Condition of the Common Jails. 97 



tion that the work of manufacturing criminals could scarcely be more 

 effectually done than it is by our jail system as at present organized and 

 managed. This is strong language but it is not lightly used. There is 

 we think, no proposition more true, than that our present jail system is 

 deeply depraving to the prisoner, and a positive evil to the community." 



Were tlie inmates of our jails tlie worst of criminals, were 

 tliey in all cases persons who had been charged with the most 

 heinous crimes, who had been fairly tried, found guilty and 

 justly sentenced, it would be an outrage upon their manhood, 

 a disgrace to the people of the state, and a reproach to the civil- 

 zation of the nineteenth century to confine them in such places 

 as are many of our jails ; but when we remember that the oc- 

 cupants of our jails are mostly persons simply charged with 

 crime, and that too of the milder types, and that the trial often 

 shows them to have been innocent, that sometimes they are 

 merely witnesses, or persons sentenced for a few days or a few 

 months for some minor offence, sometimes mere boys and girls, 

 the outrage, the disgrace and the reproach seem a thousand 

 fold intensified. The chief trouble seems to be inherent in our 

 present criminal system as connected with our jails. The 

 whole system is a relic of the barbarous ages of the past, and 

 the great wonder is that it should have been allowed to remain 

 so long unchallenged. 



I have briefly called attention to the condition of the com- 

 mon jails of the country. Their real condition must be under- 

 stood and appreciated before any great improvement can be 

 made. The remedy for the evils and defects which have been 

 pointed out, will form an appropriate subject for another paper 

 on some future occasion. 



