We have a sound basis for an estimate sufficiently impressive. There is a standing army of one hundred and thirty-five thousand men and women, at war with the community, and living on plunder and vice,—yesterday, engaged in depredations upon property—to-day, rioting in reckless extravagance,—to-morrow, reduced to pinching want. Supposing each of them to spend one hundred and twenty-five dollars a year,—say two and a half dollars a week, we have a sum total of nearly seventeen millions—and this cannot be levied upon the public at less than double that sum. This would amount to but a fraction less than thirty-five millions of dollars, and, with the costs already enumerated, would swell the grand total to very nearly fifty millions, as the annual expense which the criminal classes of England and Wales entail upon the community.
It is to be regretted that we have no reliable data from which to form even a probable estimate of either the number of criminals or the cost of crime in any one of our States or cities, so far as our information extends. If there were such, even in one State or city, an inference, of more or less value, might be drawn from a comparison of population, police force, &c. We can scarcely suppose that the incentives to crime are much more numerous and powerful here than in England. It is not found that crime abounds most in seasons of depression in business or of reduction of wages or employment, but the contrary; and therefore, the facilities with which people in our country obtain a living may, perhaps, rather promote than prevent crime. That we make much less of all crime here than is made in the older countries, is very obvious; and that escape or impunity is much more common here than there, will not be denied: so that, on the whole, we may reasonably conclude that if the tax imposed on the public, as the direct consequence of crime, could be ascertained, its enormous amount would awaken an interest in the means of preventing or suppressing it, which the considerations of humanity and religion seem inadequate to excite.
Art. IV.—REFORMATION OF FEMALE DISCHARGED CONVICTS.
THE TWENTY-SEVENTH REPORT OF THE COMMITTEE OF THE BRITISH LADIES’ SOCIETY FOR PROMOTING THE REFORMATION OF FEMALE PRISONERS, 1858.
FOURTH ANNUAL REPORT OF THE BOARD OF MANAGERS OF THE HOWARD INSTITUTION, 1858.
FOURTEENTH ANNUAL REPORT OF THE WOMEN’S PRISON ASSOCIATION OF NEW YORK. “THE ISAAC T. HOPPER HOME,” 191 TENTH AVENUE, 1859.
Although the number of female inmates of our Penitentiaries is comparatively small, their reformation is not less an object of interest. Certain it is, that efforts directed to them have been crowned with a remarkable degree of success, in proportion to their numbers. Prison returns show that it is much more rare for a female to return, on a second conviction, than for a male; and though a bad woman may be a much more revolting object than an equally bad man, she must be very radically and thoroughly degraded not to show more susceptibility of kind and good influences than most male prisoners show. Whether it is the world-wide fame of the late Mrs. Elizabeth Fry and the stimulus of her bright example, that has drawn unusual attention to the subject, or whether the wealth and leisure of ladies of rank and distinction, has enabled them to devote more attention and patronage to the reformation and restoration to society, of women who have fallen under the condemnation of penal law, we cannot say. But, certainly, the provision for such unhappy persons is much more liberal, systematic and extensive in the British Isles, than anything known among us.
We have before us “the twenty-seventh (1858) report of the Committee of the British Ladies’ Society for promoting the reformation of female prisoners.” With the parent institution there are connected ten county associations, besides five in Scotland, and the report embraces notices, more or less extensive, of the transactions of each of them. The central committee is subdivided into sub-committees, to each of which is assigned the care of one of the seven principal prisons of the metropolis in which female convicts are received.
There is a distinct sub-committee, consisting of ten ladies and two secretaries, known as the Patronage Committee. “It sits on every Friday, and its especial duty is to attend to those cases of discharged prisoners from metropolitan gaols which are recommended to its care by the authorities of the prisons, or by ladies who visit there. Endeavors are made to investigate the previous history of each individual; and if there be reason to believe that one is in earnest in the desire to reform, measures are taken to assist her in so doing.
“The rule of the Patronage Committee is, that the prisoner appears before them immediately on her liberation, to comply with which rule she often voluntarily stays back in the prison till Friday. She brings with her, under the charge of a warder, a certificate of health, and the written answers to a list of printed questions.”