The enterprise. [volume] (Wellington, Ohio) 188?-1899, 1891-04-15


hammers and shoe lasts toreclaim these
people. Aye, we want more than SER
mons on the Sabbath day, Society must
impress these men with tie fact that 1t
does not enjoy their suffering, and that
it is attempting to reform and elevate
them. The majority Of criminals sup
pose that society has a grudge against
them, and they in turn have grudge
against society.
They are harder in heart and more
infuriate when they come out of jail
than when they went in. Many of the
people who go to prison go again and
again and again. Some years ago, Of
fifteen hundred prisoners, who, during
the year, had been in Sing Sing, four
hundred had been there before. In a
house of correction in the country,
where, during certain reach Of time,
there had been five thousand people,
more than three thousand had been
there before So, in one case the pris-
on, and in the other case the house OF
correction, left them just as bad as they
were before. The secretary Of one Of
the benevolent societies Of New York
saw lad fifteen years Of age who had
spent three years of his life in prison,
and he said to the lad, "What have they
done for you to make you better?'
"Well," replied the lad, "the first time
was brought up before the judge he
said, You ought to be ashamed of your
SELF And then l committed crime
again, and / was brought up before the
same Judge, and he said, You rascalp
And after while committed some
other crime, and was brought before
same Judge, and he said You ought to be
hanged That is all they done for him
In the way of reformation and saliva
ton. 90" you say, "these people are
incorrigible." ] suppose there are hun
dreds of persons this day lying in the
prison hunks who would leap at the
prospect of reformation, II society would
only allow them a way into decency and
respectability. co." you say, 81 have
no patience with these rogue5." l ask
you in reply, how much better would
you have been under the same circum-
stances? Suppose your mother had been
n blasphcmer and your father sot, and
you started life with a body stuffed with
evil proclivities, and you had spent
much of your time in n cellar amid
obscenities and cursing, and II at ten
years of age you had been compelled to
20 out and steal, battered and ban
daged at night if you came in without
any spoils, and suppose your early man.
hood and womanhool had been covered
with rags and filth. and decent society
had turned its back upon you, and left
You 10 consort with vagabonds and
wharfrats-how much better would you
have been? | have no sympathy with
that executive clemency which would
let crime run loose, or which would sit
in the gallery Of 4 court room weeping
because some hard-heartcd wretch is
brought to justice, but do say that the
safety and life Of the community de-
mand more potential influences in be-
half OF public offenders.
In some of the city prisons the air is
like that of the Blacl, Hole Of Calcutta.
have visited prisons.where, as the air
swept through the wicket, IL almost
knocked me down. No sunlight. Young
men who had committed their first crime
crowded In among old Offenders. saw
in one prison a woman, with n child al
most blind, who had been arrested foI
the crime of poverty, who was waiting
until the slow law could take herto the
almshouse. where she rightfully be.
longcd; but she was thrust in there with
her child amid the most abandoned
wretohes of the town. Many Of the of.
tenders in that prison sleeping on the
floor with nothing but a vermn-covered
blanket over them. Those people
crowded, and wan, and wasted and hall
suffocated and infuriated / said TO the
men, "How do you stand it herc?'
God knows" said one man, 1--WE have
TO stand IT," o, they will pay you
when they get out. Where they
burned down one house they will
burn three. They will strike deeper
the assassin's knife. They are this min.
ute plotting worse burgla les. Some OF
the city jails are the best places know
Of 10 manufacture foot-pads, vagabouds
and cut-throats. Yale college is not 50
well calculated to make scholars, nor
Harvard so we'll calculated to make
scientists, nor Princeton so well calcu-
lated TO make theologians, as many OF
our jails are calculated 70 make Grim
inals. All that those men do not know
Of crime after they have been in that
dungeon for some time, satanic ma
chination cannot teach them. In tho
insufferable stencil and sicltening sur
roundings of such places there Is moth
ing but disease for the body, idiocy for
the mind, and death for the soul. Stifled
air and vermin never turned thief into
an honest man.
We want men like John Howard and
Sir william Blackstone, and women like
Elizabeth Fry, 10 do for the prisons OF
the United States what those people did
in other days for the prisons of England.
thank God for what Isaac T.. Hopper
and Dr. Wines and Mr. Harris and
scores Of others have done in the way
Of prison reform, but we want some
thing more radical before will come the
blessing OF Him who said 81 was in
prison, and We came unto Me-"
Again, In your effort TO arrest this
plague Of crime you need TO consider
trustworthy officials. "Woe unto thee,
o land, when thy king is child and
thy princes drink in the morning" II
Is great calamity TO city when bad
men get into public authority. Why
was II that in New York there was such
unparalleled crime between 1866 and
1912 IL was because the judges Of
police in that city at that time, for the