The Richmond palladium and sun-telegram. [volume] (Richmond, Ind.) 1907-1939, 1914-02-16
Crime Against Criminals.


ago. Of all the words which he plowed into the
human mind none has been driven deeper than
His whitening condemnation of the TEX talonis.
We have heard that it has been said by them OF
old times, IAN eye for eye and toothe for 8
TOOTH" He said but l say unto you that We shall
love your neighbor yourself. But the civiliza
ton which calls itself by His name still hangs or
to that old savage doctrine When a man strikes
at civilization, it strikes back at him. When he
knocks out it's eye, it turns about and knocks out
his eye. When he hurts it, it turns around ano
claps him into prison and says, There, I'll make
you smart for that
Last year we had behind prison bars popu
lation of 10000 souls. This is sufficient tt
build city larger than Dayton, Ohio The brai1
energy and the physical energy there bottled ur
could build railroad across the continent, anc
the one sole reason these people were sealed up II
their living tomb that our civilization was
giving them IAN eye for an eye and a tooth fol-
TOOTH"
What is criminal? He is warped whee
which won't fit into the machine. He is mora
cripple who can't walk the chalk line His sense
of right and wrong, his instinct of loyalty to the
law have had their bones broken and he is nc
longer fit to stand alone.
Sometimes the criminal is simply an unsuc
may sit on the judges bench. We welcome his
fine home in community and marry off oul
daughters to his sons. He is cripple who has
concealed his infirmity. His brother cripple
who lets us see the limp in his gait sent off tt
the penitentiary.
And after get him into the penitentary
we make him more of criminal than ever. The
more crippled up he was morally to begin with
the more do we ourselves cripple him. Our pris
ons are absolute failures. They cause more crime
than they cure. Men who come from them are
than they were when they went in. The.
are the schools of crime.
The man who broke the law but did not pay
the penalty may rise to honor and respect, but
he who pays the price for his offense and is sup
posed to have wiped out the score is branded with
the most odiuos name that living man can bear
When he down the street one policeman
says to another "There's fellow we want tt
watch. He is an ex-convict. We must watch
him.
If khufu, the Egyptian Pharaoh who bull
The pyramid six thousand years ago. were sud
denly to return to this world, he would stare
open eyed and astonished at our school house anc
factories. He probably would faint with be-
Wllderment when street whizzed by or some
one called him over the telephone But we
into damp i-smeling prison and look upor
the striped convicts bottled up in its living tombs
he would rub his hands and grin This is some
thing like it. This makes me feel like home.
see you treat these fellows in the good old way ,
Our prisons fail, not because the men ar
made to suffer-that is not the point at all-bu
because nothing is done during their incarcera
ton to develop them into normal, useful men,
This counter to the whole Christian no
it was that the punishment to be visited on a,
unbrOtherly man must be for his sake and no
for the punishment's sake 1t must be remedia
and designed to help him rather than hurt him.
Perhaps a reason for this state of affair
which exists in penitentiary system as
whole there some shining exceptions) i
that the prisoners have had no voice Men il
graves cannot be heard very far. And the DO
tical henchmen who, as rule, have been place
in charge of the prisones as a matter of politica
favor have not been disposed to speak for then
There is but one remedy for the present con
1tion and that is to use the recognized scientifi
methods in dealing with the prisoner that we us
in dealing with other cripples. He is a warpe
Wheel He must be Strengthened out in order t
it in his place.
We use more science in cobbling an old sho
than do in mending these broken souls. w
demand that an undertaken be licensed scien
fist before he can prepare corpse for the grave
But the men who take charge of these living per
sons, who are given control of them after the
are no longer able to control themselves, are Jus
such persons, as rule, as one might meet any
where. They have fitness for their position