Commissions from foreign governments, after visiting the different prisons of the United States, have all reported emphatically in favor of the Separate system: as, that of Beaumont and De Tocqueville to the French Government, in 1831; of Mr. Crawford to the English, in 1834; of Dr. Julius to the Prussian, in 1836, after a most careful perambulation of all the prisons of the country; of Demetz and Blouet to the French, in 1837,—being the second Commission from the same Government; and of Neilson and Mondelet to the Canadian Government, in 1836.
In accordance with these recommendations, numerous prisons have been built or are now building in Europe. In England a model prison has been constructed at Pentonville, which is perhaps the best prison in the world. In the late Report of the Surveyor-General of Prisons, laid on the table of Parliament during its last session, it was expressly declared, from the experience gained in the Pentonville prison, "that the separation of one prisoner from another is indispensable as the basis of any sound system." As long ago as 1843, no less than seventeen prisons on this principle were built or building in different counties of England, and several in Scotland. In France the whole subject has undergone most thorough discussion by the press, and also in debate by the Chamber of Deputies. Among the works now before us is a volume of more than six hundred pages, filled by a report of this debate, with notes, which ended in the passage of a law during the last summer appropriating ninety millions of francs for the building of thirty prisons on the Separate system. Such is the testimony of France and England.
Similar testimony comes from other quarters: from Prussia, where five prisons on this system have been built; from Denmark, where ten are now building; from Sweden, where eight are building under the auspices of the monarch, who, when Prince Oscar, wrote ably in advocacy of the Separate system; from Norway, where one is now building in the neighborhood of Christiania; from Poland, where one has long been in existence, and three others are nearly completed; from Hungary, where a project has been submitted to the Diet for the erection of ten on the Separate system; from Holland, where one is about to be erected on the plan of Pentonville; from Belgium, which has yielded to the Separate system, and has even engrafted it upon the famous Maison de Force at Ghent, the model of our Auburn Prison; from the Duchy of Nassau; from the Grand Duchy of Baden; from Frankfort-on-the-Main; from Hamburg; from Geneva, in Switzerland: in all of which prisons on this system are built or are building. From poor, distracted Spain proceeds the same testimony.
To this array of authorities and examples may be added two names of commanding weight in all matters of Prison Discipline,—Edward Livingston and Miss Dix. The first, whose high fortune it was to refine jurisprudence by his philanthropy, as he had illumined it by his genius and strengthened it by his learning, in his Introductory Report to the Code of Prison Discipline, as long ago as 1827, urged with classical eloquence a system of "seclusion, accompanied by moral, religious, and scientific instruction, and useful manual labor." Miss Dix, after attentive survey of different systems throughout our country, fervently enforces, as well in the publication now before us as in her Memorials, the merits of the Separate system, and of its administration in Pennsylvania.
It might be said that the voices of civilized nations, by a rare harmony, concurred in sanctioning the Separate system, if the Boston Prison Discipline Society had not raised a persistent note of discord, which has gone on with a most unmusical crescendo. As the solitary champion of an imperfect system which the world is renouncing, it has contended with earnestness, which has often become prejudice, and with insensibility to accumulating facts, which was injustice. With frankness, as with sorrow, we allude to the sinister influence it has exercised over this question, particularly throughout the Northern States. But the truth which has been proclaimed abroad need not be delicately minced at home. We do not join with the recent English writer, who, among many harsher suggestions, speaks of the "misrepresentation," the "trickery," the "imposture"[124] of the Society or its agent,—nor with Moreau-Christophe, who says, "La Société des Prisons à Boston a juré haine à mort au système de Philadelphie";[125] for we know well the honesty and sincere interest in the welfare of prisoners which animate its Secretary, and we feel persuaded that he will gladly abandon the deadly war which he wages against the Separate system, when he sees it as it is now regarded by the science and humanity of the civilized world. But we feel that his exertions, which in some departments of Prison Discipline have been productive of incalculable good, for which his memory will be blessed, on this important question have done harm. In his Reports he has never failed to present all the evil of the Separate system, particularly as administered in Philadelphia, sometimes even drawing upon his imagination for facts, while he has carefully withheld the testimony in its favor. This beneficent system and its meritorious supporters are held up to obloquy, and the wide circle that confided implicitly in his Reports are consigned to darkness with regard to its true character and its general reception abroad.
One of the most strenuous advocates of the Separate system at the present moment, whose work of elaborate argument and detail now lies before us, is Suringar, called sometimes the Howard of Holland, who had signalized himself by previous opposition to it. He says, "I am now completely emancipated from my former error. This error I do not blush to confess openly. The same change has been wrought in the opinions of Julius in Prussia, of Crawford in England, of Bérenger and Demetz in France, and of all men of good faith, who are moved, in their researches, only by the suggestions of conscience, unswayed by prejudice or pride of opinion." Perhaps in these changes of opinion the Secretary of the Boston Prison Discipline Society may find an example which he will not be unwilling to follow; and it may be for us to welcome him as a cordial fellow-laborer in the conscientious support of what he has for a long period most conscientiously attacked.
From this rapid survey it will be seen that our convictions and sympathies are with the Separate system. Nothing in Prison Discipline seems clearer than the general duty of removing prisoners from the corrupting influence of association, even though silent. But we are not insensible to the encouragement and succor which prisoners might derive from companionship with those struggling like themselves. It was a wise remark of the English Professor, that "students are the best professors to each other"; and the experience of Mrs. Farnham, the matron of the female convicts at Sing-Sing, shows that this same principle is not without its effect even among classes of convicts. Perhaps the Separate system might be modified, so as to admit instruction and labor together, in a small class, selected after a probationary period of separation, as specially worthy of this indulgence and confidence. Such a modification was contemplated and recommended by Mr. Livingston, and would seem to find favor with Von Raumer in his recent work on America. This privilege can be imparted to those only who have shown themselves so exemplary that their society seems to be uncontaminating. But it remains to be seen whether there is any subtile alchemy by which their purity may be determined, so as to justify a departure from the general rule of separation.
Finally, we would commend this subject to the attention of all. In the language of Sir Michael Foster, a judge of eminence in the last century, "No rank or condition of life, no uprightness of heart, no prudence or circumspection of conduct, should teach any man to conclude that he may not one day be deeply interested in these researches." There are considerations of self-interest which may move those who do not incline to labor for others, unless with ultimate advantage to themselves. But all of true benevolence, and justly appreciating the duties of the State, will join in effort for the poor prisoner, deriving from his inferior condition new motives to action, that it may be true of the State, as of law, that the very least feels its care, as the greatest is not exempt from its power. In the progress of an enlightened Prison Discipline, it may be hoped that our penitentiaries will become in reality, if not in name, Houses of Reformation, and that convicts will be treated with scrupulous regard for their well-being, physical, moral, and intellectual, to the end, that, when they are allowed to mingle again with society, they may feel sympathy with virtue and detestation of vice, and, when wiser, may be better men.