Among many other advantages calculated to improve the morals of delinquents, and to render them useful to Society, it will possess, after a certain period, the singular faculty of extending to the Public these incalculable benefits, perhaps without any expence whatsoever; since it may be reasonably expected, that by training both Sexes to productive labour, extended and rendered valuable by the proposed introduction of ingenious machinery, it will hereafter become an object of advantage to new Contractors, (after the System is fully matured, and the profits arising from it clearly ascertained), to take upon them the conduct of the design, without stipulating for any annuity or assistance whatsoever from Government. Nay, the certainty of this profit, and its magnitude arising from labour alone, may, perhaps, ultimately even create a competition of Contractors, who, instead of receiving, will be induced to offer a premium to Government for the appointment to the situation; the value of which will be evidenced by the increasing annual profits.
It is, indeed, highly probable, that as the Institution advances to maturity, under a plan so admirably adapted to render labour productive in the greatest possible degree; in the same manner will the profits gradually increase year after year until they shall be rendered obvious and certain, and not as at present depending on speculative opinions.
The proposed annual report to the Court of King's Bench, through which medium the progressive profits will be generally promulgated, will create notoriety, and excite attention; and it is by no means improbable, that when the contract becomes open, by the decease of the two Gentlemen to whom the Public are to be indebted for this invention, that it will acquire a precise value, like any other saleable commodity.
This was exemplified in the instance of Convicts sent to America, which for a great length of time cost Government a large sum annually, until a discovery of the profits, arising from the disposal of the services of Felons, created a competition, which eased the Public of every expence whatsoever on account of their Transportation.
But these are not the only advantages which the Country will derive from this new Penitentiary System. Its success will rapidly change the œconomy of the many unproductive Houses of Correction, which have been erected at an enormous expence to the different Counties, under the Act of the 16th of Geo. III. cap. 43. Those in the management of these respective Establishments will gladly follow an example which mingles in so great a degree—humanity with reform and profit, thereby holding out a prospect both of diminishing crimes, and reducing the County Rates, now estimated by the Finance Committee at fifty thousand pounds a year for prisons, and criminal Police alone.
Such are some of the benefits which may be reasonably expected to arise from the proposed Penitentiary System. If they shall be realized to the extent which is contemplated, so as to render transportation, as well as the Hulks, unnecessary, the pecuniary saving to Government in twenty years will be immense. This may be ascertained by referring to a [preceding page], where the disbursements in the criminal department are inserted, which have taken place since the commencement of the American war, which rendered a new System necessary. If to this sum is added the expences incurred by the Counties, it will probably be found to have exceeded Two millions sterling in all.
But still further advantages may be contemplated in addition to those of a pecuniary nature.—By retaining delinquents in the Country, and rendering their labour profitable to the State, a new source of wealth is opened which never existed at any former period, since the labour of convicts transported, whether to America or New South Wales, has been totally unproductive to the Country.
The success of such a design, once clearly manifested, would give a new and favourable turn to the System of Punishments. Labour would be exacted in almost every case, not more for the benefit of the State than the advantage of the Prisoner, since labour and reform generally go hand in hand.—Without the aid of labour, it is in vain to expect an improvement in the morals or habits of delinquents—without an asylum to which discharged prisoners can resort for employment, their punishment produces no advantage. On the contrary, the vices of a Gaol send them forth more hardened in iniquity, and greater adepts in the trade of thieving than before.
Nothing, therefore, can be more hostile to the diminution of crimes than the present mode of punishment for small offences, by a short imprisonment, without being employed in useful and productive labour.
Under this defective System the different Gaols in the Metropolis and the Kingdom, are periodically vomiting forth hordes of Minor Delinquents, who serve as recruits to the more desperate gangs, and remain in a course of turpitude until cut off by the commission of higher offences. Some exceptions, doubtless, there are; but while the resource for honest labour is so effectually shut out, many who have totally lost character, and are without friends, seem to have no other resource.