"DANIELS" ON THE JUDGMENT-SEAT.
THE articles in this journal on the Report of the Transportation Committee were copied into many newspapers ; and from various quarters we have heard that the startling facts, elicited by the in- quiry, produced a strong impression of the necessity of abolishing transportation to the Penal Colonies. While, however, there is reason to believe that sound opinions on this most important sub- ject are gaining ground among the philanthropic and instructed portion of the community throughout the kingdom, here in Lon- don—at head-quarters—in our courts of justice—the effort is made to perpetuate a system which not only fails as applied to the repres- sion of crime in England, but is poisoning society, and rearing sv hole nations of the wickedest criminals the earth ever produced, in the otherwise fine colonies selected as their place of punishment. Recently, we had occasion to notice an egregious blunder of Mr. LAW, Recorder of London ; who patronized transportation,because, said the judge, " imprisonment presented no security to the public against the commission of crime,"—as if transportation did, or the prison system could not be bettered : and this week, we have the Common Sergeant and Sir PETER LAURIE preaching the same doctrine. In the Central Criminal Court, on Wednesday, a woman, who was an old offender, and had been "imprisoned at least twenty different times," was convicted of stealing a pocket- handkerchief. The Common Sergeant observed—" Then it is the duty of the Court to transport her." The prisoner, "who had betrayed the greatest indifference during the trial "—knowing, of course, that the customary punishment of her guilt was not heavy —" on hearing this observation of the Court, burst into tears, and was much agitated." But the Common Sergeant, after having publicly declared that it was his " duty " to transport her, had " some conversation " with his brethren on the bench; "and it appearing that she had not been convicted on any serious charge, the Court ordered her to be imprisoned for six months." Such is the report of the trial in the newspapers.
The prisoner was removed ; and then the Common Sergeant thought it his " duty " to "call the attention of the Jury to the great terror which prisoners entertained of being transported "—
" In fact, it was only the dread of transportation that appeared to make any impression ; and if that punishment was done away with, he believed it would be impossible to lice in this country. He trusted the speculation which bad been advised, of trying such an experiment, would never be carried into effect. If it was, be should tremble for the consequences."
The wise Magistrate Sir PETER LAURIE entirely coincided with the trembling Sergeant; and was surprised that "any difference of opinion on this subject could exist among the learned gentle- men of the bar." Whereupon, the Common Sergeant announced his most righteous determination with respect to the future punish- ment of offenders— "In future, the Court were determined to act on one uniform principle ; and that was, on the first conviction, to give one chance, by only sentencing the party to be imprisoned for a certain time ; but if they were convicted a second time, the punishment in every case (no exception would be made) would be transportation. He trusted this determination of the Court would become publicly known."
With the Common Sergeant it is "a word and a blow." He did not wait long for his determination to be "publicly known." The next prisoner was found guilty of stealing six pocket-handker- chiefs; and it was his second conviction— The Common Sergeant—" You have heard the rule [ay, but not before the crime was committed] the Court has laid down in the case of a second convic- tion' a rule which will not be departed from. Therefore the sentence is, that you be transported beyond the seas for seven years."
The prisoner on hearing this sentence burst into tears.
The Common Sergeant to the Jury—" You see, gentlemen, in every case the great terror which exists of the punishment of transportation."
Now, if Sir PETER LAURIE had not flattered the Common Ser- geant by his entire agreement with his opinion on transportation, or if the poor devil tried last had been lucky enough to be put to the bar half an hour before, be would have been sentenced to brief imprisonment, instead of transportation for seven years. But the Judge was resolved to make good his assertion that there was nothing like transportation to terrify a rogue, and that but for transportation " it would be impossible to live in this country." Perhaps the Common Sergeant did not exceed his " duty" in this case ; as he manifestly did in the first, when he declared that
transportation should be the punishment of an offence to which six months' imprisonment only was actually awarded: but it is plain, that in the second instance the sentence was unexpectedly harsh. Indeed, the Judge thought it necessary to make a sort of apology to the second prisoner for the unusual severity of his punishment—" You have heard the rule the Court has laid down."
But suppose a greater criminal, who knew that transportation
would be his doom, had been placed in the dock, convicted, and sentenced, and had gone through the ceremony with professional hardihood, as the chances are a thousand to one that he would, might not the Foreman of the Jury have retorted upon the Court- " You see, my Lord, in every case the little terror which exists of the punishment of transportation"?
It is gratifying to find that there is no sympathy between the leaders of the Tory party and the City sages on the efficacy of transportation. The Quarterly Review for October, just pub- lished, in a valuable article on the state and prospects of New South Wales, approves generally of the recommendations of Sir WILLIAM MOLESWORTH'S Committee. " The transportation system," says the reviewer, " as now executed, while it injures the free colonists, and saps the wellbeing and the very life of the Black population, is productive, we suspect, of very little reforma- tion to the convicts, and of no substantial relief even to the Mother Country." Again--" We concur with the Committee in their general conclusion, that the time is come when the practice of transportation to the Australian colonies can no longer be con- tinued on its present scale, or in its present shape, with any advantage to those settlements, to the Mother Country, or to the persons whom her laws have condemned ; and if, as we are led to hope, these colonies may still be made to bear a part in the reformation of offenders, it must be in connexion with other and more wholesome institutions."
The reviewer suggests, that imprisonment in this country, on the Philadelphian system, should be substituted for transporta- tion ; and that reclaimed qffenders only should be conveyed to the Australian colonies, after the expiration of their sentences ; which might in some cases be shortened, as they would have a better chance of recovering their position in society there, where the prejudice against them would be less, than in England. Against penitentiaries abroad the reviewer is decided. Irreclaimable offend- ers, he says, might be permanently placed in some " penal re- ceptacle; ' and he adds, "Such penal receptacles may probably be fixed, with much less expense and with much better security against oppression or neglect, in secluded spots of the British Islands, than on the distant soil of art infant colony." The mistake of the Transportation Committee is thus avoided by the reviewer; while he concurs in the sound portions of their recommendations, and moulds into a practical form the benevolent suggestion of Arch- bishop WHATELY, which they had left imperfect.
As the Common Sergeant and his colleague on the bench spoke not from Tory inspiration, perhaps they derived their bright ideas on the subject from some worthy citizens, not altogether un- interested in the material prosperity of New South \Vales, which depends so much on a supply of convict labour.
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