While many members of our Visiting Committees have been zealous in their endeavor to open the door of hope to the prisoners, and to stimulate them to higher ideals of life, the general conditions obtaining in the prisons have also claimed attention. It is a prescribed function of the Visiting Committee of any prison, whether State or County, to note the “condition of the buildings ... the discipline and management,” and to make report of their observations. Great discretion and a full understanding of the situation are essential in publishing the results of such comments and observations. In the early history of our organization, there were so many abuses prevalent in the management of prisons that by far the larger part of the activities of the Acting Committee consisted in the effort to remedy the evils of management. These efforts were eminently successful in those days of emergence from medieval methods; and while we all rejoice in the very great amelioration of conditions, it must be confessed that penal improvement has lagged behind all other agencies for betterment. If we compare our educational system, hospitals, transportation methods, agricultural development—any field of human endeavor—with our correctional institutions, we are overwhelmed by the extreme lack of corresponding progress.
Personal Visitation.
The reports of the Visiting Committees for the year 1918 indicate that there is no loss of interest or effort in seeking to restore men and women to their better selves. In consequence of the quarantine caused by the epidemic of influenza, which resulted in keeping visitors away from four to six weeks, the statistics do not bulk as large as usual.
| Number of reported visits to the Eastern Penitentiary | 337 |
| Number of reported interviews with the inmates | 6,435 |
| Number of reported interviews with the inmates of the Philadelphia County Prison | 3,631 |
| Number of prisoners interviewed at Central Station by Agent | 15,933 |
| Number of discharged prisoners receiving direct aid | 590 |
On practically every Sabbath one or more of our members take part in the religious services in the prisons.
We are convinced that many of those with whom we meet from time to time are victims of circumstances, and also that many of them are defective in mentality and in self control. At some time, we trust the General Assembly will take up seriously the subject of the degenerates who need treatment in accordance with the most approved psychiatric methods. Some of them need institutional care for a much longer time than is indicated by the Court sentence. Here they should be restrained until they are deemed ready to become useful to the community.
Employment of Prisoners.
In the great Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the most flagrant evil of the prisons is the lack of wholesome employments for the inmates. Even some of our laws designed to help conditions have aggravated the evil. For instance, the law of 1913, which, with the best intentions, repealed other laws for employment in the State Penal Institutions, in order that the inmates might all be employed in making articles for State use, did not create a sure market for the articles thus manufactured, and therefore the number of prisoners profitably employed in the penitentiaries is not so large as under a former law when 35 per cent. of them could be kept at work in the manufacture of articles or products to be sold in the open market. A simple remedy for this deplorable state of affairs may be found in granting the privilege of selling the surplus stock in the market at the prevailing price. Organized labor found undesirable competition with the products of free labor only when the prisoners were employed on the vicious contract system. Under the present methods, the prisoners are to receive a fair wage and the products are to be sold at the market price. Perhaps we could make a beginning by listing certain industries in which the convicts may be employed. Place no restrictions on agricultural products, including canned goods, on the work of stone crushing and in general the manufacture of road-making material, and also allow two or three indoor industries, such as the manufacture of carpets and knit goods. Thus the problem may be solved. When we consider the very small number of persons so employed in comparison with the hordes of outside workers, it appears very evident that the amount of real competition would reduce to the vanishing point. No industry would be injured, the tax-payers would be relieved from a large part of the expense, the prisoners would earn their own maintenance, and thus the demoralizing effects of idleness would be averted.
Discharged Prisoners.
It has sometimes been stated that for some visitors, the prisoner loses his charm when released from confinement. He may be decidedly interesting behind the bars, or perhaps he may be simply an object of curiosity, or a psychological specimen to be studied, like some abnormal freak of nature. Within the wall the visitor may show warmth, interest, cordiality, sympathy, a certain degree of familiarity, but on the outside the atmosphere is below zero. This is a species of charlatanism for which we have no sympathy. It is an exceedingly important part of our mission to set the discharged man on his feet, and to establish his goings. If ever any man needed sympathy and material aid, it is when the man released from confinement again becomes a member of the community. Not all the men and women who are released seem to require special help, but those who are in need are very greatly dependent upon human kindness till they have regained some sense of confidence and have again become self-supporting. If aid and good cheer are not forthcoming at this crucial time of testing, there is imminent danger of a relapse into former bad habits. We believe that all of our visitors realize the importance of maintaining our interest and kindly feeling for the prisoner at the time of his release.