NOVEL PUNISHMENT.
When Mayor James L. Schaadt, of Allentown, Pa., began his office a year ago, new ideas were inaugurated for evildoers, and generally with good effect. When but a few days in office, a party of boys were brought before him on some trivial charge of disorder. The offence needed some punishment, and the parents were too poor to pay even a small fine. The Mayor learned the family shingle was still in use in the boys’ homes, and as the boys were too young to send to the station-house for a day or two, the Mayor sent the boys home with instructions that they should be soundly spanked by their parents as a punishment, and to report at court the next day whether their sentence had been carried out. The scheme worked well until some of the fathers refused to do it, then the Mayor did it himself until he tired of it, and finally it was required to be done in the court-room by the police officer; the plan has worked well and the number has greatly decreased.
On many prisoners fines are imposed, and he trusts them to be paid on instalments, and they never fail to satisfy the obligation. It acts as a deterrent to committing a like crime. Squads of tramps are put to work on the city streets without guard, and they very soon skip out of town, fearing re-arrest and a long sentence.