Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1908-03-10
WORK FOR PRISONERS
New York Pe!nitentiary System
Profitable to State.
LESS EXPENSE TO PUBLIC
Cost Of. Maintaining Convicts
Greatly Reduced.
SOME CONVINCING FIGURES
Comparison Of Conditions Prevailing
in4District Of Columbia and
Elsewhere.

In the course Of the agitation for i'm
provement in the lot of criminals neces-
sarily held in confinement in the District
OF Columbia much emphasis has been laid
upon the benefits which would follow
the installation of suitable methods OF
employment. Obviously the execution Of
this idea depends solely upon the con-
struction of a new penitentiary or jail
for the District. and hence any arguments
concerning the value Of employment as a
formative agent toward the regeneration
of as large a proportion of the prisoners
as possible becomes also an argument in
favor of the now much-discussed PROPOSE
ton to have a modern prison in this juris-
diction.
AS a means of shedding light upon all
phases of the situation which faces the
taxpayers of Washington probably no
agency could be more valuable than the
state commission Of prisons Of New York.
In 1906 there were only three commits
sioners. but a new law enacted by the
state legislature put these men out Of
power. and the report of 1907 was COM
piled by commission of seven members.
respective Of the personnel of the COM
missions. however. the results shown and
conclusions reached are probably Of equal
value as bearing upon the local situation,
and In that respect they may be treated
as emanating from one source.
:. Maintenance Of Prisoners.
The points in the reports which should
have particular weight as parallels upon
which the problems in the District of Co
Iumbia might be laid for solution are
those which deal with the per capita per
diem cost of maintaining prisoners in the
state prisons. where employment is pro-
Vlded for the men and women and with
the admittedly unsatisfactory methods of
maintaining other prisoners in the six
county jails or penftentiaries, which are
administered under, county control and
In which there are no means of employing
the inmates. In other words. the reports
OF the state commission Of prisons of
New York offers for the District Of Co.
lumbia an actual comparison of the work.
ing of a system exactly similar to that
which obtains In the District Jail, and
system in which every effort Is given to
exercising the bodies and minds of pris-
oners.
Dealing with the purely economic phase
OF the employment of prisoners, the re-
port shows that in the four great prisons
u,
burn prison for women. Clinton prison
and Sing Sing: the net earnings for. 1906
were $137.lO5.S 80 and in 1907 Sill, .05.
The prison population In the former year
was ;, 466 and in the latter 1852 so that
the per capita per diem earning capacity
of the inmates was shown to be a frac-
ton over 10 cents; but this figure did not
take into. account or credit the prison
laborers with the value Of garden prod
uce which their labors added to the lar
ders of the. big institutions. nor did It
credit them with the actual value OF their
work when expended in painting. car
pentering, wall building and other sim
liar industries. nor in cooking nor in any
OF the other countless duties included. in
the daily routine. ~
Cost to the State.
The reports do not show the length OF
the prison working day. so that a sum-
mary of the productivity of the convicts
cannot be carried out to it's last analysis
The Per capita per diem cost of n1aInte-
nance in the four institutions in the same
years was. respectively" 44s and 1896.
But this too, is subject to qualification,
because 1t takes into account the Au-
burn prison for women, where the main
tenance cost Is nearly double that of any
one Of the three institutions for men,
Both commissions agreed, in broadly
sweeping statements. that the convicts
by the actual marketable products Of
their labors were able to earn about one
fourth as much as 1t costs to maintain
them.
New York met and solved the convict
labor problem as presented by the trades
unions, and the products Of the big prison
workshops are nearly" all sold back to
the state at carefully graded scale of
prices, which also has the effect of re-
ducing. the showing of the earnings Of
hn yNrfc *
ing physical employment for the inmates,
the big, New York state prisons are also
equipped with schools in which close at
tentiOn ia given to the instruction Of il
literate or semi-illiterate convicts.
Each school is under the supervision of
paid officer, but many Of the assistant
teachers are drawn from the ranks Of the
convicts. The actual result has been to
reduce the absolute illiteracy to less than
one-half of i per cent and the report of
the commission in 1905 thus speaks Of the
methods followed in the work:
1.-The course of study is nearly identi-
cal with the usual grammar course In the
public schools, except that 1t Is divided
into twelve grades instead of eight, and
places the greatest emphasis upon reading
and writing, geography and history.
Arithmetic receives considerable atten-
ton. but is not regarded as of equal i'm
portance with the other subjects. Strong
and measurably successful effort is made
10 SuiOc the TcdUlHS IldtlSr the DrlS-
oners so that 1t will be help and stimu-
lus to their moral uplift. The classes are
given books to read from the prison IL.
brary. which tend to supplement their
school work and awaken their curiosity
Special effort is made to induce the pris-
oners to use their spare time in worthy
manner" f
County Jail System.
The six different county 1ails, or peni-
tentiaries as they. are styled in New
York, are almost Identical in the methods
of receiving and handling prisoners with
the Jail in the District of Columbia They
are utilized as places Of confinement for
short-term prisoners as we'll as for men
and women arrested by the city and state
officers, who are held awaiting action by
the grand jury, and afterward those who
are indicted are similarly confined in COM
pulsory association with convicts un.h
tried in court. The reports do not enter
into the cost of maintenance in these
penitentiaries, but the prison commits
sioners of 1906, In dealing with the moral
and economic phases of the jails, anu in
recommending legislation which would en-
able the state to purchase or otherwise
secure control of the county Institutions,
summarize the situation as follows:
Under the former system of working
convicts In the state, industries were es-