The mirror. (Stillwater, Minn.) 1894-1925, 1898-08-04


standard and improve the methods of
the work.
ADULT REFORMATORIES.
After juvenile reformatories had been
successfully maintained in the United
States for seventy years the idea dawn
ed that the age of sixteen years was
not necessarily the limit in this work,
but that the same reformatory methods
which had been successful with young
children might be efficacious with chill
dren of larger growth. Accordingly
there was established the Elmira Re-
formatory for young men between the
ages OF sixteen and twenty-five, i'm
prisoned for their first offense. The
methods and discipline were necessarily
more rigid for young men but the ami
mating principle was the same. The
experience at Elrlira proved the etfica-
cy of reformatory methods for prisoners
of this class and similar institutions
have been established in Massachusetts,
Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois,
Minnesota, Wisconsin and Kansas.
Legislative steps have been taken for
the establishment of similar institu-
tions in Connecticut and New Jersey.
Within the past ten years there has
been an extension of the reformatory
methods which have proved successful
in reformatories, to state prisons and
penitentiaries. Notable examples of
the endeavOrs in this direction are the
state prisons of Western Pennsylvania,
Ohio, Illinois and Minnesota.
The fundamental principles on which
the reformatory methods rest are the
following:
First.-The recognition of the posi-
bility of reformation. No criminal is
to be judged incapable of reclamation
until he has had fair chance. There
is no possibility of reclamation without
enlisting the voluntary cooperation of
the subject; obstacles may be removed;
weak wills may be strengthed; new
purposes may be awakened and may
be nourished and encouraged until they
become established; favorable envi-
ronment may be secured and main
tanned.
Second.-The adoption of scientific
methods. The purpose of the reforma-
tory must be reformation. Its entire
force must be concentrated upon that
one purpose. EXtraneOus and incon-
sistent elements must be eliminated.
To this end there must be: (a) a skilled
superintendent chosen for fitness, eX-
perience and conservation, and retained
during good behaviour. He must have
the power to select his subordinates
with sole regard for fitness, without
the interference Of political influences
or personal favoritism; (b) a board of
managers in thorough sympathy with
the reformatory idea, possessing large
powers and having the courage to ex.
ercise them regardless of political in.
tluences; (c) superintendents of instruc-
tion in the principles of religion and
ethics; in those departments of knowl-
edge which are essential to good citi-
zenship, and in such methods and
habits of industry as will afford the
means of an honest livelihood; (d) such
system of friendly oversight and
assistance to the prisoner after his dis
charge as shall foster his manliness and
independence, assisting him only so far
as may be necessary to save him from
absolute want; guarding him from
black mailers, informers and human
vultures who would destroy him and
shall leave him to himself at the earli-
est possible moment.
MACHINERY FOR REFORMATION.
The machinery for carrying out these
principles varies somewhat, though not
essentially, in the different states. 1t
consists in the following:
(a}. The indefnate or indeterminate
sentence, whereby the convict is sent to
prison not for fixed term of years but
for an indefinate time, usually with
maxium limit; the prison authorities
being authorized to release him before