New-York tribune., 1872-03-26

"Committees in every State OF the Empire. that
the representation Of Germany may be COM
'"petc." M. Lanfa, Minister OF the Interior IN
Italy, entered heartily into the plan; the King
promptly issued decree naming Royal Com-
mission to examine into the questions offered by
modern pcnitentiary science and the condition OF
Italian prisons. The other European POWERS are
yet to be heard from. The commissioner
notices, as a curious fact that, OF all nations
applied to, Turkey has given the most cord'ai
welcome to the proposals and urges Its prep
arations for the Congress most zeai-
ously, the Turkish journals claiming that
no better opportunity could offer to show to
the world the exceptional advance which the
country has made of late in moral and intel
| lectual culture. mexico, Brazil, the Argen-
tine Republic, Chill, Colombia, and other
| South American States have decided to take
part in the Congress, and some of them have
"already named their Commissioners" Oar
own States are, Of course, expected 10
take large ard influential share in the
| deliberations.
| Now this Parliament of Humanity, as we
might call it, ia undoubtedly grand IN c0ncep-
| ton, and will be practically useful IN erect
especially in those counties where Prison or
Social Reform of any kind is novel, or, at
| best. a vague idea. Its reaction upon ourselves
will be proportionably slghter, as the teach
| ings of Christianity are already so well known
| to us as to have grown hackneyed. we DO
| not need to be told now that our erring fel-
| lOw-creature is bone of our bone and flesh OIL
| our flesh, and that from love to God, to our
| brother and regard for our safety, it behooyes
us to care for his soul as for our own. When
| he commits a crime, it is just that he should
| be kept apart, as diseased person,
| in a hospital, where he will not
infect Others and will have a chance for cure
There is the theory, so Christian and expedl-
emf that it goes without saying. The fact OF
our practice is that our penitentiaries, as
rule. are palaces, on the stone walls OF when
the States have squandered Millions and
where the sole object, as far as the convict IS
| concerned. is to force work enough out OF
him to pay for them. Our jails, houses of
refuge and correction, are usually simply hot
beds of crime, into which the idle, homeless
boy goes, to come out armed with every
knowledge and purpose of vice. In but two
States (New-York is not one OF them) Is
there any provision for aid, advice, or
oversight of the discharged convict when
he il thrown, banned and helpless, out into
the world. Every man knows that the great
fraction of the community withdrawn all over
the Icountry from active life into our prisons
and iails is a cankerous mass, whose cure and
restoration to healthy working condition
calls every day upon our humane and Christian
principles; yet so sluggish is the temper OF
the people about it that the work OF the So
cety for Prison Reform which has summoned
this Congress is scarcely known outside of the
scaboard cities; and we need go no further
than some of the marble prison palaces in
these very cities to find the rotten diet of the
prisoners inducing disease and death, and
murder by torture administered as discipline.
| 1t is very well to summon all the nations OF
the earth to hear our theories, but we might
better not invite them to look too closely
| into our practice.