Sir Evelyn Ruggles-Brise

“ It was the immortal Howard who first stirred public opinion in England to consider the question of prison reform. As Burke finely said of him "He surveyed all Europe, not to view the sumptuousness of palaces, but to survey the mansions of sorrow and of pain: to collect the distresses of men in all countries. The plan was original, and full of genius as of humanity. ”

“ Because it is a more inspiring and a nobler task to reform a man by punishment, than to use punishment merely as the means of retribution by exacting from him the expiation of his offence by a dull, soulless, and a monotonous servitude, public sentiment, in all its zeal for the rehabilitation of the offender, is apt to overlook the primary and fundamental purpose of punishment, which, say what we will, must remain in its essence retributory and deterrent. ”

“ We find 'Imprisonment' formally installed for the execution of offences against the law in the French Code of 1791. At this time Mirabeau is said to have anticipated modern penitentiary science by publishing a remarkable report, declaring Prisons to be 'maisons d'amélioration,' founded on the principle of labour, separation, rewards under a 'mark' system, conditional licence, and aid-on-discharge. We seem to be reading a modern treatise on Prisons—a sudden gleam of light, bursting on an age darkened by the shadow of much unutterable cruelty in the punishment of crime. ”

“ Those who declaim against the 'law of silence,' in the same breath denounce the prison régime as a 'manufactory of criminals,' or as a 'nursery of crime.' In what way could criminals be better manufactured than by allowing a free intercourse, where evil designs and plottings, both for mischief inside and concerted crime outside the prison, would be fostered and encouraged? ”

“ It is not given to every man and woman to be capable of combining discipline with kindness: to be at the same time firm and gentle, to be inexorable in securing obedience, while, at the same time, adapting tone and method to the infinite mentalities and moralities to be found in Prison. It is not an exaggeration to say that harshness and abuse of authority are as rare in English Prisons as instances and examples of kind and considerate treatment are abundant ”

“ Put consistently with the free authority and discretion of the Court, it ought to be possible to create a national system, for which the Lord Chancellor, or Secretary of State, as Chief of the Magistracy, would be responsible. I would not advise the imposition of any official system independently of the Courts, but only that the political heads of the Judiciary should take steps to satisfy themselves that Probation, as a system, is working efficiently at every criminal court in the country, before whom offenders of all ages, liable to the penalty of imprisonment, are brought. ”

“ Let us not forget the gentle and comforting influence of our Lady Visitors, and the thousands of forlorn and despairing women, young and old, who perhaps find, for the first time, the voice of sympathy and encouragement, which, like a ray of sunshine, lifts the gloom from off their souls. ”

“ They are laying bricks all the time, till the fatal day of liberation comes—fatal because the Borstal System depends essentially for its success upon the Aid-on-discharge which Aid Societies, individually and collectively, can and will render. If the crime in this country is going to be diminished, effort must be concentrated on the young. It must be seen that the piece of masonry which we have built up does not fall to pieces, like an Egyptian mummy, immediately it comes into contact with the outer air of liberty. But the best-conceived regulations will not, by themselves, effect much. ”

“ While firmly maintaining the system of human rights unimpaired, and while not failing in the protection of the State from any attack made on that system by persons, individually or collectively, let us exhaust every means for saving the potential offender from succumbing inevitably, in the absence of prophylactic methods, to the temptations to commit anti-social acts, which from causes mental, physical, or social he is unable to resist. ”

“ Many cruelties have been enacted in the past in the name of prison discipline—solitude, darkness, chains, floggings, tread wheels and cranks, even until a comparatively recent period, were regarded as the essential accessories of punishment. In studying the history of punishment, we cannot fail to be struck by the singular inventiveness of the human mind in designing forms of suffering for those who broke the law—crucifixion, mutilation, stoning, drowning, torture. ”

“ Habituals were men who drop into crime from their surroundings or physical disability, or mental deficiency, rather than from any active intention to plunder their fellow creatures or from being criminals for the sake of crime. The professionals were the men with an object, sound in mind—so far as a criminal could be sound in mind—and in body, competent, often highly skilled, and who deliberately, with their eyes open, preferred a life of crime, and knew all the tricks and turns and manœuvres necessary for that life. ”

“ It is, in the abstract, an attempt to give expression by the executive dealing with crime, to the natural and scientific law that, up to the age of 21 (the age of civil majority for the ordinary affairs of life) , neither the human mind nor the human body is fully formed and developed, but is still plastic and receptive of good influences, skilfully and carefully applied. It is, in the concrete, a simple system of firm and exact discipline, tempered by an ascending scale of rewards and privileges which depend upon industry, conduct, and special merit. ”

“ It was not until the folly of unprofitable and cruel punishment had been illustrated, as in this country, by its failure to correct, or prevent, or until the certainty of punishment was recognized as the real deterrent for crime, that the penal system was rationalized, and by a slow process, due to a progressive widening of the circle of humanity, to what M. Tarde describes as "la propagation ambiante des exemples," the civilized races of the world laid down the sharp and cruel instruments by which alone it had been believed that society could be avenged, and justice secured. ”

“ He says, "I say it boldly: if the penitentiary system has no other purpose than reform, the lawgiver must abandon the system, not because it is not admirable, but because it is too rarely attained. The moral reform of the individual is a great thing for the religious man, but not for the statesman: a political institution does not exist for the individual, but for the mass. ”

“ So long as the Statute preserves the distinction between imprisonment with, or without, hard labour, it is necessary that the system should give effect to the distinction, but the meaning which has been so long associated with the phrase "hard labour" still lingers in the public mind, which even now is apt to imagine that a sentence of hard labour implies a long period of solitary confinement with employment throughout the sentence on hard monotonous forms of labour, such as cranks and treadwheels. ”

“ Side by side with the machinery of the public elementary school system, there must be agencies at work of which the high purpose is not only to secure that the defective child shall be treated in accordance with scientific method, and that the pauper child shall not have less favourable opportunity than his fellows, but that all classes of children after satisfying the standard of literacy ordained by the school authority, shall, during the period of adolescence, be subject to such influences as shall secure them, when they attain maturity, a fair chance in the competition of life. ”

“ In England and America, Probation: in France and Belgium, the 'sursis à l'exécution de la peine'—all mark the reluctance to resort to fixed penalties when Justice can be satisfied by other means. England, I believe, stands alone in its adoption of the system of Preventive Detention—one of the most notable reforms of recent years for dealing with the Habitual Criminal. The success of the system, so far as it has gone, goes far to justify belief in the virtue of Indetermination of sentence. ”

“ When Plato said that the object of punishment is to "make an offender good," he did not intentionally underestimate the 'retributory' theory of punishment. He only meant that, in the language of modern philosophy, [Pg 2] we must respect the reversionary rights of humanity, and while inflicting punishment for an anti-social act, must not lose sight of the duty of restoring, if possible, the offender to society as a better man or woman. As stated by the Committee of 1894, we must not regard him or her as "a hopeless and worthless element of the community." ”

“ In the United States of America, where science and humanity march hand-in-hand in exploring prisons and places of punishment, and in surveying the whole field of crime, we find that practical steps have been taken by the establishment of criminal laboratories, as at Chicago and Boston, to classify offenders, especially the young, according to the nature and degree of their mental capacity for distinguishing right from wrong. ”

“ The great War—terrible and hard school of experience though it has been—has given us the great object lesson of what new conditions of life, resulting notably from the control of the Liquor Trade and facility of employment, can effect. A century of legislation directed to the changes of the penal code, or the methods of punishment, would not effect what social legislation, induced by the War, and affecting the daily habit and living of the people, has revealed during the last five years,—the numbers coming to prison reduced 75 per cent! ”

“ Let us regard them as a College or University of persons of all ages, sexes, and dispositions, and let us not forget that this 'corpus' on which our reforming influences are to be brought to bear is, for the time being, not subject to all the impulses, stimuli, hopes, rewards and temptations to which persons in free life are subject. It was well and truly said by the Home Secretary (Mr. Churchill) in the House of Commons, in 1910, "the mood and temper of the public with regard to the treatment of crime and criminals is one of the most unfailing tests of the civilization of any country. ”

“ It must not be supposed that an Englishman, going to hear discussions on penal subjects in a foreign country, where the laws, habits, and character of the people are entirely different, is going to bring back new ideas of Prison administration, which he will be able at once to apply, with advantage, in his own country; nor must it be supposed that he is going to carry with him instructions and opinions on these matters which other nations will readily adopt. With a pardonable pride in his national institutions, he is disposed to think that his Prison system is the best in the world ”

“ Behind this highly organized method of care and supervision lies a great and a sincere humanity, which prevents the work degenerating, as is too often the case, into a hard and mechanical routine. The Borstal System, by itself, would not work wonders, nor by itself, eradicate the vicious or anti-social elements from the young criminal heart; but a system of strict control and discipline while under detention, followed up and supported by a real and effective system of "Patronage" on discharge, furnishes the secret of the considerable success that has been obtained. ”

“ If such co-operation could become general throughout the country, a new and formidable 'preventive' against many acts of petty and repeated lawlessness would be created, and there is little doubt that many persons of both sexes who hitherto have spent their lives in and out of Prison—the despair of the Courts, a source of perpetual trouble to Police, and of nuisance to their neighbours, would, on inquiry, and mental observation, be found to be 'irresponsibles', and proper subjects for medical care, rather than the grim severity of ceaseless and useless imprisonment. ”

“ It is on the assumption that punishment will have the effect of deterring from crime that its infliction can alone be justified, its proper and legitimate purpose being not to avenge crime but to prevent it. The experience of mankind has shown that though crime will always exist to a certain extent, it may be kept within given bounds by the example of punishment. This result it is the business of the lawgiver to accomplish by annexing to each offence the degree of punishment calculated to repress it. ”

“ The proposal to found a State, or Penal, Reformatory, confirmed and emphasized the opinion that had been rapidly gaining ground, both in England and abroad, and especially in the United States, that up to a certain age, every criminal may be regarded as potentially a good citizen: that his relapse into crime may be due either to physical degeneracy, or to bad social environment: that it is the duty of the State at least to try and effect a cure, and not to class the offender off-hand and without experiment with the adult professional criminal. ”

“ More than this would be a waste of so much human suffering; but to apply less out of consideration for the criminal is to sacrifice the interests of society to a misplaced tenderness towards those who offend against its laws. Wisdom and humanity, no doubt, alike suggest that if, consistently with this primary purpose, the reformation of the criminal can be brought about, no means should be omitted by which so desirable an end can be achieved. ”

“ In future years, it is hoped that it will not be a commonplace, as it is now, for many old offenders to attribute their downfall, and their persistence in a criminal career, to neglect during infancy and early youth, and to the absence of any controlling influence to save them during the initial years preceding maturity from acts of mischief, or of fraud, until Prison, as the automatic and unvarying penalty, destroyed in them the germs of hope and confidence, and self-respect, without which a foothold in honest life could with difficulty be regained. ”