The Barre daily times. (Barre, Vt.) 1897-1959, 1919-03-14
PRISON REFORM AND
CHILD WELFARE TALKED
Dr.. Hastings H. Hart, Secretary of Rus
sell Sage Foundation, Addressed
Audience at State House
Last Evening.

DIR, Hastings H. Hart, secretary of the
Russell Sage Foundation of New York,
and recognized as one of the leading
authorities in the country on prison re-
form and child welfare, talked at the
Vermont legislature last evening on
these two subjects to an audience which
filed to capacity the reception room at
the State House. James b. Estee of
Montpelier presided, and preliminary re
marks were made by w. II. Jeffrey, state
probation officer, and Frank Tracy, sher.
lift Of Washington county.
Or, Hart praised the work of Sheriff
Tracy in instituting in Montpelier and
Washington county the plan of putting
the prisoners out 10 work, where work is
TO be Sound and thus making them pay
for their keep, with something to spare
for themselves. The speaker said that
Sheriff Tracy was a pioneer in this line
Of prison reform and that many other
states and districts were now copying
the Montpelier plan and that Sheriff
Tracy had already made name for him
self as an authority on prison reform
throughout the country.
Speaking of states prison at Windsor,
DR.. Hart said that the prison is very
well kept up and well managed Coming
directly from visit there, he pointed
out the defects and made the following
recommendations That the women
should be kept by themselves (the pres
ent system of keeping them being very
bad both for the women and the men !;
that a woman's reformatory should be
established and the further away from
the mems place of detention, the better
that this reformatory should not be in
the nature OF a prison, but simply a
farm, with cottages, where the women
could raise farm products and be self
supporting.
Dr. Hart attacked vigorously the con-
tract system under which the work of
the prisoners is let out to contractors,
He maintained that the firms which are
making these contracts are working the
state.
Every day you are forcing your pris-
oners to tell 1900 lies said Dr. Hart,
when you allow the shirts made by
your prisoners to 90 ont with the guar
antee that they are .made in Milwaukee.
As q remedy for this situation, the
speaker suggested that the state buy
four Ford trucks, carrying ten men each.
and transport the inmates of the prison
to such places in the nearby country
where labor might be needed, thus en-.
abling the farmers and others to get help
when they needed it and helping the
prisoners to earn somewhere near what
they are worth, rather than "disgracing
their manhood and keeping mp unfair
competition by allowing them to work in
these days for the sum Of 81 cents a
day"
DR.. Hart favored The consolidation
plan which is being worked out for the
states prison and the house of correc-
ton, urged the reconstruction of the
hospital at Windsor, and suggested that
the buildings now being used by the
house of correction at Rutland might be
handy as a branch of the home for the
feeble-minded
With reference to the problem of the
dependent child in Vermont, DIR. Hart
endorsed the action Just taken by the
various religious communions of the
state in asking that dependent children
hereafter be separated from delinquent
children in their care. He maintained
that dependent children should not be
sent to the industrial school at Yer
gennes, but should be taken care of in
some other way, preferably by the "plac-
ing" method, where good homes could be
found.
The speaker declared that Massachu-
sctts is every year sending her overflow
of dependent children into Vermont
homes to be cared for, and that there are
plenty of good homes in the state, which
should be used to take care of Vermont's
dependent children, before we tackle the
problems of Massachusetts,.
Legislative Notes.
A dinner was given at the Pavilion
hotel last evening by the members of the