Parole Law Recommended For Rhode Island.—The Board of Control and Supply of Rhode Island, which has charge of the State penal institutions, recommended in its annual report to the Legislature that a parole law be put into effect in this State. Under the proposed plan, prisoners who have served a portion of their sentence may regain their freedom and retain it as long as they live up to the terms of their parole.
Convicts Build Arizona Bridge.—“Cross-continental automobile tourists who will take the southwestern route to the Panama-Pacific Exposition at San Francisco in 1915, will cross the Salt river in going from Phoenix to Tempe over a substantial concrete bridge 1,508 feet long instead of having to ford either a wide raging torrent or a deep long, sandy, dried-up riverbed, according to season of the year,” says Dr. Charles G. Percival, in his new book, “The Trail of the Bull Dog,” which deals with the writer’s two years’ automobile trip of 50,000 miles. “The interesting part of this bridge lies in the fact that it was built of concrete in twenty-seven months entirely by convicts’ labor. The bridge is eighteen feet wide between curbs and 240 tons of steel rod and wire are contained in its construction. The bridge is floored with reinforced concrete and a two-inch bitulithic dressing. Eleven piers, each 125 feet in length, support the bridge, which is excellently lighted by electricity at both approaches, and throughout its entire length from power generated at the Roosevelt dam seventy miles away.”
In Iowa.—Prisoners at the Fort Madison penitentiary get increased pay and shorter hours through an agreement made by the State board of control for the cancellation of one prison contract and the transference of the contract of the Fort Madison Chair company to the Fort Madison Tool company. This takes 175 men out of the contract labor system.
By the terms of the arrangement, the board may terminate the remaining contract on or after March 1, 1916, by giving ninety days’ notice. The old contract could not be cancelled before October 15, 1917. The State gains more than a year by the new deal.
The State will receive 60 cents a day for each man employed by the tool company under the new agreement. In addition the company will pay each man 10 cents a day for himself. The working day will be cut from ten to nine hours.
Auburn Inmates Celebrate Under Their Own Captains.—Fourteen hundred convicts in Auburn prison, observing Lincoln’s Birthday, marched from cells to chapel and mess hall solely in charge of convict captains elected by the inmates several weeks ago as their representatives in the Mutual Welfare League. The convict officers relieved the regular officers and maintained splendid discipline.
The holiday entertainment was furnished entirely by convict talent and included an address on Lincoln by an inmate. Addresses were also made by Thomas Mott Osborne, chairman, and Professor E. Stagg Whitin, of New York, and Professor Henry T. Mosher, of Rochester, members of the State Commission for Prison Reform.
Tynan’s Way.—Writing to the New York Sun, Warden Tynan of the Colorado State Penitentiary says:
“The position of penitentiary warden is the last in the world for a policeman. The policeman’s education is all wrong. He thinks only of hunting out the evil in his victim, of making a record in convictions. A policeman warden would keep the black hole full, he would wear out the cat-o’-nine tails, he would revive the iniquitous stool pigeon and spy system; he would produce the typical, modern penitentiary which sends out unbettered and unstrengthened man and which menaces the society which it is supposed to protect.
“By removing the continual threat of arms, by eliminating oppressions and brutalities, by establishing a system of graded rewards for cheerfulness and industry, the Colorado penitentiary has been given a wholesome, helpful atmosphere. The men have taken no unfair advantage of square dealings and fair intent. They have met every advance in honesty and enthusiasm.