The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1875-03-07

tact that the immediate managers of such
institutions are generally coarse and vulgar
people, taken from the lower strata of politics;
partly in the fact that majority of the un-
fortunate inmates are supposed to have no
friends, and may, therefore. safely be kicked,
and partly in the fact that so many Of them
owe their misfortunes to their vices, that the
habit of dealing with vicious and repulsive
people has O tendency to harden the hearts
and deaden the sensibilities of keepers and
attendants. We tear there is little reason
to hope that this class Of abuses will ever
be remedied by official action. When John
Howard-one OF the brightest names on
the roll of philanthropy devoted his
life to mitigating the condition of prisoners,
he unveiled hideous state of facts, at
which the humane part of mankind recoiled
with inexrressible disgust and horror. 1t
was he that gave the first impulse to the eff
forts for amelorating the treatment of people
in such institutions; but great part of the
work still remains to be DONE The novelist
Dickens, whose pages are, perhaps, over
charged with meodramatlc sentimentalty,
opened new field tor reformers by his
graphic pictures of brutality in the English
almshouses, showing that the prison discipline
societies had only attacked one of two great
kindred evils. Institutions of so-called
charity harbor the same kind of abuses, and
for perfectly similar reasons that have always
prevailed in the management of prisons. So
large proportion of the inmates of both are
base, repulsive people, without protecting
friends to intercede for them, that habit is
naturally generated of treating the whole
class as if they were brutes, and their only
security against outrage must come from
phlanthropic organization outside the routine
of official management.
Profoundly impressed with this view, which
the whole history of the prison discipline
efforts and other similar movements since the
time Of Howard abundantly confirms, we ven-
ture to suggest to that part Of this great COM
munity who take an active interest in the un-
fortunate whether it is not Christian duty
to organize two voluntary associations, under
Legislative protection, for securing humane
treatment of people committed to the mercy
of our city institutions. One of these humane
associations should have especial relation to
the city police, and assume field of labor
similar to that of the Prison Discipline
Society, which is prosecuting so praiseworthy
a work in connection with the prisons, peni-
tentaries and jails of the State. Such an as
ISOLATION should be clothed by the Legislature
with full powers of inquiry INTO the action Of
the police in the streets and especially in
the station houses. Its supervisory inter-
est would operate as great restraint
on abuses, and by exposing them when
they occurred and bringing them in forcble
manner to the attention Of the public authori-
ties they would create wholesome fear in the
minds OF men who too easily give way to their
brutal and unbridled passions. We cannot
doubt that some of our first citizens would
consent to act in such an association, as
citizens of the State of the highest eminence
are members of the Prison Discipline Society.
should be organized on the same model, with
reference to the management Of our public
institutions Of charity. One Of its great ad-
vantages would be to convince the keepers Of
erful and influential friends who would look
after his treatment with as constant q vigi-
lance as is pracused by influential relatives in
the case of particular persons. We commend
these suggestions to the thoughtful considers
ton Of the benevolent