SOLUTION OF THE CONVICT DIFFICULTY.
Tinny the model official may say that his right hand knoweth not what his left hand doth ; for there is a kind of official igno- rance which seems to preclude ministers of state from exercising a conscious use of their own virtues. In the late debate upon the renewal of convict transportation, we do not remember that there was any allusion to the satisfactory progress which has been made in the custody of convicts in Ireland, or to the plan which the Directors of Convict Prisons in that island have for disposing of p!isoners after the period of their discharge under ticket-of-leave. The whole subject that was vainly debated in the House of Com- mons is discussed with perfect comprehension and a distinct pur- pose in the Second Report of the Directors.* In England the is- sue of tickets-of-leave has been abruptly stopped ; Ministers, almost confessedly, are at the end of their resources ; and the whole subject is handed over to a Select Committee of the House of Commons in order to find out what to do. As it is all but cer- tain that transportation will not be renewed, the only relief from present evils lies in the direction of improved convict discipline, and in private employment for the ticket-of-leave men ; and the case is met by the Irish Directors. They start from the point that our Colonies, with the exception of Western Australia, will not receive our convicts. They know_ the general distrust of reformation tested alone by prison-surveillance. "The press," they say, "teems with charges committed by ticket-of-leave men; the system is denounced by some of those administering the criminal justice of the country as an unmitigated evil ; but we do not hear the suggestion of a remedy." Such are the actual cir- cumstances; and, assuming that the convicts must be discharged at home, they go back to "the Lord Chancellor's intentions ex- pressed in the House of Lords in 1853, that it was never contem- plated to turn a mass of unemployed convicts loose upon the coun- try, and that means should be taken to assist in procuring em- ployment, and in employing them in the interim." To that end, the Directors, writing in December last, report that they are en- deavouring, as a preliminary step, to coiled prisoners eligible for discharge in certain establishments, such as the Smithfield prison in Dublin, and Fort Camden near Cork harbour. In Smithfield, invalids and men acquainted with trades, of the selected class, can be profitably employed; at Fort Camden, the able-bodied will be employed on the fortifications. These, however, will not be nurseries in the sense of indulging ; they will be real reforma- • "Second Annual Report of the Directors of Convict Prisons in Ireland, for the year ended 31st December lt366. With Appendix. Presented to both Houses of Parliament by command of her Majesty." tortes, "acting as filters between the prisons and the communi- ties," testing the reformation of the prisoner, and throwing his improvement more on himself than can be the ease in the prison. "Hard work and coarse fare must be the rule ; and in the evenings care- fully-selected lectures may inculcate lessons of practical utility. It is im- portant that these establishments should be as self-supporting as possible ; the officers connected with them should be cognizant of some branch of in-
d , and give the public the benefit of their own labour : the prisoners may be employed in offices and avocations that could not be sanctioned in a prison, but which, in this intermediate stage, would tend to engender self- respect. We believe that, by means of these establishments, we shall ob- tain a further insight into the prisoner's character through individualiza- tion, and thus be enabled to recommend the really deserving for tickets of licence."
The last, indeed, is a most important point—the seeming an insight into the prisoner's character individually, and thus ob- taining the means of meting the genuineness and degree of his reformation. With regard to many, the authorities will probably be able to certify that they are really reformed. Others may perhaps fail, and be returned to the penal establishments. The fact that a prisoner has not passed through these establishments will constitute a warning for the police. With regard to women, the difficulty is greater than even with men. Immediately after discharge, a woman is totally deprived of the honest means of obtaining a livelihood : in industrial em- ployments, persons of her own class will not associate with her; and families naturally object to receiving convicts as domestic servants. The difficulty has been met in France, and again we encounter the excellent M. Demetz as one of the promoters of re- formatory discipline. In 1837, M. Demetz established a Societe' de Patronage in connexion with the great prison of St. Lazare, through which 700 women have passed with scarcely a serious re- lapse. At Montpelier, 360 prisoners have been returned from a similar institution to their families, or have been placed in situa- tions; only six out of that number having relapsed into crime since 1847. M. Berenger de la DrOne, President of the Court of Cassation in Paris, gives a striking testimonial to the Societe of the St. Lazare, in his recently-published work De la Repression Penale.
" Pres de 200 jeunes liberees sent aujourd'hui reunies dans une maison, allude rue de Vaugirard, qui eat ding& par des sceurs religieuses, sous l'in- spection des dames de Is swift& Lorsque ces jeunes ffiles sent suffisam- meat preparees et corrigees, ces dames lea placent comma domestiques ou comme ouvrieres dons des mai-semi choisies avec soin ; elles leer servant alors de patronesses, les assistent de leer conseils, de leurs encouragements, et de leer maternelle surveillance. 700 jeunes files environ, apres avoir passe par la maison de refonne, mit ainsi recn, an dehors, la destination a laquelle chacune d'elles etait propre, et oat, a peu d'exceytions pres, re- pondu, par l'honnetete de leer vie, aux efforts pm avaient ete faits pour lea ramener au bien."
Keeping on this model, and on the principle that the prison rou- tine cannot test individual character and conduct, the Irish Di- rectors of the Convict Prisons have chalked out a course for them- selves. They do not propose to increase the existing prison-esta- blishments, as the plan would be attended with expense delay, and difficulty. They had already announced their design a draft- ing female convicts into existing private charitable institutions; and that plan has been enlarged through an appeal to the public. A number of benevolent ladies are willing to manage gratuitously the Irish copy of the Societe de Patronage : as it now stands, this plan promises to be far better, both as an example to the guilty and as a refuge for the penitent, than the notorious factory at Parra- matta at New South Wales. The Directors have thus grappled in Ireland with those difficulties which are thought to be so over- whelming in England ; and they appear, from their own account, to have a very fair prospect, not only that they should accomplish the work, but that they should render the establishments ne- cessary for the purpose in a great measure self-supporting. The plan is not a mere project : the Directors of Convict Prisons have been effecting progressive improvements which have regularly led up to it ; and they have all their preparations made. Their re- port is written for 1855: we have now consumed four months of 1856, and probably the Select Committee on the Convict System of England might obtain very useful information from the Irish Directors.
Previous page
