Lancaster daily intelligencer. [volume] (Lancaster, Pa.) 1864-1928, 1882-01-03
The Prison Management.

great clues need purge. 4 N!o!eIlt
radical purge.
The Prison Management.
We print in full on our fourth page
to-day the communication which Prison
Keeper Burkholder sent to the prison in
spectors yesterday, and which was not
printed yesterday, only because it acci-
dentally failed to reach us until a very
late hour in the afternoon. There will be
some valid objections to the taste dis
played by the keeper in firing off such an
unprecedented message as this at the
board of direction of the institution
whose keeper he is, and it may fairly
be held that much Of what he
says bears just as severely against the
condition of things when the ring to
which Burkholder belongs controlled
the prison direction and elected subOrdi-
mates at variance with the keeper.
Now that the order is just reversed
Burkholder and his friends naturally are
more sensitive to the horn of the Bull
ring in their flesh. Even in this view of
case the communication, and the disre-
gard with which it will no doubt lie
treated throughout by the present ma
jority of the board, are useful to illus
trate the miserable system of admins
tration to which the prison must he sub.
ject SO long as the present plan of gov
crning it is continued. While men are
run for inspectors as a speculation on
the part of pOt-hOuse politicians and the
subordinate officers are changed yearly
to crafty the schemes and reward the
retainers of our political bosses, and
while the dOuble-headed government of
keeper and board of inspectors, with di-
vided responsibility and undistinguish-
able authority, is persisted in, there can
he no substantial reform in the manage
ment of the prison.
All these consideration aside, much
that the new prison keeper says about
conducting it is true, however often and
better it may have been said before. The
frequency of escapes, the irrespOnsibility
OF the underkeepers, the delay in the
subordinates elect taking their seats, the
amount of raw material and stock of
manufactured goods carried, the loose
ness in the purchase of supplies and the
transfer of goods on hand from one ad-
miniStratiOn to another, are sub
jects that call loudly for reform.
The people will stand by the prison
keeper if he makes Il sincere
effort to effect this. They will condemn
the board if they fail to cooperate with
him in securing it. And they will watch
both parties to see if they are working
for the public good or for buncombe.
For few men get into Office in this county
by the grace of either of the Republican
rings who do not need close watching.
WE would like to think we'll OF John
L. Jacobs, the Democratic nominee for
president of the New York Senate, be-
cause he is Lancaster county born, and
because in that trying time when he
was clamorously nominated for governor
OF New iork..by the frenzy of q conven-
tiOn let loose, he declined the temptation
with dignity. Ii Mr. Kelly has no other
objection to lin than his behavior on
that occasion, the refusal of the
Tammany senators to vote for
him is ineXcusable. But we sus-
pect that there is something wrong
with this Jacobs that he is, like his old
political namesake, something of Il de-
ceiver. The 81" which is hot against
Tammany is us hot against Jacobs
and loudly proclaims his unltness. 1t
seems that he has been one of the kind
of legislators who represent their pet
corporations better than the people. For
that sort of representatives the Demo
cracy have no use in New York or else
where, by the grace of Tammany or Til
denism.
FITZ JOHN PORTER receives a most