The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1872-01-28
The Principles and Work Of Prison
Reformers.

The Principles and Work Of Prison
While the subject of reform is now attract
ing very general attention, both from local
communities and legislative bodies, and no.
where more thoroughly than in our own city
and State, it was an excellent conception Of
the Prison Reform Association, on Friday
evening and yesterday, to get the friends Of
the criminal classes together in such numbers
as they did, and to call public attention to the
objects of their association as they have done.
We have been frequently amazed, not only at
the evident lack of sympathy, but the absolute
hostility Of the community to three particular
classes of criminals who must necessarily
dwell among us. They are drunkards, prosti-
tutes and State Prison convicts. We as q
people seem to look upon all such per-
sons as beyond the pale of our sympathy
or hope of their reformation Hence the pub
lie look upon them with dread and disgust
with scorn and contempt Or if we manifest
any kind of confidence in their promises Of
reform and better living we do it in such an
ungracious way as to create grave doubts in
the minds of the criminal classes in regard
to our sympathy with or sincerity in their
efforts. Hence, also, when any Of these
classes leave the prisons or penitentiaries
they are given 1.-The cold shoulder" by the
majority of us, and by none more readily than
by those who should, according to their pro-
fessions and faith, love the sinner while they
hate the sin. Hence have arisen our inebriate
associations and retreats, our Magdalene
asylums and midnight missions and the
Association for Prison Reform, whose proceed
ings we report in the HERALD yesterday
and to-day. The few must bear the burden
of the many, and as they have to work
against this community prejudice to which we
have referred, they are themselves sometimes
looked upon with contempt equal to that
shown toward the criminals for whose moral
and physical good they have organized.
We, the public, start out upon false
assumption, which was briefly but pithily
declared by Ex-Governor Seymour in his ad-
dress before the meeting on Friday evening.
"These men," said he, referring to State
Prison convicts, ''had no such genius in crime
that they could, of themselves, work out all
their baleful deeds if there had not been
state of morals and depraved public opinion
which gave hotbed growth to their powers
to work mischief. They did not make cor
ruption; corruption made them. They lived
and moved unknown and unnoticed until they
were made pestilential by favoring circum-
stances, just as the lurking diseases are made
wide-sweeping plaques when foul atmos-
phere develops their deadly poisons. We can
of crime in large and truthful way without
arraigning the public" Again: ''Crimes do
not show so clearly the character Of
the criminals as they do the social
aspect of the communities in which they
are committed" Never were truer words
uttered by any one, and we think the Gov
ernor very properly laid the blame where it
justly belongs-at the door Of the wealthy and
the intelligent classes, who so constantly for
get that wealth and business have powers and
duties devolving upon them as well as rights.
Hope, the great keynote of this Prison Asso-
citation, is, as Mr.. Seymour remarked, a great
reformer. II is that which lives longest and
dies hardest in every man. 1t is that which
has made worthy business men and honored
and honorable Christian men of many convict
in this and in other lands. 1t is that which
lifts man out of the slough of despond"
and sets him upon his feet, points him to the
celestial city, the bright future before him,
and, with cheering word and warm grasp,
bids him strike out boldly for himself. The
inspiration of such a hope is worth more to
any man, and especially to such men, than all
the gold of Ophir or the pearls of India, could
they be offered to them.
But the principle upon which our prison
discipline is carried out is, as it was aptly de-
clared, a disgrace to the Christian civilization
of the age It is the principle Of the wicked
servant condemned by the Saviour in one Of
His beautiful parallels, because he exacted
the very last farthing of the hundred pence
due him from fellow servant, notwithstand-
ing the common lord and master of both had
forgiven him a much larger debt. Society
acts on the assumption that man who COM
mits State Prison crime is necessarily
hardened criminal. 1t rarely or never stops
to inquire how often, If ever, he resisted the
temptation before he fell, and 1t never takes
into account his circumstances and surround
ings, which have oftentimes much more to do
with the commission of crime than any innate
desires which the criminal may cherish.
Hence the law shuts prisoners up in its
stone walls and iron cages, and seeks
by harsh treatment to obliterate every vestige
of his better manhood out of his nature; and
against this principle the Prison Reform As
ISOLATION is working with zeal and with some
degree Of success. But il needs the SYM
patty aud the encouragement of society and
the removal of this unchristian prejudice,