PRESIDENT’S ADDRESS
Mr. Collins, after alluding briefly to the purposes and work of the Association, rehearsed the part his own State had taken in the development of plans for the scientific treatment of criminals. Having traced the successive steps in prison reform, in which he showed that New York State had taken the lead, he said:
“Public sentiment has always called for the education and training of the young. How much more important and of what inestimable value is the saving of the adult. Situated as we are here, at the gateway of the republic, we admit at Ellis Island more than a million new people each year. Vital statistics in New York City gave 59,000 births last year, only 11,000 of which were of American parentage. Austria, Russia and Italy each sent us 200,000 immigrants last year. What is more natural than that many of them, wholly unacquainted with our country, our language and our laws, should in their first effort at living in the land of liberty run counter to our laws and find their way to prison. Surely they do come, and the number is constantly increasing. There are now 12,000 convicts in the prisons of this State, made up largely from this cosmopolitan army of ignorance and superstition. This is the problem we have to solve in New York State, and while it is no doubt a fact that our State will always have more than others, it is nevertheless true that every State in the Union will have this class of prisoners to deal with in increasing numbers as time goes on.”
Superintendent Collins detailed the good that followed the separation and classification of prison inmates into groups or grades and the training of the mental faculties through the plan of education in vogue in New York State prisons. The labor and industrial training provided in connection with mental training was spoken of and a plea was made for the indeterminate sentence. In conclusion Superintendent Collins made a timely argument in favor of a reform in county jails. In this connection he said:
“We who are familiar with the facts know that many convicts are received at the prisons who are morally poisoned and contaminated while awaiting trial in the jails by the intimate association with confirmed and degraded criminals which is permitted in these institutions. This is especially true of the younger class of offenders, who come to the jail having respect for authority and dread of confinement. At no period of their penal term are they so susceptible to external influences. If at this period a practical reformatory influence is exerted upon them, their correction can in most cases be accomplished, but if they are left in idleness and subject to the evil influences of degraded companions their respect for law is soon destroyed, and they become hardened and defiant and accept the theories and ambitions of the confirmed criminals as their own. Thus the man who enters jail in such condition that proper treatment would readily turn him from his criminal course often reaches the prison a most discouraging subject for its reformatory system.
“For the interest of society, as well as the protection of young offenders, the jail system should be corrected. The jail buildings are improved and the prisoners are better fed than they were fifty years ago; otherwise the system remains practically the same. Its conspicuous defects still exist. No chain is stronger than its weakest link; the extensive schemes of penal administration in the several States have their fatally weak part in their jails. Genuine and effective organization in the United States for the salvation of criminals and alleged criminals must take heed of these facts, which are notorious.
“May I now suggest that a committee, to be called, if you please, the Committee on Plan and Scope, be appointed at this session of the Prison Congress to consider the following recommendations:
“First. A rational and uniform system of jail administration.
“Second. A uniform system of education for prison officers.
“Third. A uniform system of education for convicts.
“Fourth. So far as possible, a uniform system of prison discipline.
“Fifth. A uniform system of classification.
“Sixth. A uniform system of parole, and a careful consideration of all other matters that in their judgment would tend to make further reforms in the treatment of the criminal classes.
“This committee to make a report of their conclusions at the session of 1907.”
The Congress, deeply impressed by Mr. Collins’ recommendations, subsequently appointed a strong committee to report at the next meeting on the jail system in the United States.