“Phillips Brooks, when he used to visit the institution at Concord, it was said, never varied his sermons one jot or tittle in presenting them to the prisoners of that reformatory, than in giving them to his cultured congregation in Trinity Church, and he never failed to instruct, impress, and move his congregation of prisoners as no other man to whom I ever listened. And that leads me to the point that I believe that all religious services in a prison should be carried through with the same care on the part of the clergyman, and with the same dignity with which he would conduct the services in any church. The ritual of the church service always appeals to prisoners. The services of the mass, or the ritual of the synagogue, never fail in receiving the reverent attention of the devotees of those faiths; and my observation is that prisoners always respond to those services in which they themselves are largely participants. Congregational singing, responsive readings, repetition of Psalms and the Lord’s Prayer are usually entered into with interest and satisfaction.
“The prison chaplain should be keen in his appreciation of human nature, in dealing with the individual prisoner, that he may see the good that exists in each prisoner with whom he comes in contact, and work upon that side of his character. Humanity is much alike the world over. Race and condition have not so much influence upon the characteristics as we sometimes believe. In the modern American prison will be found prisoners from nearly every nationality under the sun. Their methods of evil are about the same, and they all respond to the same influences, and are actuated by the same motives, each as the other; and the prison chaplain who has learned this, and has learned that there is always something in every prisoner which he can draw out and develop, is well on the road to successful dealing with them. It is not so much the work of the superintendent, warden, or chaplain, to make over a man into something else, as it is to develop him along the lines of his better self.
“When the Saviour called the fishermen, Peter and Andrew, to be his disciples, he did not say to them, ‘Follow me, and I will make you into great orators, or great preachers,’ but, ‘I will make you fishers of men.’ So, when we approach the prisoner, we should not ask him to be something different from himself, but should try to bring out and develop his better self; by holding before his vision the ideal Man, which is Jesus, and the ideal society, which is Christianity in its perfection.”
EVENING
The evening session was again held in the Senate Chamber of the Capitol. The first address was made by Mr. Frederick G. Pettigrove, Chairman of the Massachusetts Board of Prison Commissioners, on “What a Central System May Do to Promote the Efficiency of Prison Methods.”
“A world-famous essayist and statesman said that a complete theory of government would be a noble present to mankind, but he added, it is a present that one could neither hope nor pretend to offer. We are forced to remember this limitation when we examine the various systems of prison government and attempt to suggest remedies for the deficiencies in them. I shall try to show that in whatever way the prisons are governed there are certain reformatory methods and agencies that can be made much more effective and available by the aid of a central system than by being left entirely to local administration. I shall make no attack upon any system, because it would be unjust and ungracious not to remember the great service that has been rendered to the State by the able and philanthropic men and women who have devoted their services to the prisons, and have striven to lift them from mere places of detention to a condition of high public service.
“If all the corrective methods that are now stamped with the approval of public sentiment could be maintained to the best advantage in a single prison, there would be no need of any central authority. It could not be contended that a general board would be any wiser in appointments than the local boards of management. Nor could there be any larger or more humane interest in the affairs of a particular prison, than is shown by the supervisors who have only one prison under their charge. But it would be manifestly impossible, in the larger States at least, to include in a single establishment all the various agencies that are needed for the discipline, the training and the treatment of prisoners; and it is therefore essential that different places should be provided to furnish opportunities best suited to the capacities and the needs of the widely differing individuals.
“The managers of one prison cannot command a knowledge of all the prisons as well as a central board, and if the methods that are now employed are to be used for the greatest good, and to be made available for the largest number of offenders, there must be some general authority to rearrange and reassign prisoners after they have been committed.
“I have no intention here of proposing that the State should take absolute control of all the penal institutions, or even that the authority of all boards of management should be measurably disturbed; but only that some central board should so far possess authority over all the penal establishments as to be enabled to make a rearrangement that would promote efficiency of effort.
“In order to show how such a degree of centrality might be sufficient for large reforms let me outline briefly what I believe would be the best method of classification of prisoners if all suitable facilities could be given by the legislature: