Art. VII.—AN EXTRAORDINARY DOCUMENT.
We have before us a stitched pamphlet, entitled “Report on the Subject of Prisons, by Rev. Alexander L. Hamilton, State Commissioner, to Hon. Austin King, Governor of Missouri—Referred to the Committee on the Penitentiary, and three thousand copies ordered to be printed, January 5, 1853,” pp. 24.
The author of this report is, we doubt not, a very worthy and intelligent gentleman, or he would not have been appointed by the Executive of Missouri on so important an agency. That he has fulfilled his mission to the best of his ability, we may also admit; but that his report contains “such information as is necessary to present the subject of Prison Discipline fully to the consideration of the next general assembly of Missouri,” we cannot believe. Indeed we do not hesitate to say that it is entirely deficient in every point that a report on such a subject, for such a purpose, should embrace.
Statements are made, which have been disproved over and over again, until the repetition of them is loathsome to those who have been familiar with the subject. Principles are set forth as of present validity, which have been long ago abandoned even by those who once advocated them. The most ultra partisan opinions and doctrines are revived, with such an air of sincerity and confidence, as leads us to believe that the Rev. Commissioner never saw or heard of the oft-repeated refutation of them. He refers to those whose minds are steeped in prejudice, as the most reliable and responsible sources of information; and perhaps we cannot better describe the document, as a whole, than by saying that it is a synopsis of the reports of the Boston Prison Discipline Society and Mr. Gray’s book, prepared and printed at the expense of the State of Missouri.
We owe it to ourselves to cite a passage or two from the report, to serve as an indication of the qualities we have mentioned.
As to its rhetoric and logic let the following suffice:
The conviction forces itself upon my mind, that, if the numerous weighty objections already given be correct—this (the separate) system is not only wrong per se, but will soon be deserted by its remaining followers. For if it be true, when alluding to it in the least objectionable manner, that this system is only suited to short sentences, as many of its friends and advocates aver, then, “to all intents and purposes,” it must soon be subject to one of two consequences; either the penal code of the laws of the land must be so altered as to suit the demand of the system, or the system must be so altered as to fully come within the demands of the law.
As to its facts let the following suffice:
Upon the separate and solitary principle, the prisoner—good, bad, or indifferent as he may be, surrounded by his Bible, and such other good books as are given him from time to time, remains all alone in his cell, from the first of January to the last of December, until his term of imprisonment expires; and is thus left to his own reflections by day, and by night—unless paid an occasional visit by some kind officer of the prison, or by the chaplain. And hence it is, that in too many instances to justify the means employed, insanity precedes the work of reformation.
Were we to cite but a single passage from the report to include the logic, the rhetoric, the philosophy, the facts, and the reliability of the statements in a single view, it would be the following:
Upon my arrival in the city of Boston, Massachusetts, so soon as I had visited the State prison at Charlestown, and the Boston new jail, under the guidance of Hon. Louis Dwight, I was convinced in my own mind that said jail, for the purposes for which it was designed, was decidedly the model prison of the age.
The commissioner was so fortunate as not only to see “the model prison of the age,” but to obtain from the same source “a design of a model prison for the State of Missouri;” and so comprehensive and clear were the conceptions of the commissioner upon the view of these model edifices and plans, that he made up his mind when he “first saw the design,” (and his views remained unchanged after his return,) “that it has no superior either in the United States or in Europe.”
Among the inexplicable mis-statements which we find scattered through the report, we may cite the following:
As has been proven, beyond all successful contradiction, this system (the congregate) is not only more humane, but it is also far less expensive than the separate system.
Nothing is more obvious than that from the very nature of the discipline, the administration of a prison on the separate plan must be the least expensive. The first cost of the structure will probably be greater; but we have supposed it to be conceded on all hands, that a prison on this plan once erected, the expenses of maintaining it were much less than those of a congregate prison with equal accommodations.
While we admit that the first cost of a prison for convict-separation is greater than that of a congregate prison, we must demur to the Rev. Commissioner’s broad assertion on this point:
“I speak not unadvisedly,” he says, “when I assert, that the erection of a prison for associate purposes, is not half so expensive, as the erection of a prison for the separate and solitary confinement of its inmates—all things considered.”
The most zealous opposers of the separate system have not pushed this objection to any such extreme, and to any considerate mind it carries its refutation with it.
As an inducement to proceed on the plan submitted by the commissioner, he assures the executive that “the prison once completed and properly officered, unless in case of some unforeseen accident, will demand of the State treasury nothing more for at least fifty years! And more than that,” he says, “after paying for itself during the first few years of its existence, it will thenceforth yield annually a handsome revenue to the State.”
The cost of the Missouri “Model Prison” is set down at $250,000, and as a sort of guaranty against any new expense for improvement in after times, the commissioner has the assurance of one gentleman, (which another promptly endorses,) that “the principles of the main building are such as will last for one hundred years!” This gives a chance for a long nap to our Boston friends.
We are not without hope that some of the good citizens of Missouri will get a glimpse of this report of the Rev. Alexander L. Hamilton, and will insist upon a more intelligent and impartial inquiry, before they commit themselves, or suffer the Legislature to commit itself to so large an expenditure, for an institution so permanent, and involving so many interests of humanity and public economy.