The New York Tombs Inside and Out! / Scenes and Reminiscences Coming Down to the Present. A Story Stranger Than Fiction, with an Historic Account of America's Most Famous Prison.

by John Josiah Munro

Before we can rightly understand the advances in prison reform that have taken place the past hundred years, we ought to be familiar with the treatment accorded prisoners in the early centuries of the Christian era and for hundreds of years afterwards. The prisons we read of in the ancient world were places of pestilential horror. They were dark, damp, and unsanitary dungeons, from which the sunlight was entirely excluded, where the chains rusted on the arms and feet of the prisoners, and where they were frequently left to die of starvation.

The ancient method of dealing with criminals was threefold, namely, death, exile and physical punishment or torture. Some of these methods prevail in some parts of Europe to the present time. But the Christian ideal of prison management is several steps higher. It has not yet reached it, but it has been forcing itself upon the world for many years. We believe a prison ought to be a place where the offender against human law is to be reformed or Christianized, and afterwards restored to society an industrious and useful man.

The prevailing idea in some of our criminal courts is that the average prisoner is not only a dangerous character, but also a hopeless moral and social defective and must be restrained and punished permanently. After the criminal has been sent to a penal institution, the authorities there, as a rule, seem not to care whether he is reformed or not. Indeed, the prisons of to-day, with few exceptions, cannot reform the unfortunates therein, as they are not conducted on Christian principles nor by Christian men. Our legislators have not yet learned that the only positive reclaiming force in the world for criminals is the religion of the Lord Jesus. Not only is this true, but many of the persons who manage our prisons do not believe in religion themselves and certainly have little faith in it for others.

There is so much indefiniteness of idea as to what prison reform is, that it would be well at the outset to say what we mean by it. We would define prison reform not only as the reformation of the prisoner, but the more efficient management of our prisons by men of fitness and experience in the interest of humanity and economy.

Among the other reforms inaugurated by Mr. Collins since he took charge of our prisons of this State was the abolition of the lock-step. All men that are now sent to our prisons are drilled by a regular military instructor and march no longer to the mess hall or the shops in the lock-step, but as soldiers. This gives them a manly bearing and helps their general health.

Some of Mr. Collins’ other reforms consist of the abolition of the convict striped suit for first offenders, and no longer cutting the convict’s hair short, except for sanitary reasons. Abolition of tin plates and tin cups used at meals and crockery substituted. The numbering of each one’s laundry and permission given to first offenders to wear “honor bars” on their sleeves for good conduct, which gives them special privileges. Mr. Collins has raised the moral tone of our prisons in other ways, all of which shows him to be a man of energy and of a practical turn of mind.

There is one other place where reform can be carried out to good effect. In nearly all of our State prisons and penitentiaries there are suppressed murmurings over the prison food. Coarse food that is not eaten is dearer in the end than palatable food that is consumed with a relish. For the purpose of having good discipline in our large prisons I would suggest the following: Put every inmate on his good behavior and give the men a chance to earn three good meals a day.

If they are well behaved, let them eat at the Warden’s table. This plan is no longer an experiment, for it has been tried, it is said, in some of our Pacific prisons, and works like a charm. The old saying that the best way to reach a man’s heart is by his stomach has been found true.

Let there be three tables in each prison.

1. The first table is for men against whom there is no mark for rudeness or breaking the rules for one whole month and who do their work well. The board is first class at this table and each convict is entitled to a napkin. They are allowed to converse with each other and have waiters. Call it the Warden’s table.