Art. II.—INSPECTORS OF PRISONS.
Much of the efficiency and success of any system of prison discipline, depends on the characters and dispositions of those who occupy the post of Inspectors. As it is out of the question for the most judicious and vigilant inspectors to make a prison what it should be, while incompetent persons are employed to execute the discipline, so it is equally out of the question for the most energetic and thoroughly qualified officers to administer successfully the affairs of such an institution, so long as they are subject to the control of incompetent Inspectors. To secure the desired results, there must be marked confidence between these parties, and such a coincidence of opinion and counsel as shall give unity and strength to the administration.
In cases where the appointment of the principal officers of a prison is in the hands of the Inspectors, there is danger that the independence which is so essential to faithful and efficient action, will be put in jeopardy. It requires no ordinary degree of courage to pursue a measure which is likely to involve a sacrifice of one’s livelihood, and especially where no moral principle is concerned. It may happen, for instance, that some indulgences are allowed or winked at by the Inspectors, which are in violation of the discipline established by law. If the warden remonstrates against the practice, it may be at the risk of losing his place, and it is easy for him to persuade himself that the responsibility is on the Inspectors, whose servant he is, and that the most discreet course for him is to hold his peace and his place. But we think a wise Board of Inspectors would see to it, that the warden is put at his ease on that point, and that the utmost freedom is enjoyed by him, not as a matter of grace, but of right, in the utterance of all his suggestions and objections.
There is no uniformity in the several States, either as to the appointment of Inspectors or the relations they shall sustain to the public on one side, and to the prison and its inmates and resident officers on the other. In some States they are appointed by the Executive, in others by the Legislature. In some they are popularly elected, and in others (as in Pennsylvania)they are appointed by the judiciary. Our own impression is, that the appointing power of this class of officers is most properly lodged in the executive department of the government. It is, in its nature, analogous to other duties of this department. It is in the exercise of purely executive authority that the convict is committed, and it would seem fitting that this same power should exercise a suitable control over him, directly or by agents of its own appointment. If the Legislature has exercised its functions in the enactment of the law, with adequate penalties, and the Judiciary has past upon the guilt of a transgressor and fixed the measure of his punishment, one would think the remaining part of the work is peculiarly appropriate to the Executive.
There may be some advantages in giving the Inspectors the appointment of warden and other principal officers, but it is clear that we thereby lose an important check on both parties. There have been many instances of gross official misconduct by Inspectors of prisons, which would probably never have been revealed, had the appointing and removing power been lodged in their hands. It is obviously undesirable to place official parties in such a relation that each should be interested in concealing or palliating the neglects or misdeeds of the other. If each is made responsible to a third and superior power, the opportunity to practice collusion, as well as the temptation to it, is essentially diminished.
But leaving this question for future discussion if need be, we propose to set forth briefly a few considerations which should weigh in the selection of prison Inspectors, let who will appoint them: And
I. They should be men of unquestionedprobity. There is scarcely any public office which an ill-disposed incumbent may not prostitute to base or selfish purposes, if he is so disposed; and in the distribution of patronage, the execution of contracts and the furnishing of supplies, it would not be difficult for a prison Inspector to overstep at least the bounds of propriety. There have been not a few cases in which the official demeanor of such bodies or of individual members of them, has been made the subject of public investigation to the great discredit of those concerned, and to the manifest depravationof public morals. To put a man into such an office, whose character and standing are open to reproach, or even reasonable suspicion, is a gross dereliction of duty, and ought to subject the appointing power to severe animadversion. It should moreover be a provision in every law touching the appointment and duties of Inspectors, that they shall not be directly or indirectly concerned or interested in any contract or negotiation connected with the prison, from which any emolument can be derived; and the use of their official position for the purposes of self-aggrandizement or other sinister end, should be punished with exemplary severity.
II. Prison Inspectors should beintelligentmen. Not only should they be well-informed upon matters more immediately connected with their official duty, but they should have some general knowledge of the various methods of managing penal institutions. There are radical differences in the theories which prevail on this subject and in the systems founded on them. It would be very difficult for the Inspectors of a separate prison, for example, to administer its affairs discreetly and efficiently, if they were not familiar with the points in which it differs from all other prisons, with the dangers and deficiencies which have been ascribed to it, and with the methods of obviating these dangers and supplying these deficiencies, if they really appear. In the selection and distribution of occupations, and in adapting them to the habits, constitution and capacity of convicts, as well as in making the pursuit of these conducive at once to the welfare of the prisoner and to the legitimate ends of punishment, good judgment is required. The warden and other officers of the institution should see enough in their intercourse with the Inspectors to command their respect and confidence. True it is that in the minor details of prison economy, the warden and heads of departments may have most knowledge and tact, but in a comprehensive view of the principles of the institution, and of the most eligible methods of bringing them into efficient and harmonious development from day to day, the Inspectors should take the lead. The proper discipline of a prison population of three or four hundred men, combining employment, instruction, encouragement, subordination, economy, moral influence, and physical and mental improvement,with the privation and pain which constitute the penal element of the institution, is not a work for uninformed or narrow-minded men.
How often has a shrewd business man taken in charge the financial and economical interests of some of our prisons that have, year after year, made a fair report, and shown well to superficial observers, and exposed to public rebuke gross negligencies, if not outrageous frauds which the Inspectors—“good easy men,” had neither eyes to see nor ears to hear, nor capacity to understand? If we desire our prisons to answer the true ends of their organization, we must put them under the supervision of active, intelligent men, who have an opinion and responsibility of their own.
III. Prison Inspectors should behumanemen. Though the direct care and management of the convicts must of necessity be entrusted to the resident officers, the Inspectors, and not the resident officers, are the true representatives of the government in the administration of the discipline. In the character of those who are appointed to the immediate charge of the convicts, there should be a general guaranty that every office of humanity, that does not relax or neutralize the rigor of punishment, will be observed. It is not difficult for an officer of severe or violent temper to abuse a convict shamefully, and conceal the act from the ordinary observation of Inspectors. And hence no man of such temperament should be entrusted with the custody of prisoners. On the other hand, a weak and effeminate officer may become the tool or plaything of a convict, and lose all influence and authority over him. It is, moreover, possible that an officer—even the chief officer—of a prison may, by indolence and carelessness, inflict a negative wrong on prisoners, which is quite as intolerable and inexcusable as positive inhumanity.
A neglected prescription of the medical officer—a delay to attend to a reasonable request—a harsh repartee or an undeserved denial of confidence may be more cruel than thedoucheor the cat-o’-nine-tail—and yet how easily every thing of this character would escape the superficial observation of Inspectors, in their weekly circuit. Their humanity must not only be evinced in the discharge of their own duties, but it must promptthem to interpose every needful barrier to the positive and negative inhumanity of others. The power being all on one side, the utmost care will not always prevent its abuse.
IV. Prison Inspectors should behopefulmen. We need not disclaim all sympathy with those (if such there are) who take a demure look, a whining confession or a flippant utterance of religious phrases, as indications of reformed habits or reliable principles. No one who has been familiar with the course of this Journal, will suspect us of any undue leaning in that direction. But we are equally indisposed to fall in with the views of an opposite class, whose maxim is, “once a convict, always a convict,” and who instinctively distrust every profession of repentance, and of a desire to lead a different life.
We have known inspectors who, from long official intercourse with convicts, and familiar knowledge of their cunning and hypocrisy, seem to feel as if it is not safe to give heed for a moment to any thing they may say, or that may be said for them. Let them be approached in the most respectful manner, and by persons who can have no interest in misleading or deceiving them, and the moment the errand is found to be in behalf of a convict, they seem to regard the bearer of it as a little better than an accomplice, or, at least, a dupe.
It cannot be denied that well-meaning but credulous persons are oftentimes quite officious on such subjects, and through ignorance or indiscretion, are induced to urge upon Inspectors very injudicious measures. This annoyance must be borne by public functionaries as a part of the price of their “blushing honors,” and set off against the privileges and prerogatives of office. If a man is presumed to be innocent till he is proved guilty, why should not a guilty man be regarded as a hopeful subject of reforming influences, till he is proved incorrigible? What would be the condition of every member of the human family, if conviction of sin works a forfeiture of all claim to sympathy and confidence?
There is a wide difference between a seasonable encouragement of attempts to amend one’s life, and a blind confidence in professions and promises. A kind look or word at a propitious moment, in the progress of penal suffering, changes the whole influence of it. A frown or a repulse will freeze intoimpenetrable hardness a heart that might be melted into penitence by timely compassion and sympathy. If prisoners are treated with less tenderness by Inspectors than is shown to the wild beasts of a menagerie, we must expect them to resemble wild beasts in ferocity when they are let loose. The true light in which Inspectors should regard themselves is, as protectors of the public against danger from such a source. They are appointed to superintend a process by which the ferocious passions of a man may be subdued—his vicious inclinations changed and right moral feelings and habits implanted. If the highest and best object of penitentiary discipline is attained, he who is received under it as a tiger, is discharged from it as a lamb. The infrequency of such a transformation might not be so striking if Inspectors executed their functions in a proper spirit. Not only would their personal and official influence contribute more directly to this result, but the whole economy and discipline of the prison under their charge would take the same direction.
V. We have only to add, that nopoliticalinfluences or considerations should be allowed weight in the appointment of prison-inspectors. We need not say that this remark has no local application, though we have no doubt that it would receive the hearty concurrence even of those who may regard the avoidance of such influences as quite impracticable. Political parties live by power and patronage. Offices of honor or emolument are the bribes that tempt men into the strife for party-supremacy, and upon a due distribution of these depends its maintenance, when it has been attained. But there are some posts which involve labor rather than honor. The emoluments of them but poorly compensate for the pains and self-denials they impose, and the duties require qualifications so peculiar and so rare, that we cannot afford to restrict the field of selection to any party. It is difficult enough to fill them properly, “with the world before us where to choose,” but the difficulty is rendered almost insuperable when a large portion of the community, and possibly an actual majority, are excluded, as out of political caste.
The choice of Prison Inspectors and School Commissioners and overseers of education and reformation should uniformly fallon those who are, on the whole, best qualified to serve, irrespective of all political relations and considerations. If we must have a new set of officers introduced into our prisons, and a new set of teachers and text-books into our schools, whenever a revolution occurs in the position of political parties, neither our prisons nor our schools will prove to be of much value. When we can trace all the ignorance and all the crime of the community to the door of one political party, we may be disposed to charge on them the burden of taking care of dolts and rogues; but so long as both are common to all political parties, it seems more wise and equitable to draw from all the best skill in the greatest force they can yield to enlighten the one and punish or (if possible) extirpate the other.
VI. There is another negative qualification of prison Inspectors—not mentioned last because we esteem it of the least consideration—and that is the absence of all morbid and whimsical philosophy about theoriginof criminal acts. There are some people who may, with comparative harmlessness, indulge their fancy in framing theories to account for crime, without involving criminality. They may amuse themselves by analogies between the irregularities of the skull and the proclivities to particular crimes, or by tracing a disposition to larceny, robbery and murder to some physiological mal-formation, for which the offending party is no more responsible than for his stature or complexion. Or they may discover a process by which to lay the blame of all crime on society, and show to their own satisfaction that when a foul murder is committed, “Society” should be hung as the real offender, and not the poor wretch whom (as they would say) the “state of society” has betrayed into the commission of the deed!
This is not an imaginary supposition. Our own ears have heard a man of much repute for active philanthropy, and sharing quite generously in the confidence of the community, assert in an address to a large public assembly, concerning a woman who was then under sentence for the wilful murder of her child, that she was not the blame-worthy party—“She went,” he said, “from door to door, and sought work. All objected to employing her because she was incumbered with a child. Finding this incumbrance a bar to her success, she threw it into the Schuylkillriver, and who would blame her?” asked the popular orator. “Those who turned her from their doors are the guilty ones, and should now be where she is, and in her place suffer the extreme penalty of the law!”
Now, a prison Inspector needs to be free from all such fancies. He has nothing to do with the origin of crime or the blameworthiness of those who are under his inspection. All these points were settled before the convict came under his notice. All he has to do is to see that the sentence awarded by legal authority is duly executed. He has a share in the oversight of an institution established for that purpose, and his simple duty is to see to it, that the penal purpose of his confinement is fulfilled with due regard both to the dignity of the Commonwealth and the rights of the convict—for a convict has rights as well as a freeman—and the Inspectors stand between the parties, not to theorize or speculate, but to oversee the process of punishment, that it may be conformed in all respects to the provisions of law.