MICHIGAN STATE PRISON.
We have received the Report of the Board of Control of the Michigan State Prison at Jackson. It is a pamphlet of 140 pages, including 40 full page cuts. There are also four folders of the farm plots. It is a report which reports. We have already spoken of the 26 pages reporting the menu for every meal for a year. We may learn the names and duties of the 90 officers, and their salaries. One table gives the age, nativity, crime, sentence, residence and previous record of each inmate. The names are wisely withheld. The average population was 986. Twenty-five men had escaped in the last two years. We are informed of the date of the escape and the part of the farm and premises from which they absconded. The date of their return is specified. Ten were at large when the pamphlet was made up. They are confident of apprehending these ten. They have no barred windows, no locked doors, no armed guards. The men work over a plantation of more than three thousand acres, of which 2,137 belong to the institution. They rent 900 acres. They had 507 cattle when the report was made, having just sold 146 steers for $14,600. The dairy of 200 cows supplies the institution with abundant milk and butter. Horses, hogs, bees and poultry are also in evidence. “The banner record in poultry this year was made by an inmate * * * who without an incubator was responsible for hatching and raising more than two thousand chickens.”
By no means do they confine their attention to farming. To put a thousand men on a farm of three thousand acres and expect them to support themselves and have a surplus is an absurdity. There are various industries.
| Twine plant, product 1916 | $106,820.79 | ||
| Canning factory, product 1916 | 62,949.58 | ||
| Granite shop, product 1916 | 16,385.79 | ||
| Brick and tile plant, product 1916 | 52,866.44 | ||
| Brooms, product 1916 | 5,696.25 | ||
| The net earnings in two years were | $206,206.18 | ||
| They had paid to the efficient workmen | 65,009.35 |
In the year 1917 they were anticipating a canned pack of $100,000.00. Of the products of the farm “they eat what they can, and can what they can’t.”
Canning Factory.
“The intensive production of fruits and vegetables on the farms created a surplus which had to be cared for. * * * Hence the necessity for the canning plant. This industry * * * has accomplished more than any other one industry in the prison to insure the industrial success of the institution.
“From the standpoint of a prison industry it ranks first, inasmuch as the entire produce except the can is the direct result of prison labor. While other industries require the purchase of material for manufacturing, in the canning plant, the material, coming from the prison farms, is also produced by prison labor.
“The refuse from the factory in the lines of fodder, husks, etc., from the sweet corn; vines and pods from the peas; tops from the beets, and pomace from the apples press, furnish largely the ensilage ration for the large herds of cattle.
“The management is adding each year some new item to the pack of canned goods, until now it includes all varieties of fruits and vegetables, apple jelly, sorghum molasses, baked pork and beans, spaghetti, and the generation of pure cider vinegar. (They may soon rival the 57 varieties of Mr. Heinz.)
“The sanitary conditions in the factory are perfect. Any man, in order to be eligible to work in this factory, must have a clean bill of health from the prison physician. To further the sanitary conditions, the equipment and entire interior of the plant is painted white.”
Consumers and any one interested may inspect this plant at any time. Here they see the men, preparing the vegetables for canning, in a white room, dressed in white caps, white coats, white shirts, and white aprons.
They have copyrighted the label “Home Grown,” and adopted as their slogan: “We grow, pack, sell and guarantee our own product.”
Their goods are sold in the open market, being very popular throughout the State and in adjoining States.
They have long ago abolished the contract system which was really a system of slavery. They have gone beyond the policy of raising produce or manufacturing articles for State-use, but transact business on the State-Account plan, disposing of the product wherever they can find a market. They claim that under their system of employing convicts, outside labor has nothing to fear from competition. Contract labor may have been somewhat of a menace to labor on the outside, but these men earning wages are engaged in honest production and the product is distributed just as the fruits of any other industry. Let me illustrate. A man working on a farm, in a canning factory, in a cotton mill, commits a fault and is secluded from the community but continues his work on another farm, in another canning factory, in another cotton mill. He receives wages which maintains his family. Competition is neither increased nor diminished. When the man is released, he may return to his old job. High authority in the labor unions has stated that there is no objection to a system which affords fair play to the prisoner and also to the working man. Laborers have justly opposed the exploitation of prisoners under the lease and contract systems. They have not been opposed to the development of prison industries on a fair basis. They present no objection to a “State-Use” method, and we trust they will not oppose the development of a few industries organized under the State-Account plan which appears to have been so successful in the Michigan State Prison.
Fair Exhibits.
The products of the prison industries and of the farm have been shown at a number of County Fairs and also at the State Fair, and the public has thus been informed of their activities and greatly pleased therewith. Nought has been heard but favorable comment.
Kitchen and Dining Room.
The culinary department is managed on the most approved sanitary scheme. None but healthy men are employed. They use every vegetable which will grow in Michigan, as long as the season lasts, and the canned product when the season is over. Every sanitary precaution is taken in the preparation of the meat from the pasturage and feeding of the stock, the slaughtering and handling of the carcass, in the cooking and serving the various viands on the dining table.
Objects.
It is not the object of the officers to exploit the men to the advantage of the State. In the last two years they may have returned to the State about $9,000, but in the same time they paid out to the men the sum of $65,000 in wages. They are spending their surplus in betterments. They have built dormitories, with rooms, not cells, avoiding particularly the menagerie appearance. They aim to supply the men with a wholesome and natural environment, believing that thus they may accomplish the main object of a penal institution which is the reformation and restoration of the offender.
A. H. V.