The record-union., 1893-09-20
PRISON LABOR ON ROADS.

'The greatest thing for good roads is
to put prison labor on them." says the
Colusa Sun. Not by good deal. Not at
all. Free labor has the right to work
upon the public roads. 1t should not be
part of our prison system that the con-
fined should be taken off the prison
work upon the roads, is off Of the cloth of
the disgraceful Southern system with its
prison pens, and its cruelties and jobbery.
To work convicts on the roads would as
surely as the sun shines breed corruption,
jobbery and all manner of chicane. 1t
would involve heavy cost for transporta-
ton, extra guards, prison camps, task
masters and political thimblerigging in
the furnishing and dispensation of sup
plies and the like.
But above all that it would be robbing
free labor of its right to earn an honest
living, with the State. the county or the
road district as paymaster. Says the SuRs
laboring man should object to it any more
than to the introduction of machinery.
If county can afford to pay one hundred
thousand dollars for roads, give it to
prison labor and let it build two hundred
thousand dollars worth" Herein lies the
fallacy that prison labor, involuntary
1oI &c 1ohn hot
can accomplish as much in the same time;
that because there is no wage paid there
fore it is all clear gain. on the contrary,
the cost of supplies must be taken out and
paid to the State. So, too, the extra cost
for guards and transportation and equip
ment.
cannot be worked to so good advantage;
that willing labor, as every employer
knows, is far and away the more eco
nomic, and it will be found that convict
work is not at all cheaper than free labor.
Besides this, it is the poorest policy in
the world to bring the convict much into
prison is had, first, to protect society
from the assault of the vicious; second,
to deter the criminal from the course he
has chosen; third, to reform him to the
extent that he may be taught that he can
restrain his passions and can live without
indulgence, and that the State does not
IL
Precisely for that reason. reformation,
the parole system was set up; precisely
because reformation is the chief end of
Imprisonment was the system of rewards
and credits introduced; precisely for that
reason is sequestration of the person of
the criminal resolved upon, that he may
realize more fully the privileges of lib
erty and communion with his fellow
men.
To put the convict upon the highway is
to bring him into contact with the world
and cut away more than two-thirds of the
confinement that is essential to his
reformation. The very fact that convict
is one of the strongest reasons to be ad-
vanced against it. We want to encour-
age all labor to be productive. Give road
building to willing, weli-rewarded labor,
and we will get not only better jobs, but
we will encourage labor to become pro-
ductive, and to view rural life more
kindly.
By disbursing the money of the county
purse among the willing workers of the
county, every one of whom, directly or
indirectly is taxed to keep the convict,
is to increase money circulation, and con-
serve all industrial activity. The laborer
on the county roads buys his supplies at
retail of the grocer, and butcher. and
baker, and merchant, without the inter-
Yenlion of the middle man, that the State
becomes if conyicts are worked.
To tax labor to support the convict, and
then deprive labor of means of employ
ment by using this dependent instru-
ment, is to do labor grave injustice.
Within the prison walls the convict
ought to be employed-frst, as means
of discipline; second, to compel him to
contribute in part at least to his own sup
port. Labor in and labor out of prison
by convicts are not parallels, and that
which supports the one will not maintain
the other. Convict labor on the roads
will simply make more convicts.
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