The Wheeling daily register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1864-1878, 1878-04-12

after his pro.rscted confinement, the
probabilities are tha. it will be but 4
short time until you will have the pleas
ure Of paying Tor smother prosecution and
term oflmprisonmeut.
/ Let Us take another view Of the mat.
ter. Suppose We have 80 convicts in
the peIitentisry, who are all kept en-
/ p.oyed a. yariCu; occupations and trades.
/ Now suppose they are a.. psrtoned out
! by the Governor and they al go to work
as soon as they sre released at the same
trades or employment they were engaged
St in the prison? Wouldn't this $50 men
"ntertere" just as much with
the lsboring class ss they did
when in the prison? or suppose they had
never been convicted at al, would't
there be the same grounds for complaint,
viz: that there are Just $50 working men
too many, and if they are furnished by
the tax payers with clothing, boarding
and lodging then the balance of US can
ge. along first rate. 1t seems TO me that
the one position is equally tensble with
the other, and that there has been less
argument produced 10 show why these
people should be kept here in idIeress, at
II heavy expense TO the already over bur
dened tax payers of the S.ste, than IN any
question l ever heard publicly discussed.
We have now population Of forty
million people in the United States and
about 10000 conyiCts, not more than one
half Of whom are kept employed, or
about one convict st work to every four
thousand inhabitants. The ides that
this smsll percentage could interfere to
any conceivable extent with the working
men Of the country appears to me pre-
posterous.
There are other causes Of much greater
magnitude which are doing their part in
depriying thousands of our laborlng men
out OF employment. One Of these is tie
grest variety OF modern inventions in the
way of improved machinery, by which
one man or woman is enabled TO DO the
same amount OF work in given time
that twenty or thirty would do in the
old way. Another cause is the financial
coalition Of our country. 1t appears
that the entire financial machinery is
of our statesmen are unable TO devise any
means to repair It. And again there
appears to be an "irrepressibIe conflict"
between capital and labor, and our lead
ing politicians all seem TO be lending
their aid TO the side of capital.
MillionaIres are becoming too humorous,
in our Government, and their influence
to-day is ruling our Government.
The money Of our country is getting
in the hands o! the few, to the detr!ment
of the many.
Twenty years ago, millionaires were
almost unknown in the United States. to-
day the are numbered by the hundreds.
1 have read quite q number OF articles
in different papers on the subject OF
convict labor, but none of them seem to
propose any very decided improvement
upon the cOntrac. system. Besides, tho
Legislature at its las. session passed an
act requiring the Board Of Directors TO
lease out the labor inside the prison walls
to contractors. OF course this act would .
have to be repealed before the Board of
Public Works or Directors could DO any
thing towards stopping the leasing Of |
the convicts TO contractors, or csnceling |
the contracts now existing. And. con- |
siderng the fact that outside of the Pan |
Handle, the manufacturing interest is so
irsigniicantly small there is not, in my |
opinion the leas. probability OF the Leg |
islature doing any thing of the kind.
There Is only one Of two things that |
can be done in our State. One Is to lease |
out TO contractors, the conviets, to be |
worked inside the prison walls, and the !
other is to keep them locked up in their
cells idle, and tax the people to support
them. As 1t is impossible for the State
to carry on any kind of manufacturing
interests, without a very large spproprIa-
tion of money, this is a thing we all know
the Legislature will not DO.
Mr. Weaver, one of the contractors
who run the whip factory here and only
work fifty men, informs me that they
employ a capital cf from $4,000 to $4O,-
600, 50 it is pIsln that it would require, in
order to work al the prisoners now here,
at an advantage, at least $lOO0OOl |
Is it likely that such an appropriation
can secured next winter2
MT. Editor, l nave merely gwen you,
in feeble manner, my opinion upon
this subject, which can, and will, | sup
pose, be taken for just what 1t is worth.
If l were TO consult my own individual
interest in this matter, | would be in
favor Of stopping the working Of all con-
vcts at once, and keeping them locked
up in their cells, as by so doing they
would give much less trouble to the Off
GERS Of the institution but the question
is, how would it shec. the interest of the
State at large? Yours, b.