The record-union., 1893-03-24
HISTORICAL ATTEMPTS UPON
THE PAROLE BILL.

Several of the leading papers of San
Francisco have manifested a great deal of
feeling over the parole bill, and three of
them have become absolutely hysterical
in their attempts to induce Governor
Markham to veto the Act.
The latest evidence of hysteria on this
subject is the statement editorially made
in two journals that the news of the pas
sage of the bill and the probability that
the Governor will sign it, has led the one
termers in the San Quentin Prison into
unruliness, so much so that discipline has
been broken down and the orderly char
acter of prison life disturbed to the great
distress of the prison officials.
We will not be so uncharitable as to
charge that these statements originated
in the Offices of the San Francisco papers.
But they are false and out of the whole
cloth lies, and the press giving them cur
rency has been grossly imposed upon by
some one. The statements reflect severely
upon the prison officials for one thing,
amounting to charges of incompetency.
But aside from that, the very conduct
said to have been unruly would close the
doors of the parole privilege to the con-
victs guilty of such insubordination.
The opponents of the bill run away
with the idea that the measure gives a
convict some privilege which he may
avail of at his pleasure-that is, that
whenever a one-termer, after serving a
year, chooses to walk out of the peniten-
tiary he may do so. If our San Francisco
contemporaries believed this to be so.
patience and charity in that direction
would be virtues. But they have the bill
before them and know that it does not
guarantee any such privilege.
Let US see precisely what the bill does
provide. In Section l that the Board of
Directors, the Warden and the Chaplain
or the Resident Physician shall consti-
tute the Board of Parole Commissioners.
In Section that they are to serve with
out salary, but to have actual expenses
while while serving as such board. In
Section 3 that the board shall meet at
least once in three months.
Section provides that when convict
has served the minimum time prescribed
by law for his ofense, or if there is none
prescribed, then when he has served one
year, or if he has served six months of a
minimum term, or if he has served ten
years of a life sentence, he may apply to
the board to be paroled. If, says Section
5, the board "belteUeS the applicant has
reformed" and that if released he will be
able to provide for himself and will obey
the law and conform to the rules the
board may prescribe for his guidance,
then the prisoner may be released.
But it is very clearly set out that while
on parole the convict is and remains in
legal custody and subject by order to be
taken and returned, and if the prisoner
leaves the State he is to be treated as an
escape. By Section the board is to
make rules and regulations, to which the
paroled man must conform his daily walk.
BY Section if the prisoner for violating
these regulations is retaken and incar-
cerated, his case is to be investigated and
he is not eligible to apply again under
six months.
The essential feature of the parole bill
is its reformatory and restraining infiu-
ence. The conditions precedent to its
operation is the belief of chosen body OF
men that the prisoner is moving in the
direction of reform, which is the chief
end and aim of nearly all imprisonment.
Paroling him under regulations will,
therefore, tend to strengthen him in ref.
ormation. 1t throws about him restraints
that are more powerful than prison rules
and stronger than bars and bolts. These
restraints keep him out of low resorts
away from vile company, the.saloon and
the gambling hells. They compel hin
TO be frugal, industrious, sober and law
abiding. When we discharge prisoner
bso1rralv we turn him loose without