The Birmingham age-herald., 1915-07-24


 ing said of the prisoners in this state, the convict lease system and prison re- form in general. that it is fitting to give the ideas of an authority.
 There is probably no more picturesque figure in prison work of the United States than Thomas Mott Osborne, the Warden Tom' of Sing Sing. The world is watch ing this man as he slowly puts into oper- ation his ideas concerning prison reform.
 He has felt all the hardship and degreda- tion of the prison and is trying to inspire Sing Sing healthy desire in the men to live decent life out in the world.
 Warden Tom Is not sailing smoothly without criticism, but in spite of this he is seeing the work progress and knows in the end he will be able to have brought about real reform at least at Sing Sing.
 In speaking of his work. Mr. Osborne says: Reform in our prison must come from the inside, must be formulated and worked out by the men themselves
 MT. Osborne says. We have coined for have allowed that word to come back and to dominate our thought and our reason ing in regard to the men who commit crime" We make the mistake In study ing the prisoner that naturalist would make if he wanted to write something about the habits of the polar bear and would go down and study polar bear wan dering around a tank in a menagerie. He might find that the polar bear had white fur. but he would not get very far be- yond that in studying the habits of the animal.
 "The fact of the matter is that so far as I myself personally am concerned, after a rather extensive criminal acquaint- ance both in and out of prison, I have reached the conclusion, satisfactory to myself, that there is no man in prison that isn't perfect natural product.
 T do not mean to say that he Is nor nal. Of course there are very few nor mal persons. Sometime ago I was read ing the introduction written by Bernard Shaw to play. in which MT. Shaw makes the statement that he is the only normal man there is, and he says that is the reas- on he is so remarkable.
 If you will make a careful examination of the men in prison you will find man after man who has gone through just this experience, and the stupid judges (there are some stupid judges) who condemn our men to prison will write articles for the newspapers In which they speak about these confirmed criminals that go from one institution to the other, the idea being that there is something criminally, funda- x&.xll whereas the fact of the matter is that he has been driven into being a criminal by the stupid treatment he has had, first in the orphan asylum, then in the chill drens institutions and then in the reform atories and finally in the states prisons. We have made him criminal.
 Perhaps you ask me how know that know it from talks I have had with these men and their description of the treatment they have received when they were in these reformatories and reform schools. l know it from my long ex- perience with the George Junior republic, for I was for 10 or 16 years president of it's board of trustees. I have seen chill dren who had had one term in reform school and who were just as vicious as any child who goes his way into state prison. I have seen those children, through the system of right education, which is the basis of the Junior Repub- lie, swing right around into the right path as surely as I have seen the chill dren of my friends swing into the right path. Sometimes I have seen the chill dren of my friends swing into the wrong path.
 Our prison system. from the orphan asylum through to the prison has been a gigantic failure. We might just as well face the fact first as last; in fact, we might much better face it first than to keep on any longer to the last.
 Let me tell you a few of the things I found in prison. Those who support the old prison system think they are bestow- ing a very opprobious epthet upon us who favor new system by saying that we are idealists that we are theorists that we are impractical.
 "On the lips of some men that word 1mpractical'' implies all that is bad in the world. Why. every living man and woman is theorist. You cannot help being a theorist
 We are all theorists. The only differ ence is that some people act upon the ories which are contrary to fact and others have good solid facts at the basis of their theories. The only differ ence between the supporters of the old prison system and those of us who de- mand new system is that our theory is right and their theory is wrong.
 Seriously, l have heard men gravely argue that it was painful thing that prison labor was so inefficient; that we ought all of us to do something to make prison labor more efficient; that we ought to study the subject. It never seemed to occur to the amiable gentle men that slave labor is always inefficient always has been and always will be.
 Now, if there Is any one thing that is more cruel and stupid than the system of