Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1905-09-06

practical use in many of our modern penal
institutions And just so long as the seAte
rents, contracts or leases its convicts to prl-
vate contractors inhuman systems OF pun
ishment will prevail in order that the I'M
willing slaves of the law may be forced to
work the full quota of hours demanded by
their taSkmaSterS.
In part responsibility for the extreme
cruelty that today marks nearly every
method of prison punishment is the fact
that there is hardly a state in the Union
where prison authorities are selected be-
cause of any particular fitness they them
selves possess for the work, or because OF
any knowledge they may have of prison
methods. The sole essential requisite for
appointment to a position of authority In a
penal institution depends in most cases on
the ability of the candidate to deliver votes
on election day
What influence has he got?" How many
votes does he control?'' These are the
questions that those who hold the appoin-
tive power always ask.
But even more vicious than these evils,
which affect only individuals of certain
class is the final one of which / am to
write, which affects every industry and
every American working man-open compe-
tition with unpaid, slave-driven convict
labor which has been forced upon wage
earners in nearly every art and trade given
to free men to earn livelihood.
In every city in America these cheaply
made products of prison labor are to be
found on sale in the stores and shops in
competition with the products of free indus
try. Shirts, collars, shoes, furniture, hollow
ware broOms, cigars, baby carriages and q
variety OF other products. made by prison
labor, are sold today In Boston in the shops
OF the small retailers and In the big depart
ment stores. These self-same products you
will find in every city in the country. The
public that buys such goods never realizes
their prison origin and the dealers who put
them on the market guard the secret of
their ability to undersell all competitors as
q uyh m ri lac
from Paris or moonshiners who make corn
whisky in Kentucky.
1t shall be my purpose In whatever
shall have to say about the employment Of
prisoners not only to show that 1t is wrong
to allow men who have been committed to
penal institutions by the laws of the land
to be put into treadmills of industry for
the profit of influential contractors and dis
honest prison officials, but to prove that 1t
Is a violation of the right of every Amer
lean citizen to force free and honorable
labor to compete In the open market with
that of convicts, and to endure loss OF work
and lower wages because of the prison.
made products that now flood our cities.
There are five systems of employing con-
victs In vogue In the United States today
the lease the contract, the piece price plan
New York system.
1.-The lease system 1 found best exempli-
fled in the state of Georgia. There, as in
Alabama, Florida and louisiana where
this system is most generally employed. the
convicts are hired out to an individual or
firm for specified time for a given sum
of money. The lessee assumes all control
of the convict. He feeds, clothes and shell
tiers the prisoners he has leased. and is also
supposed to maintain all discipline. Thus
the convict Is completely removed from the
authority of the state"
Reports from the Pittsburg district are
to the effect that more than 5000 men have
been made idle in the railway mines be-
,xF tka
to get cars to ship the product. This diff
Guilty has been encountered during the last
six months. and, according to officials of
the miners, has been growing steadily
worse in the last thirty days.
The Industrial Workers Of the World, as