The herald., 1894-12-19
7 /ICTIMS OR VAC RANTS?

original industry for the occupation OF
her dependents this would, In the ma
ture OF things, soon be wrested away.
So far ell schemes OF magnitude for
the profitable employment OF prisoners
have failed because they we're illogical
and shortsighted in that they considered
only this one condition, namely, that the
employment should be profitable to the
state and to tho prisoner, and left wholly
out of account the very active. aggres-
sive and jealous private citizen. who
holds the balance Of power and is ready
to veto any scheme that does not inure
to his benefit. No successful employ
ment OF this class OF labor will ever be
found that Is not directed toward the
betterment of the community whose
laws the criminal has broken and by
whose taxation he is sheltered and fed.
In California the solution of the whole
queatioE OF prison and pauper labor is
to be found in the making OF good roads.
Good roads are blessing and Q comfort
to any region. but they are peculiarly
desirable in California, where railroad
communication is ecant and imperfect.
and the product of mines and orchards
is often separated from market or smell
ter by marshes and forests and
mountain heights. There 10 nothing
which would 40 quicken the natural in
dustriea OF our state aB q system OF
broad. finely built highways; nothing
would 90 attract tne traveller and home
seeker; nothing would so swell the rev.
enues OF the state, Weneed more roads
than could be built by the employ ment
of free labor in thousand years. In
thia work there can be no injurious
competition, no degrading of any In.
duetry. do usurpation of an honest citi-
zen's rights. and to employ prison labor
for this end is to employ 1t for the best
good of the people.
If such a step 10 feasible In the utiliza-
tion of our prison labor II is even more
feasible and practicable in the cass OF
the hordes of men roaming the country
and trying to exc out q comfortable and
dignified existence through the industry
OF others. 1t is unnecessary to wait for
legislative action to set the ball
rolling. Let the supervisors of some
OF the southern counties, where
roads are not of the best,
and these gentlemen OF leisure are the
most plentiful. and their entertain ment
even more embarrassing than in the
north. initiate q new industrial era.
Inla Is che season when ROAD building
and road repairing can be pursued to
the greatest advantage, when even the
hard pan yields to we'll directed blow
of the pick. and top dressing of sand or
gravel applied to the adobe will "stiok."
This, too, is the season when the perma-
nent resident is too busy with plow and
spade to serve the common wealth.
Sound the tocsin of labor along the
green banks of the San Bernardino and
San Gabriel, through the Santa Ana val.
ley, and beneath the stately groves that
line the Santa Ynez. Call from their
alfalfa and barley couches those who
peacefully slumber along the irrigatipg
streams of tine Merced and in the levsls
ef Fresno. Extend to them the alterna-
live OF cheerfully swinging the pick and
welding the shovel for food and shelter
and fair wage or of sullenly plying
these weapons of toll at the muzzls OF a
Winchester at NO wage at all.