St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1889-04-09
PRISON LABOR.

Without quorum present the house
attempted to discuss yesterday the vital
question of convict labor. Like the
Australian system election bill. and
with the exception of few members,
no one was prepared to discuss the sub
Ject intelligently, although it involves
more money than any other state plant
now in existence.
Mr.. Willrich, without question, drew
his bill providing for the immediate
adoption of the estate account SYSTEM"
after hard study of the delicate problem
presented him. He was certainly Gin
doing SOY in harmony with the pro-
greSSive reformatOry spirit of the day.
Illinois and Ohio have adoptedit. Penn
sylvania is in line with them, and for
the last five years contract convict labor
has grown in disfavor. In Minnesota,
the corruption and fraud connected with
Its short regime certainly made it an
object of public distrust.
~
But Mr.. Willrich'S bill possesses the
one grave error of plunging the state
into this new and untried system at
once. AS a critic of the measure OBJ
served: "When the state under his
plan has wantoned with the thing for
two years, it will be 100000 wiser" 1t
appears to be hasty and unwise push
ing of the state into bramble bush,
where all that will be accomplished
will be the loss of it's eyes. And they
are eyes that cannot be scratched in
again.
The legislature of 1887 in no uncertain
IL q
prison inspectors to employ the con-
victs on the state account system as an
experiment, and $4,000 was appropri-
ated for the purpose. The idea of this
was to accumulate sufficient data upon
which the Legislature of 1889 could base
a substitute system for the contract one
abolished. The writer remembers how
we'll it was stated in the house two
years ago that this was the intent of
the bill passed. But for reasons best
known to themselves the prison in
spectors evaded this law, carried none
of it's provisions into effect, and the
present legislature finds itself sans
data and no nearer a solution of the
question than the body preceding it.
r.
The house handled the prison in
spectors without gloves yesterday. They
we're condemned tor their arrogant
action and deliberate diSobedience of a
statutory provision. 1t was shown how,
through their neglect, the convicts at
Saltwater had lain idle, and mentally
apd physically rotted. All this time
5000 lay in the state treasury subject
to the call of the inspectors and for eX-
perimental labor for the prisoners.
-
1t is for the lack Of this data to war
rant the success of the state account
system that the Willrich bill met with
the opposition it did. The Keyes bill
providing for series of legitimate ex-
pertinent with three labor systems for
two years was recommended to pass.
What might be better than this (if pos
sible) would be the enforced resigna-
ton of the present board of inspectors,
the appointment of new board which
will obey the laws. and then the addi-
ton by the legislature of $4,000 to the
sum given two years ago, for them to
try any legitimate labor system for the
next two years. By 1890 the next legis-
lature would be we'll Informed enough
to pass practical and humane law.
The present inspectors are so welded
to the contract system (see their report)
as to make unbiased action upon their
part impossible