Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1881-11-28
8ailp &enntbsf Journal.
Augusta. Monday xorll.s, Nov. 2s.


Education and Crime.
The question whether education serves
to prevent crime Is of large importance
to every community. The general belief
appears to incline to the affirmative side
Of the question, but the other side has IFS
supporters. A pamphlet has just been
issued BY the Bureau o. Rducaaion. con-
tanning a report made by J. P. Wicker
sham L. l.. d.. for fifteen years the State
superintendent Of public instruction OF
Pennsylvania. and chairman Of the com
mittee appointed by the National Educa-
tional Association to investigate this sub
iect. Mr.. Wickersham seems to have
performed his task faithfully. and bis con-
illusions are strongly in favor OF the prop
osition that education prevents crime.
At the commencement of his labors he
examined the statistics Of the two peni-
tentiaries in Pennsylvania. The re-
suit of this investigation is told
in his own words as follows
1.-THE two Pennsylvania penitentaries in
1879 received 799 convicts, and Of these
ia were wholly illiterate; in 1880 they
received 722 convicts, Of whom Isl were
wholly illiterate in two years. l,52l con-
victs, with 265 illiterates. Thus there is
committed by illiterates more than one
sixth of all the crime in Pennsylvania for
which punishment is inflicted by incarcera-
ton in penitentiaries while the persons Of
this class of an age to be sent to the peniten-
tiary for crime do not constitute one
thirtieth Of the population. 1t appears.
therefore, that one-sixth Of the crime in
the State is committed by the illiterate
one-thirtieth part of the population. But
this Is not all. In addition to the litter
ates there were received at the two peni-
tentiaries. in 1879 and 1880. 272 convicts
who could barely read and write and had
no education beyond that point. If we
class these among the uneducated. as we
clearly have right to do. the number of
illiterates in the pententiaries would be
swelled to 537. and the astounding fact
would appear that more than one-third Of
all the penitentiary offences in the State
are committed by this small but unfor-
tunate class Of our people"
An examination into the reports of the
prisons and penitentiaries OF some twenty
States only served to repeat the story OF
the relation OF education to crime that the
prisons told. From these
he reached the following conclusions:
"G) That about one-sixth of all the
crime in the country is committed by per-
sons wholly illiterate.
(2) That about one-third of it is COM
mitted by persons practically illiterate.
(3) That the proportion of criminals
among the illiterate is about ten times as
great as among those who have been in
structed in the elements of common
school education or beyond"
These conclusions are strengthened by
statements from other distinguished inqui-
rers in the same field. who have found
the facts substantially rs above.
So much for our own country,
and when inquiry is made in foreign
the same conclusion fol-
lows investigation-that ignorance fos-
ters crime. that education tends to
decrease it. DIR. Wickersham says: :
"Of IA. O73 persons committed to prison
In 1872 in the British Islands. 1885 could
not read or write, 92.l26 could read or
read and write imperfectly. leaving only
1899 who could read and write well and
223 who had received superior educa-
lion. The number of women and girls
arrested and punished for crime in Lon
don in 1877 was POOLS. Of this number
4 FOG, or 81 per cent. could neither read
nor write; 1865, or 6S per cent, could
read only; 1000. or 10 per cent, could
read and write tolerably well; al or Z
per cent. could read and write WELL and
had received a higher education. A
late number Of the Journal des biblio-
theques populaires, Paris. contains table
Of criminal statistics embracing 63 OF the
81 departments Of France. From this
IL appears that. of3.354 pc rsons
arrested for crime. l.4S0 were unable to
read or write. 1862 could read and write
and only 5l2 could read and
write we'll. And DIR. Wines is authority
for stating that in Belgium one-half of the
prison population is wholly illiterate on
and in Holland one-thrd."
Tho writer notices and replies to the
opinions of Alison the historian and Buck
lie and Hurbert Spencer that education
does not prevent crime. He also notices
arguments to the same effect drawn from
the United States census of 1860. which
Is confessedly incorrect and unreliable
upon the matter. But we are not so much
in the opinions OF those persons.
eminent though they be, and pass on to
what DIR. Wickersham says Of the
resu1t produced in pennsvlvania