392 HUMAN BIOLOGY 



notion of what this will do for the offender or for society. 

 I am warranted, from what I know, in saying that many a 

 judge has never been inside the institution to which he 

 sends offenders, and practically no judges have any knowl- 

 edge of the effects of the regime to which they consign 

 offenders. This chasm between prescribing treatment and 

 diagnosis followed by the observation of results is anti- 

 science; the law appears to be very little concerned with 

 results, and if obtaining results is not the main business of 

 the law, then it is a strange phase of human endeavor. 



But this statement of lack of cooperation between science 

 and the law in criminal affairs must not stand alone and be 

 taken merely at its face value. As we said above, there is no 

 real distinction between crime and delinquency ; the fact is that 

 the delinquent is an offender against society who has committed 

 offenses of just the same nature as the criminal, only at an 

 age arbitrarily determined as juvenile. Now, in connection 

 with the study of dehnquents as such, and working hand 

 in hand with juvenile court authorities, science has been 

 playing recently a very considerable part. Medical, psychi- 

 atric, psychological, and social investigations of dehnquents 

 have been growing apace, undertaken in scores of places by 

 well-organized chnics. Sometimes, and very properly, 

 this extends beyond the mere examination of the offender to 

 study of the etiology of the offense. It is true, however, that 

 science has had, even in connection with these chnics, 

 very Kttle to do with the treatment under the law. Perhaps 

 one reason for this is that science has not advanced far 

 enough to be able to offer enough to create confidence in 

 what it might do. However, its chances for carrying out 

 experimental therapy, such as science everywhere under- 

 takes, have been so shght that lack of progress in discovering 

 eflPective treatment is readily understandable. The next 

 step must certainly be therapy scientifically prescribed 

 and administered, with close observation of results. It 

 would seem easy enough to command the resources of 

 probation departments and state correctional institutions 

 for dehnquents in order to demonstrate the possibihties of 

 therapy and estabhsh the causes and remedies of the weak- 

 nesses that now exist. 



