The Birmingham age-herald., 1911-05-05
USE OF IRONS ON
 STREET WORKERS
Dr. Parke Says It Is Done
 To Save Money
SHOULD CONFESS IT
Man Who Can Pay Fine Is Allowed To Go While Penniless Must Work in ShackIes At
 30 Cents Day
o the Editor of The Ase-Herald:

To the Editor of The Age-Herald:
 When the petition of the Board of Health was presented to the commissions CTS, asking that shackles be removed from street workers, it was perfectly un- derstood that we were dealing with a so- biological question, not a sentimental one. Penology has long passed the sentimen- tai stage. It bases It's conclusions on the social consequences of certain communi- ty practices. That right penological thought coincdes with right sentiment is only natural
 We have commonly inherited the idea that we must make punishment so repul- sive and severe as to deter wrongdoers. Too frequently we are merely giving ex- presson to impressions received from our associations without weighing the evi- dence upon which these impressions rest.
 Are we not doing this very thing when we take the position that conditions must be made hard for the petty offenders, who now work our streets? The citizen who violates our police regulations and city laws and who has money enough to pay
 
 for whatever reason. cannot pay his fine, must work out his fine, not dollar for dol lar, but two dollars for one, and work under shameful and cruel conditions work with shackles which impede his movements and add to his burden and his shame. It resolves itself practically into claiming that if a citizen violates a city ordinance and has the money to pay his fine, he is taken back into citizenship. for the same offense, then he is crim- nal and must be treated with great se- verity so that others may be deterred from following in his footsteps. Let us have the courage to admit the truth, that we exploit these unfortunates for our community benefit that we work them with shackles because we want to save the expense free labor would entail; that we force them to work for us at 50 cents day; that we make real criminals of them and leave them anti-social and with feeling of resentment for the injustice done them
 True 1t is, that in Jefferson county many state convicts are turned loose after they have served their sentences, but if these men confne their operations to the minor infractions for which our city convicts are sentenced, they cannot constitute such a menace as represented and hence should not be held up as req sons why we should steel our hearts and cloud our judgment against these unfor- tunate petty offenders who now work for us in chains.
 Some may assert that the men who find themselves in our chaingangs do not mind it. Even though we would grant such monstrous assertion it would not alter the objection to the system. The bull fighter who exposes his life in the ring for the qualification of the populace, probably enjoys the task as a whole. The bull dog. pitted against the bear, ap- parently enjoys the fight immensely. The prize fighter certainly seems to enjoy the contest, but in weighing the sociologi- cal effect of all these practices this side Is not considered. What is considered is the effect on society and that is what we have to consider here in Birmingham as regards this city convict question. The sentimentalist who thinks of the bull and the bull fighter and the horses, is at one with the sociologst who reprobates bull fighting for the effect on society. The sentimentalist who thinks only of the poor devil dragging chains will be at one with the sociologist who sees the dis astrous effect on our people.
 Whatever other reasons may beS signed, every one knows that the real reason for continuing this miserable ex- ploitation of the weak is that we save money and that it would involve an ex penditure of some money to provide more civilized ways of meeting the problem.
 Every one recognizes that if we were raising money from lottery, as they did in Louisiana, and a protest were raised, the only excuse or paliation we could offer would be just what we are now asked to offer, that we cannot afford to be descent in the present state of our finances.
 If we continue to work our chained pet ty offenders, we will be forced to &C., knowledge, in action, either that we are indifferent to the consensus of opinion of the whole civilized world, and content to remain the bull, fighting. bear batting class, or that with all our boasting of great Birmingham we are so feeble that we cannot afford free labor.
 We believe that we now possess com misisoners whose competence is such that when the stress of duties permits of their Investigating this question on it's real merits, we will see the prompt removal of this blot on our city. In the meantime, those citizens who see the light might we'll send in postals or letters to our commissioners protesting, against present conditions. I am, very truly,
 THOS. D. PARKE, Chairman of the Committee of Health,
 Jefferson County Medical Society.
 Birmingham, May 4, 1911.