Wheeling daily intelligencer. [volume] (Wheeling, Va. [W. Va.]) 1852-1859, 1856-01-05

ry is returned at $40 TO- At the rate of o.lr
past progress in sixty years VIC shall have one
hundred millions of people Every pulsation
and breath that moves and governs this vast sys
TEN, emanates from the popular heart, and de-
Ponds upon the virtue and intelligence of the
people for its life giving principle.
Blythe most recent statistics with which we
are furnished, it appears TINT there are 1921
churches in the United States, the total value of
such church property is eighty-six millions, four
hundred and sixteen thousand. six hundred and
thirty-nine dollars, and there is one church for
every $40 of the entirep population There were
100000 ofOur youth receiving instructionsin
the various educational institutions Of the con-
try, onthe first of;Iune, 1850, or at the rate of
one in every five free persons.
It is said no State in the Union is without its
legal provision for the protection and support of
the INDECENT population. In many ofthe States
they receive the care and attention which places
them in an enviable condition compared with
some Of the laboFing classes in other countries.
Every State of the Union has one or more State
prison, and all the counties of States have their
county Jail for the confinement and punishment
ofotfenders.
Yet with all these safeguards provided for the
security ofpersons and property, and to nurture
and sustain our State and Federal government
with the affections of an intelligent religion and
moral constituency, the census of 1850 shows
that the number OF persons convicted of crime in
the United States for that year was about2T 900,
numerical force greater than the entire army
or navy Ofthc United States number sutfici-
ent to protect our tradeon every SCI, aud to man
and defend the forts and garriSons of the entire
country sufficient number to guard and pro-
tect as apolice every town, city and county in
the entire Union. But the picture is rendered
still darker and more forbidding; the National
Police Gazette ofApril s, 1854, says, "The pic
ture OF crime among us seems to swell into the
completeness of awfulness." De BOWS Review
Of 1855, says-of the crimes of 1851, Crime,
too, OF every grade, foots up fearful catalogue.
There were six hundred and eighty-two muir
ders, and eighty-four executions during the
year.
Virginia with an educational income of 1851,
SOC, and n, T64 scholars in Colleges, Academies
and Public Schools. $2,9G0,S76 invested in
church property, and still the census of 1850
shows that there 203 convicts in the Peniten-
tiary, and 119 conviets in JailS, being one con-
Wet Tor every seven thousand and three of the
population, and one prisoner in Jail for 1, 946.
And the last Auditors report states that the
criminal charges and guards: For expenses of
arrcsting support of persons confined il county
and corporation jaiiS, attendance of witnesses,
guarding jailS, reward andallowance BY the FIX
ecutiyc, amounts to 81, Ill Sand the cx-
pense of the Peuitentiary system of the State to
$25, 500 81
The cause of this existing crime is solved
problems; it is the inadequacy of the existing pri-
son discipline to reform the criminal, and the alb
sencc of reform institutions to meet the exigen-
cy ofthe country. The benign influence Of the
church or the school-houSe never reaches that
immense class of neglected and uncared for
youth who frequent the persieus of vice, aud arc
tine ones that swell the army of criminals that
continually supply the Jails and State Prisons
with their unreclaimed inmntes
The State should be the faithful protector of
all The Office of preventive Justice is a much
higher one than that of furnishing Aciviiized
and christian State cannot longer be indifferent
to the cry for relief that comes up from this mu-
ititutle of infant offenders in the dark dungeons
of their Prisons and the abyss of their crimes,
abandoned by parent and State, with none To
save them from the temptation of an erring lite
The State to continue to be Indifferent to the de-
plorable condition of these unfortunate ones is
but TO augment the retrihutivc Justice which is
to be incurred IN each one being the parent of
stock of Offenders that cyc 10 be pest and tax
to the State. rge7r
1.-The State should establish this institution
thought to be founded and under the exclusive
control of the State 1t is an institution to ar
rest and reform the criminal offender 1t is the
chief and highest duty of the State to protect
its citizens against the Depreciation and aggres-
sion of crime. The people cheerfully contribute
to the establishment of Jails and State Prisons
to punish crime, and they have right to de-
mand the. institution of those benign establish
ments which stand commended not only for the
reformation of crime but for their economy
Voluntary contributions may sustain successful
ly charitable institutions, but the State should
ever have the exclusive control of all institutions
designed to correct offenders"