Sacramento daily record-union., 1881-11-12
THE CLASSIFICATION OF CRIME.

THE CLASSIFICATION OF CRIME.
A considerable percentage of the discus
sion about criminal reform is wide OF the
mark. for the reason that amateur penolo-
o;sts do not understand the elementary
facts of the subject. And one of the most
common mistakes and sources OF confusion
among them is the loose use Of the word
/" criminal" For the purposes of their
reasoning this word includes all who have
been convicted of any breach of law but
when reform is talked of the very first
thing to be ascertained is the mental and
moral condition of the people to be oper-
ated upon and the endeavor to ascertain
this at once develops the fact that there
are the broadest conceivable differences
between those who nevertheless may be
roughly Jumped together as +" felons." At
the outset one clear and sharp line of de-
marcation exhibits. itself. This separates
the class which has adopted the criminal
career from the class of what may be termed
impulsive Iaw-breakers. In the first of these
classes belong what are properly termed the
habitual criminals. These are the people
who for the most part have been educated
and bred to lawbreaking as business, and
for the reform of whom the severest dis
ciplinary and persuasive measures are none
too cogent. This class includes the ma
| jority of those who are convicted OF house,
breaking, robbery from the person, and
Iarcenies of various kinds, and it includes
persons of all ages and both sexes. 1t Is
upon this class that the most powerful re-
formatory agencies require to be employed,
for they are the professional offenders, and
they furnish the bulk of the convictions,
and of the cases of multiple punishment.
In the longest settled communities the per-
centage of this class in the prisons is the
largest. Thus in London the proportion
of professional criminals is much larger
than it is in California, while in this State
the percentage of what we have termed
crimes of impulse is larger than in Eng
land or the Atlantic States.
The class of impulsive criminals is very
difficult one to deal with. 1t embraces all
those who have been convicted of a single
crime, as for instance murder, manslaugh-
ter, assault TO murder, highway robbery,
embezzlement, forgery, rape, etc. 1t must
be observed that any of these crimes may
be committed by man who has led COM
paratively upright and blameless life up to
the time of his fall. 1t is true that in
some instances these crimes are the cul-
mination of profigate and immoral courses,
but they are not so necessarily. The EN-.
bezzler and the forger of course cannot
originally have been men of strong prin-
ciples, but it does not follow that they
underwent regular course of degradation,
and that their final perpetration of crime
marked the complete decentralization of
their characters. In great many cases
the crime has been the result of impulse.
It has not even been premeditated. Some
sudden occurrence suggests the act of i'm
morality, and the specious hope of repair
ing the wrong speedily smooths over the
offense at the instant of commission.
In many of these cases the moral
alteration may have been very brief.
The realization of the nature of the deed
may have been attained almost at
once, and remorse have supervened. To
class criminals of this kind with the
callous, case. hardened ones who have never
known the least conjunction about
crime. and who literally possess no moral
sensibility, is manifestly absurd and mis-
chievous, and it is equally irrational to ap-
ply to them the same reformatory agencies
as are exhibited in the other cases.
Again. take a great many cases of homi-
eide. These are committed by men who
may have had no criminal tendencies before
in their lives. The homicides are fire.
quently the result of momentary passion,
or of intoxication. In number of cases
there has been no desire to kill when the
fatal blow was delivered, but merely
passionate purpose to resent and punish
some affront or wrong. To say that man
who has committed what the law calls
murder or manslaughter under such cir
cumstances, is a criminal in the same sense
that the habitual thief or burglar is crim-
inal, is to abuse the term. 1t is evident
that there is scarcely any point of contact
between the cases, and that they require
to be treated quite differently. In the
case of the impulsive criminal it may
indeed be questioned whether the attempt
at systematic reform is not a mistake. In
such mans character there may be no
need of artificial props. His fault has
been his impulsiveness, which may arise
from an excess of vital energy. If he has
tbs commission of his own crime, and if
the commission of that crime does not
necessarily imply the degeneration OF
character, to what good purpose can he be
put through course of reform treatment!
If he is weak such line of treatment is
very apt to make a hypocrite of him. If
he is not weak it will have no effect at all,
save to annoy him.
AS the impulsive class of criminals pre-
dominates in our prisons, however, it is
clearly important that we should preface
any serious effort at the creation of re-
form system by separating this class from
the habitual criminals, and by determining
what ought to be done with it. And we think
it ought to be recognized that though So
ciety has no option in the premises, and
must punish law breakers without respect
of persons, yet there are offenders to whom
| imprisonment does unmixed harm, wholly
apart from any question of bad associa-
tions. 1t is to these persons degradation
and an intolerable burden. It is really
vastly in excess of the offense, as regards