St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1890-09-21
SAINT PAUL.
IT CALLS TO HEAVEN.
The Disgrace of the Central Lock-
Up Is Municipal Stain.

The Disgrace of the Central Lock-
Up Is a Municipal Stain.
When a visitor to st. Paul who is con-
nected with the government of another
city asks to be shown the st. Paul ele-
plant. so to speak, he is generally pro-
vided with guide. The fire depart
ment is examined, and the foreigner
eXclaims Excellent, magnificent"
The new court house is inspected, and
again the visitor expresses his approval
in the one word Perfect" Then the
police force IS viewed, and the working
of the intricate system of patrol alarms
described. 'Well, it is great system
and first-class force" and the opinion
is again favorable. At last comes the
inevitable question sWhere is your city
jail?'' Then the guide, who has up to
that time had no cause to blush for the
city he represents, decreases three
inches in stature and looks ashamed,
as we'll he may. The way is led to the
disgraceful old shack at the corner of
Fifth and Washington streets, and the
man from abroad, who is after pointers
Oh municipal government, is given
glance at the row of cells in which men
and women are often confined for forty
eight hours at stretch. These filthy
holes in the wall, teeming with vermin
and foul smells. are an exhibit which
fails to strike the visitor favorably, for
Great God! You don't put hui
man beings in there, do you?'' Then,
having been assured that it is
rot ghoulish joke. but a ghostly fact
that this fever spot-this black hole of
Calcutta-is the city Jail of St.Paul. and
the only jail for the confinement of
prisoners for petty offenSeS, he forms
an opinion of the city government of
st. Paul which is sometimes expressed
in newspaper of the locality from
which he halls as per the following eX-
cerpt from an Omaha daily:
Il have seen the prisoners on the Siberian
frontier and noted the brutality of their
treatment, l have witnessed the scene on
the tween decks of a Cuban SLAYER. / have
seen horrible cruelty legaliZed by petty
power in more than one instance, but have
yet to see so thoroughly fiendish method
used to torture human beings as that in
vogue IN st. Paul, and applied to the unfort-
unates who happen TO fall into the hands of
police. l do not hesitate to say that the
central lookup in st. Paul is the foulest and
most loathsome place of the kind in Amer
lea"
This is but one expression of opinion
anent the state of affairs at the central
station. A night spent in one of those
awful cells with the rats and smaller
vermin, is enough to make hardened
criminal of the lightest offender. Often
it happens that man is brought in for
drunkenness. He is in many cases a
young fellow, respectfully connected,
we'll dressed and all that. His worst
fault is most likely that he has been in
discreet in getting too much of the rosy
aboard. Were be the blacklist criminal
in the record of crime he could not be
unintentiOnally treated with more sew
Gritty in being turned into cell II. Cell
IL is known to every professional drunk
and petty thief in this part of the
country, and one man wrote song
about it in which he described its terror
in 1.-THE expressive patoiS of the per-
fesh." Women are brought into the
station charged with all sorts of offenses.
Most of them are prostitutes, but some
are not. The same cells do duty for
women, and many miserable creature
has been taken from her burrow in the
morning with her eyes starting from
their sockets. her face deep-lined with
the frightful miSerieS of the night-the
next thing to an imbecile. A young girl
was put in one of these cells one night.
She was street walker. the officer said
who arrested her. and into a cell she
went. That child shrieked in such a
horrible manner that even the people at
the station thought there must be some
thing more than usual the matter. AT
last she was taken out, foaming at the
mouth, clawing wlldlyat the officers for
protection. For the love of Christi
she said, don't put me back in there; the
place is full of devils" Such instances
are all too frequent. The condition of the
place dignified by the name of jail
has been represented to those with
home the remedy lies again and again.
Chief of Police Clark has described its
condition and asked for decent quarters.
Mayor Smith has interested himself in
all effort to change the prevailing order
of things for better. The same Jail
still does duty, however. A man died
in cell there short time ago simply
because his means were mistaken for
drunken mutteringS. If the cells had
been so constructed that the man could
have been seen in passing by the jailor.
medical aid would have been secured
and that man would have been living
to-day. Surely there has been enough
of this sort of thing.