Worcester daily spy. [volume] (Worcester [Mass.]) 1850-1888, 1871-02-21

spoken here and there, The iailers and keepers
do what they can in many instances. The lack
is in the system rather than in the men who
carry out that system. The idea of reforming
the prisoner, of opening no before him the posi-.
billy of better way of life, of putting around
him influences for good does not appear SO
prominently in the prison arrangements as il
ought since we are Christian state.
No prisoner ought to 20 out OF any one of our
lails with any reasonable grounds for the com
mon feeling that society has been down on me,
and now am free, viii be down on society,"
The influences Of the prison ought TO make il
appear to the common mind that society, as or
ganized in government, as expressed by rules,
regulations and treatment, means well by, and
wishes well to, aye, and hopes well of its crimi-
nails. And the Legislators of Massachusetts COR
responds, and we trust ever will correspond, to
these views"
The law has long authorized the county COM
missioners to furnish to prisoners at the expense
of the county suitable instruction In reading and
writing, but no advantage has ever been taken Of
this authority. Out of total of S255,7 ex-
pended for the support OF the county prisons,
only So, 100 is expended for instruction, and Gin
struction" as here used includes the salaries of
chaplains. In one prison, we believe it was in
Worcester, the commissioners found forty men
idle" because there was not room in the work
shop for them. The separation of women from
men in the prisons, and the selection Of certain
prisons TO be occupied exclusively by women, are
features that have aroused much dis
trust. The women are needed, it is said, to do
the housework and the sewing. Then the eX-
pense of removal and the complication of ac-
counts are treated by county commissioners,
sheritfs and jailcrs as serious objections. But
the commissioners do not admit that these diff
culties are at all formidable and that the benefits
of economy in support and profitable employ
ment, as well as the moral advantages to the
prisoners from separation of the young from
those who are hardened in vice, and more
efficient methods of instruction, will far more
than outweigh the inconvenience, many of them
temporary, of the new system.
This system, at any rate, deserves a fair trial.
1t was not adopted without thorough considers
tion, and it is in the hands of experienced and
practical philanthropists, not sentimental theo-
rzers. They express confidence that the results
will be valuable, and the methods which the act
prescribes will generally be admitted to be
promising. 1t is not new or strange thing
that officials should prefer the old ways in which
they have been trained and distrust innova-
tons. As the report says
"Our county commissioners, sherifs, and
iailers, good men as they are, yet are very much
like the rest of mankind They naturally, rea.
sonably, dislike to be put to trouble and annoy
ance by new project, in the success of which
they have little confidence, and it ought to be
said that the objections they make arise not
from lack of interest in the prisoner or lack of
willingness to do anything that shall promise to
be for the prisoners highest welfare, but from
lack of faith in the plans of the commission.
they are unwilling TO have the old order Of
what, in their judgment, will accomplish nothing
of value