The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1903-09-12
BAILEY HAS DONE
Governor Will Issue Few If
ANY More Paroles.
Business to Be Turned Over to
Board and Warden.
HE LIKES THE PLAN.
Thinks That Parole System Is
Proper One.
Pathetic Letter from Marion
Asbell Is Received.
HE LIKES THE PLAN.

| Governor Biley will issue very few
more paroles. He may issue none at all.
On the first of October he will turn the
parole business entirely over to the
warden and board of directors of the
penitentiary under the provisions of the
indeterminate sentence law.
Il will not say that 1 will issue no
more paroles at ALL" said the governor
today, because some extreme case may
come to me for immediate action, but L
will issue none except in extreme cases.
L am a thorough believer in this pa
role business continued the governor.
1T works all right. believe every man
ought to be freed a year or two at least
before the expiration of his term-that
is, unless he is bad criminal beyond
reforming. The great majority of men
who go to the penitentiary, however,
are not criminals at heart, but they got
into bad company or something of the
sort, which landed them in the peni-
tentiary.
IF prisoner is paroled, say. two
years before the expiration of his max
imum sentence, the restraining influence
of the penitentiary is over him during
those two years. He knows that if he
gets drunk or gets into a row, or breaks
any of the conditions of the parole. he
will be taken back to the penitentiary
again. 1t has a good influence over him,
and it builds up his will power and de-
1 termination to become a good citizen.
/ He gets established in business or in
some employment so that by the time
| he is his own master it is probable that
| he will not be tempted to return TO his
old ways, whereas if he were thrown
from the prison right on to his own re-
sources, without the restraining infiu-
! ence of the prison about him, ne would
perhaps get into bad company and fab
again.
THE plan which will be adopted by
the penitentiary board in granting pa
roles will be the same as that in use in
/ Illinois. For instance, when the district
court sentences man to the peniten-
tiary it Will not fix any definite SEN
1 ternaine the degree of the crime for
which he is sent. The law prescribes a
minimum and maximum sentence for
that crime. That man cannot be pa
rolled until he has served the minimum
sentence After that he may be pa
rolled, but if he breaks the conditions of
the parole he may be brought back to
the prison at any time within the max
imum sentence
For instance. if a man is sentenced
for crime the minimum sentence for
which is five years, and the maximum
sentence is twenty-One years, he can
be parOled at the end of five years. if
his conduct while in the penitentiary is
up 10 the standard required by the
rules, but after he is Daroled he Will
! be amenable to the rules of his parole
/ for sixteen years longer, or until the
expiration of the maximum sentence.
About the first of next month I am
going to put in a day, either here or
at the penitentiarY, in going over with
the board the applications for paroles
which are now before me, and there
are a considerable number of them.
and then 1 will turn them over to the
board for action"
The hoard will have control over
the hang prisoners. those who have
been convicted of murder in the irst
degree and who are really in the peni-
tentiary for life. There is no minimum
sentences in their case, as the law pre-
scribes that they shall be hanged. The
governor will still have to pass upon
applications for psrdons for this class
of convicts. and they have been the
most treublesome class.
Governor Bailey today received a lea
ter from Marion Asbel, the alleged
pardon he turned down Friday. Asbell
evidently had not heard of the gov
ernor's action at the time he wrote the
letter. Accompanying it he sent
instances of where men had been
wrongly punished for years. and he
wished to impress upon the governor
that his case is Darellel He says in
part;
Dear Sir-Inasmuch as you have my
case under advisement. desire to write
you with other intent than to ex-
press to you the truth pure and simple
AS l sit here looking out through three
sets of iron grating into the pure free
air, J then wonder if the governor will
grasp the facts in my case as they
really exist. Then my heart drops into
despair with the thought / fear not
Be that it may, my prayers are that
God will be with you in coming to a
definite conclusion.
Governor Bailey, the facts in my
n on inn n
here in prison paying the penalty with
my precious life for a crime which L
never committed 1t is impossible for
the grave to open and the body come
forth and declare. neither is this a day
of miracles when the angles descend
upon the just. If it was you would
have been visited long ago and ] would
be in the arms of my friends in the
land of the free today. instead of oc-
caDying a Williams cell with a broken
heart and a shattered constitution. Two
years ago 1 weighed 216. now 100. My
health is failing me very fast. and the
fact that / am this side of the mad
house is more than ] can understand
under the circumstances. 1 have some
close, clean, conscientious friends, such
as c. NJ. Condor, J. w. Marley, Judge
Webb. Judge Hendricks. Judge Case,
Judge Glass, Judge McCue, and many
others. l have an old father that is as
dear to me as life. who has used every
honorable means known to the law in
my behalf, and yet his efforts are not
rewar6a--
"The prosecution IN my case set up
the theor-7 that the shot which killed
my wife came from a distance and left
no powder marks. To prove that
theory. one month after ] buried my
wife three doctors descended from
Parsons, Kas., posed as experts dug up
the body lifted it from q floating coffin
of water to look for powder marks
Two of them said in their judgment
there were no powder marks The
third one said he could not tell, and did