Southwest Washington labor press. [volume] (Hoquiam, Wash.) 19??-19??, 1925-08-28

and usually hopeless struggle e raise
bonds, the heart breaking effort TO
secure legal defense and court costs.
the crushing blow Of conviction, and
The weary struggle to take 10 life
hazaased b debts. pinchad BY poverty.
hleekened b shame. and robbed Of
the bread@winnef.
That the convict may Be innocent OF
guilty, that his crime was great or.
small, that others suffered from It,
that society may have q moral and
legal right to punish offenders, means
nothing TO the eonvict's family. Bread
for hungry mouths. shelter for shame
bowed heads. and clothing for poverty
pinched bodies are all that really mat
ter. The Judge sentences the law
breaker. elected officials enforce the
sentence, and the prison workshop
swallows up the convict No sane
person objects to the prisoner being
required to work, but every fair
minded person objects to having the
profit Of prison labor contractors and
corrupt politicians while their fami-
lies starve. More and more intelligent
people are beginning to ask why the
profits of convict labor should not 60
to the family of the convict rather
than to the few greedy, unscrupu-
lous grafters.
Every day worked in the prison
workshop earned, at non-union
wages, about Sc per day. was paid
l n to Sc per day, $1,000 for fourteen
months Of work, and actually earned
$500. The difference between the
wages earned and the pittance ] re-
ceived went into the pocket Of the
prison labor contractor. fortunately
my four children had a father who
could care for them, and they did not
suffer want. But had they been in
the condition Of the average eonvict's
children they would have been thrown
into the street. Perhaps my boys
might have been driven to crime and
my girl to prostitution, while the
prison labor contractor and choice
assortment Of politicians collected the
profits on; my labor. On my way TO
Frankfort, KY, to visit the prison
there | met a widow whose husband
had been killed in a coal mine, and
whose young son was serving pri-
son sentence for taking an automobile
from a garage where he worked
without the owners permission. saw
them together in the prison office,
and saw him bending over machine
making shirts. That evening ! talked
to the mother again and found that
sorrow and tragedy had taken their
toll of the woman's life, and there was
nothing left for her but suicide OF the
pOorhouse. But knew that the con-
tractor and his human leeches were
collecting for the boys foolish prank
at the rate of IS per day, and that the
mother was paying not only for her
boys transgression but for our sin
in permitting such conditions to exist.
In a little boarding house at Nc
Alester, Olrl., met woman whose
husband was serving a three year
sentence for selling 3 bale OF mort
gagged cotton. There were six chill
dren too small TO help run the tenant
farm, so they moved to the county
seat. The mother went out washing
and the children run wild. Two boys
were in the reform school, thirteen
year old girl was in the county home,
seriously infected with venereal dis
ease, and waiting to give birth to an
illegitimate child, and the other chill
dren were headed in the same direc-
ton. Oklahoma was rearing q crop
of criminals, prostitutes and defec-
tives, but the prison labor contractor
is collecting IS per day in profits on
the fathers labor. Great is the prison
shirt and wise the man who wears II.