l the right
hon. bast; would so enlarge his amendment that there
need be no division on the motion. -
Sir G. GREY said he would state shortly the object
which he had in view in giving notice of the amendment
which he bad placed on the paper, and he thought that the
impression that he had in reference to the terms of the
motion had been fully confirmed by the speech of the hon.
mover, and also of his seconder. He was afraid, on looking
at the motion, that it would lead to a very vague and in-
definite inquiry, extending over a great variety of subjects
which probably would occupy the committee the remainder
of the seashell, without producing any satisfactory results
—producing a great mass of evidence, but he doubted whe-
ther there could be any report. The terms of the motion
were to direct the select committee "to consider how far
and in what direction recent legislation, and the sub-
..

stitution of other punishment for-transportation, has in-
fluenced the existing amount of crime;" so that, in
addition to" on.luittiry into the act of 1853, which abo-
lished transportation in the great majority of cases, the
hon. me to inqiikainto the whole, subject of,
ref. . Itielatt#l to that to inqokeizto
whole system Kabearing on the question of the punishment
of crime, and moreover that the committee should inquire
into all collateral subjects. If the committee were ap-
pointed with the view stated by the hon. member for Ber-
wickshire, and of his seconder, it would bo necessary to
inquire into the licensing system, it being stated that the
amount of crime depended more or less on the number of

beer•houses and public-houses. There was nothing more
general than the terms of the mition, and therefore he

ihought it desirable to limit the inquiry, so that the com-
mittee might address themselves to some practical object.
But in saying that, he did not in the least wish to limit the

inquiry, as the hon. member for Berwickshire seemed to

think h; did ; but he thought it should have reference to se-
condary punishments, and he considered that the terms of
his motion did not restrict inquiry into that subject. He
di I not wish to enlirge the tarmus, but his object was merely
to define them. Having said thus much with regard to the
amendment, which he hoped would obviate the necessity of
any discussion, as they had all, be trusted, the same object
in view on the present occasion, he would proceed to notice
some of the observations made by the hon. member (Mr.
Scott.) It would be unnecessary for him to go fully into
the act of 18:51, as it would be easier to give details as to

the operations of that act before the committee than it
was to state them in the house; but with reference to the
_ _

increase of crime, which had been alluded to both by the
mover and seconder of the motion, let him say he thought
there was an exaggerated notion of the increase of crime
in the country which was not Narranted by the documen-
tary evidence before them, and was inconsistent with the

fad's. Ho hell in his hand a return lately made by Mr.
Redgravo, to the Home office. It was true this return
did not include the class of summary convictions, but it
Tenet be ncelhcted that the increase of summary convic-

tions wan the result of recent alterations in the law. Mr.

Redgrave stated the total number of counnitmetro of cri-

t ken i refelence to the circumstances to which

he adverted in the opening part of hi r p )rt as to summary

convictions for the last 21 years. This of course included
all the graver offences for which persons had been com-
mitted, and in taking into account the increase or decrease
of crime they ought to bear in mind, not merely the num-

her of persons committed to prison, but the gravity of the
offences. He would not go through the return, but he
might state that while 'ln 1834 the commitments were

22,251, in 554 "they were 29,359. But then there was an

important element that was not stated bore, and that was
the increase of population during that period. He would,
however, take two 'ears, 18 Fl and 1851, the two years iu
which the census was taken, and be found that in 1811 the

number of commitments wa. 27,780, and in 1851 it was.

27,910, while in the interval there had been an increaseoi
population in England and Wales of more than two mil-

licins. He had ia(3 doubt that in the last year, as coui-
pared with 1851, there had been an increase of about
2,000 ; but it was some satisfaction to be enabled to
state that the increase was confined to the lower class
of crimes. He thought it right to state thus much

in order to show that the statements as to the increase

of crime had been exaggerate 1. And then, with regard to
the increase of expenditure for law and justice as com•
pared with previous years, hero again the hon. memb, r
omitted some circumstances which ought to be taken into
account. lu the first place, there was no doubt that the
ab•.litiun of transportation, in the great majority of oases,
under the act of 1853, had materially increased the ex-
peuditure, by requiring the enlargement of establish vents.
A great portion of that expenditure, however, _would not
be perpetual. There was no doubt, also, that the reten-
tion of criminals in this country did increase the expendi-
ture. It must also be borne in mind, when they were
speaking of an increase of the cxpenditu•o on account of
law and juAice at present, as compared with that it was t-m
years ag.), that they had taken upon the public revenue the
expense of the maintenance of all prisoners, a portion of
which was previously borne locally. H ) would proceed
now to notice some of the remarks of the hon. geutletnan

(Hr. Scott) with regard to persons sentenced for secondary
punishment. The hen. 'member objected to th,• li nita-
tiou, he (Sir G, Grey) proposed as to the act of 1853, that
the operation of that act was of short duration that it
might Le called an expiring act, inasmuch as transporta-
tion ceased the operation of the act as to tickets-of-leave
would gradually diminish. But that was only a small
portion of the act of 1853. Tile object of that act was not
so much to enable the Crown to grant limited p tr,lon by
means of licenses granted to convicts, but its great object
was to abolish transportation except in cases in which the
setitonce by law could not be less than tramp irtation for
life or for 14 years. The great majority of cases of trans-
portation were for periods of less than 14 years. Conse-
quently the act of 1853 practically abolished transporta-
tion in six-sevenths or more of the cases liable to transpor-
tation. The result was that in 1854—he had not got the re-
turns of last year—in the United Kingdom there were only
399 persons sentenced to transportation, whereas in the pre-
ceding year, the year immediately preceding the act of
1833, there were no less than 3,059 persons so seutete.d.
He thought that was a inost, important change. It was a
change which the hon. gentleman said he regretted ; it was
a change which the hon. gentleman who seconded the mo-
tion alto said he regretted : and he collected from their
speeches that they ought to inquire whether they ought not
to advert to a system of transportation. They said—at least
the hon. member for Berwickshire said--that the system of
transportation was a valuable one, and he did not deny it,
but that it was hastily abandoned. So far, however, from
its being hastily abandoned by the Government, the aban-
donment was forced on the Government. Without raising
a just cause of quarrel and contention with some of our
most important colonies, it was absolutely impossible to
continue to send convicts to the Australian colonies. Even
in WeeteinlAustralia there was no great facility for carry-
ing out transportation. No doubt a new colony was anxious
to obtain the services of convicts on public works, in order
to make it the more inviting to free settlers. To the pre-
sent time there had been great benefits derived to that
colony from the labours of convicts. Oae great inconveni-
ence always arose from the large number of ,the criminal
population. The convicts, either from their previous ha-
bits of drankennesa and debauchery, or that their consti-
tutions were worn out, really were not fit for hard labour,
and a largo proportion of them were obliged to be treated
comparatively as invalids, and it would be imposing a bur-
den on a colony to send to it prisoners who could not labour.
He need not dwell longer on the subject of transportation,
because he did not think they were dkely to revert to it ;
but at the same time, under the terms of this amendment,
it was clear the committee might, if they thought St, con -
eider the subject of transportation generally, aid they of
course might consider the expediency of the change effected
by that act. He would say a few words with regard to the
operation of the preAmt system in this country. The hon.
member had alluded to the number of persons who had
received tickets of leave, and the number whose tickets
of leave had been revoked. The hoe. gentleman who
spoke last had certainly misapprehended the result, when
he said that out of 5,152 convicts who since the passing of
the act had received licenses 1,10), or 1,203, had f eleited
them. New that was not the case. The 447 couvicts who,
after license, had been charged with subsequent offences and
convicted of an offence which entailed the penalty of trans-
portation, had not their licenses revoked. The sentence
itself revoked it. Then there were 179 who had been con-
victed of minor offences, who had been sentenced to itnpri-
sonment, say for 3 or 6 reoaths, but for a term less than
the original sentence which the convict would have had to
serve if he had not had a license. Then there were 5'.4 in
the last item of the return who had never received their
license, and they were not included in the 5,152; but they
were convicts who for their conduct in prison had had
their licenses withheld beyond the usual term. If a con-
vict did not misconduct himself he obtained a letter of
license after a certain period. A prisoner sentenced to 7
years' transportation obtained a license in three years and
a half, and a convict sentenced to ten years would obtain it
in five, and so on. Then it was said that those tickets-of-
leave were given on proof of reformation and as a reward.
Now that was really not the fact, and there was a great
deal of misapprehension on that part of the subject. They
wet e withheld where the conduct of the prisoner was so bad
as clearly to show they did not deserve them, but in the
majority of cases, if the prisoners conducted themselves pro-
perly, and did not transgress the prison rules, they were,
according to existing regulations, entitled to the tickets of
leave. While a convict remained in prison, removed from
temptations to which he had been in the habit, it might be,
of yielding, of course no opportunity was afforded of test-
ing the sincerity of his refoi nation. It was said that the
returns on this point were not strictly accurate, and that
no doubt was the case. It had been found impossible to
obtain accurate returns of all the convicts who had re-
ceived licences in the cases referred to. The object of the
licence was to enable the convict to obtain an honest living,
and the demand for labour during the last two or three
years had been to great that hardly any difficulty existed
in getting employmeut. The instructions given to the me-
tropolitan police that they should not interfere with
ticket-of-leave holders whom they had reason to believe
were honestly earning their living, but that they might in-
terfere if they found them leading a dishonest life, and as-
sociating with bad characten-. The hon. member had stated
that it was the practice to revoke these licences on the
holders being again convicted. When they were found lead-
ing dishonest lives' and associating with bad characters, the
license was not at once revoked, but a warning was given
that it would be revoked if the holder continued in such
courses, and very often that had the desired effect. The hon.
member had referred to another point o a which be wished
to make a remark. The hon. member had stated that
tickets of leave were granted to persons sentenced to trans
portation, and withheld from persons sentenced to penal
eerritude, In compel-in the two ohm the, boat member
.