The Saint Paul globe., 1904-08-24
THE PRODUCT OF THE ENGLISH
PRISONS

1t is quite as inexcusable for ma
ton to assume permanently the Il am
better than thou attitude as for the
individual, but there is no reason why
a country should not occasionally per-
nit itself to derive an honest pleasure
from contrasting some one of its in
stitutions with a similar but some
what inferior one belonging to an
other nation. The eX-convict who has
written dispassionately of English
prisons for the current National Re
view gives Uncle Sam an opportunity
to pat himself on the back for the su-
perior management of the majority of
his penal institutions when compared
with those of England. Over here the
prison problem has not been solved, Of
course, but at least the country is
working toward solution something
which cannot be claimed for England
of view.
The writer's general coptention is
that the English prison system is alto
gether punitive, and this chiefly be-
cause the English public has not yet
made up it's mind whether the system
should also be partly reformatory.
But he has no doubt in his own mind
as to what the object of tthe,Ssystem
should be. "The ideal system, he
says, would be one which, while
sternly furnishing the prisoner for his
crime, not in yindictive spirit, but
as deterrent to- others scommfttfng
similar offenses; would zats the same
time attempt seriously ana earnestly
the improvement of the prisoners
moral fiber, the development of his
intellect, and make some endeayef to
fit him physically and mentally zen@ his
return to the world to cope with and
solve the problem which win stare
him in the face the moment he passes
the prison gate on diseharge-the
problem of existence" He adds that
the English prison system fails in
every one Of these points,; that any
man sentenced to even a short term
of penal servitude comes out Of prison
a mental and physical wreck.
A lack of regular employment, food
not of the quality to nourish and the
absence of anything like the parole
system, for instance, employed in
some of the prisons here, that might
inspire hope in the prisoner, appear to
be the chief defects of the English
prison system. The ex-conviet de-
clares that the professional criminal is
a prison product and to defects in the
system he also attributes the fact that
one hundred and twenty out. of seven
hundred and fifty convicts in the
Parkhurst convict prison are insane
and that the Broadmoor criminal
lunatic asylum is crowded with con-
victs.
In this country there are state pris-
ons that are en- par with those in
England, but there are many others so
intelligently humane in their govern
ment that their work is largely re-
formatory. Moreover, there is en-
hghtened progress in this country IN
the administration of all corrective eid-
stitutions. England, on the contrary,
seems not yet to have grasped the sig
nificanee of the problem which con-
fronts her in the government Of con-
vict prisons. Perhaps she needs an
other Dickens to arouse her to an APP
probation of the ill effects that 44aEe
resulting from her method of dealing
with the criminal class.
OF course a great deal depends on
how his grace of Canterbury acts
when Bishop Potter shows him ehis