In respect to both these branches of prison discipline, the reader shall have the language of the society, that he may be sure my representations are correct.
In the FIRST REPORT, pages 25-28, the views of the society in respect to the practice of confining several convicts in one room at night, is expressed as follows:—
"We find great unity of opinion among all well informed and practical men, in regard to the evils of this miserable system,[2] and the importance of solitary confinement, at least by night.
The superintendent of the New Hampshire Penitentiary, Moses C. Pilsbury, who has been seven years in that institution, says, he has thought much of the benefits, which would result from solitary confinement at night. The plots which have been designed, during his term of service, have been conceived, and promoted, in the night rooms. He has spent much time in listening to the conversation of the convicts at night, and thus has detected plots and learned whole histories of villany.
Judge Cotton, the superintendent of the Vermont Penitentiary, says, I feel satisfied, that great evils might be avoided, could our State Prison be so constructed, that the convicts might lodge separately from each other. Solitary confinement, during the night, would be an effectual bar, and have a great tendency to suppress many evils, which do exist, and ever will exist, so long as prisoners are allowed to associate together in their lodging rooms.
The Directors of the Massachusetts Penitentiary, in their last Report, say, that the erection of an additional building, within the Prison yard, where each convict may be provided with a separate apartment for lodging, has long been a favorite object with the government of this institution.
The Commissioners of the Connecticut Legislature, say, that the great and leading objection to Newgate, is the manner in which the prisoners are confined at night—turned in large numbers into their cells, and allowed an intercourse of the most dangerous and debasing character. It is here, that every right principle is eradicated, and every base one instilled. It is a nursery of crime, where the convict is furnished with the expedients and shifts of guilt, and, with his invention sharpened, he is let loose upon society, in a tenfold degree, a more daring, desperate, and effective villain.
The superintendent of the New York Penitentiary, Arthur Burtis, Esq. speaking of the crowded state of the night rooms, said, how can you expect reformation, under such circumstances? As well might you kindle a fire, with a spark, on the ocean, in a storm. If a man forms a good resolution, or feels a serious impression, it is immediately driven from him in his night room.
The superintendent of the New Jersey Prison, Francis S. Labaw, says, the greatest improvement, that has been made, or can be made, in Prison Discipline, is by solitary confinement. The solitary cells in this Prison, in which one fourth part of the whole number of prisoners are placed under sentence of the Court, have answered all the purposes, which it was ever expected they would, so far as trial of them has been had. No person, who has been once confined in them, has ever returned to the Prison.
The Senate of Pennsylvania say, for want of room, the young associate with the old offenders; the petty thief becomes the pupil of the highway robber; the beardless boy listens with delight to the well told tale of daring exploits, and hair breadth escapes of hoary headed villany, and from the experience of age, derives instruction, which fits him to be a terror and a pest to society. Community of design is excited among them, and, instead of reformation, ruin is the general result.