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systematic crime, and in this country crime of that character does not include offences against the person.1

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But the writer thinks it becoming to bracket Sir Alfred Wills with other advocates of the recrudescence of a drastic penal code,' who, he declares, have not a word to say in reference to crimes of violence, virulence, and brutality.' I will not presume to defend Sir Alfred against language of this kind. But as regards the veiled attack upon myself, a reference to my book will show that I am not indifferent to the deficiencies of the law in this respect. I may add that my knowledge of human nature in general, and of criminals in particular, deepens my appreciation of the wisdom of the provisions contained in the code of the Jewish theocracy in this respect. But that is not my theme in Criminals and Crime.

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Mr. Montgomery makes a furious attack upon our whole system of prison administration. 'That system,' he declares, 'is neither reformative, educative, nor deterrent.' It is not deterrent, he says, because the greater number of men in prison are not punished at all.' And as for the reformation of the culprit,' if we except the jejune attempts recently made in regard to young offenders, it has no place whatever in the English prison system.' So far as he himself and his fellow-prisoners were concerned, 'no attempt was made during a single hour of their incarceration to educate them ethically or to reform them morally. They were not only degraded but they felt they were degraded.' Here I would distinguish between our prison system and the present administration of that system. Of the spirit in which a bad system is now administered I have written in terms of unfeigned appreciation; but I agree that the system itself is bad. I have not changed the opinion of it which I formed when I served on the Prison Commission. But at that time it was idle to propose any radical reforms; and even now public opinion is scarcely ripe for reforms such as I should advocate. Sir Edmund du Cane was one of the ablest men I ever knew in official life, but he was not a sympathetic man. He thought more of prisons than of prisoners; and his influence was then paramount, and it still prevails. But here, again, Mr. Montgomery's statements are marked by flagrant exaggeration. Unless we are to reject absolutely his estimate of himself after 'doing time' under a five years' sentence, his own case is proof that prison discipline as now administered cannot be so degrading as he pretends. Otherwise he could not claim to be both morally and mentally what his above-quoted words about himself imply.

But Mr. Montgomery's main attack is against 'Society." And his panacea for the cure of the crime plague is that as soon as the judicially

'The Whitechapel murders' were the only exception to this in recent times, and, as I have recorded in my book, the author of those murders was a lunatic, and if evidence had been available to bring him to justice he would have been sent to Broadmoor.

awarded punishment for a crime has been endured the crime shall be forgotten, and we shall hail the discharged criminal as a brother. What does this mean? Are we to invite him to tea, introduce him to our daughters, and make him free of our homes? At this point, again, the writer's own experience refutes his allegations. For here is an ex-prisoner accepted as a contributor to the most exclusive of reviews. His own case indicates that the better sort of people treat ex-prisoners much as they deserve. And as for the rest, a good deal of mawkish and mischievous nonsense passes current on this subject. If the public ever come to regard crime without indignation and reprehension it will be proof that the moral sense of the community has become definitely lowered. It is not the taint of the prison that influences the intelligent and the thoughtful, but the taint of the crime. Most true it is, as I have urged with emphasis, that crimes are often committed in such circumstances that the offenders are deserving of pity rather than of punishment, and genuine repentance entitles a wrong-doer to the utmost consideration. But, speaking generally, a criminal is a bad man, and I should outrage not only my common sense but my Christianity if I treated a bad man as a brother.' The tie of brotherhood is too sacred and tender to be dragged down to such a level. But it will be asked, Is a man never to have a chance if once he falls? Most certainly he is. And not Christianity only, but common philanthropy will be eager to hold out a helping hand to him. One of the worst elements in the article I am criticising is the writer's sneer at the work of those who are giving their lives to help discharged prisoners. Their work is always difficult and often thankless; but not only its genuineness, but its practical value is unquestionable. And Mr. Montgomery's words are not only unjust and untrue, but they are calculated to injure the cause for which ostensibly he pleads; for their natural effect would be to check the flow of money into channels through which so many discharged prisoners now receive hearty and effective help. I speak here with authority, for my position at Scotland Yard gave me opportunities such as no ex-prisoner could possess of forming a judgment in this matter.2

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Such work is both delicate and difficult. When a man of education and social position falls into crime it is not easy to put him on his feet again. And in country districts and small towns, where everybody knows everybody else, it is naturally difficult to find employment for anyone who has been convicted of crime. But here in London, so far as regards criminals of the class engaged in manual labour, it may be asserted that, generally speaking, employment will be found for a discharged prisoner who is both able and willing to work. Of course in times of general destitution, when employment is scarce, it is not to be expected that ex-prisoners shall be preferred to men who ? Here I would refer to p. 176 of my Criminals and Crime.

have never fallen. And certain types of criminals are quite hopeless. For example, what can be done for a man who regards his crime as entitling him to what the workers call 'a soft job'? Or for the man who insists on the claim Mr. Montgomery prefers, that, having served his sentence, the criminal must be treated as though he had never been convicted?

But all this is merely the fringe of a great and important question which is of practical interest to everyone who has a pocket to be picked or a house to be broken into. What concerns us is the fact that there are men in our midst who live in and by crime. And the problem for solution is, What is to be done with them? I have contributed half a score of articles to this Review on this question in various phases of it, and I have dealt with it in my Criminals and Crime book; and my purpose here is merely to take up a few of the main points which Sir Alfred Wills adopts, and his critic assails.

Sir Alfred's classification of criminals is: first, the young and the first offenders; second, petty offenders who are not 'habituals'; third, 'habituals' who are not 'professionals'; and fourth, 'professionals.' The 'professionals' he describes as

men who, with full appreciation of the risks, with abundant intelligence, and often enough with a good education and with plenty of mechanical skill, prefer a life of crime, with its excitement, its large element of sport, its periods of luxury, idleness, and debauchery, to anything which involves the comparative monotony of honest work.

I will not speak here of offenders in the first of these categories. Important reforms in prison discipline in regard to the young are now upon their trial; and the new Probation of Offenders Act is a further gratifying proof that the punishment-of-crime system is giving way. Of criminals in the second category I have elsewhere written not a little, and I will now confine myself mainly to the 'habituals' and the 'professionals.' The existence of 'professionals,' as described by Sir Alfred Wills, Mr. Montgomery scouts as 'a figment of the imagination' and an assumption which is not only whimsical' but 'absolutely false.' This sort of blatant denial, however, is proof of nothing but want of knowledge and of manners. My only criticism upon Sir Alfred's words is that they are too general. The ranks of the 'professionals' include a considerable minority who would desert if they found an easy way of doing so. And though such cases are not very hopeful, neither are they hopeless.

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The élite of this class are men who have both the genius to plan and the wealth to finance great crimes. Such criminals are ludicrously few in number, but the trouble they give and the harm they do are incalculable. As my knowledge of them is derived from official sources I have abstained from naming men still living; but the cases given in my book, and referred to by Sir Alfred Wills, are typical.

Carr's residence in Bloomsbury was a better and more expensive house than I have ever owned. And in his house at Wandsworth Raymond surrounded himself with luxuries such as I never dream of possessing. Neither of these men ever earned an honest shilling in his life. Both of them were wealthy, and both of them continued their career of crime to the very last.

The ordinary professionals are of course much more numerous; but they are well known, and there would be no practical difficulty in dealing with them. My scheme for that purpose, which in its main points Sir Alfred Wills adopts, is before the public. I have formulated it in my book, and I need not repeat it here in detail. Surely charity itself would take sides with common sense in holding that if men insist on preying upon the community they should be deprived of the liberty they abuse. But no one should suffer that fate, save by his own deliberate act, after he has been declared a 'professional' as the result of a full and open judicial inquiry upon that issue, and notice to that effect has been officially served upon him.

But we are told these offenders are the victims of early neglect; they are just what society has made them, and they cannot help committing the crimes for which they are imprisoned. If this be so, I reply, it is an additional and a most cogent reason why the State should take them under its care. Many of them are the product of our cruel and senseless punishment-of-crime system which Mr. Montgomery champions. His statement of that system is most apt. 'I have always understood,' he says, 'the theory of the law was that a man was punished for his crime against the community, and that all the law was concerned with was the fact of the commission or otherwise of the crime.' Precisely so. The law at present concerns itself only with the crime and its punishment. But my contention is that the law should consider the criminal and his antecedents and circumstances; and that, moreover, with the object of safeguarding the interests of the community, as well as of dealing fairly with the culprit. According to the theory of the law,' offenders differ only to the extent disclosed in the records of the Habitual Criminals' register, as set out in the judge's calendar. And the result is that a poor wretch who is deserving of pity often receives the same sentence, and is always subjected to the same penal discipline, as a scoundrel who deserves hanging. A further result is that Sir Alfred's first category becomes a training for the second, and the second for the third; so that an offender who begins with petty offences and brief terms of imprisonment graduates as a convict sentenced to penal servitude for some serious crime. Mr. Montgomery's denunciation of the system is well founded; but it refutes his own argument, and his inferences are wild, and the remedies he suggests ridiculous.

It is in Sir Alfred Wills' third category that the system works most evil. In this sphere Major Griffiths' epigram is not so very

far from truth, that one half of the prisoners ought never to have been committed, and the other half ought never to be released. But the Juggernaut car of the punishment-of-crime system administers injustice impartially to all alike. The maxim that crime must be punished ranks with the eternal verities. I denounce it as both false and mischievous. There is no obligation whatever to punish crime; and the infliction of punishment, save with some intelligent and beneficent aim, is not only senseless but barbarous. The obligation which rests upon every criminal court is, so far as the law will allow, to deal with an offender in whatever way the public interests may require. If we came on a mother, sitting with her face in her hands, trying to solve the problem how many slaps the principles of eternal justice required her to administer to a naughty child, her crass folly might well amuse us. But she would not be more foolish than is the judge who sets himself the task of fitting the punishment to the sin' when the verdict of a jury places a criminal before him for sentence.

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Surely common sense would tell us that in such a case the essential inquiry should be, Who is the offender? What is his character ? What his antecedents and circumstances? But the law at present makes no provision for any inquiry of the kind. And my practical acquaintance with such matters leads me to say, first, that the attempts now commonly made to deal with it in a rough-and-ready way are most unsatisfactory, and often work injustice to accused persons; and secondly, that holding a public judicial inquiry for the purpose would be both desirable and practical. As regards this last point Sir Alfred Wills' imprimatur will satisfy most people.

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The patients admitted to our public hospitals are more numerous than the offenders arraigned in our criminal courts; and yet, though the physicians who deal with them give their services gratuitously, the medical history' of every case is carefully investigated. But our judges act like quacks who administer offhand a few stock remedies to all who come up for treatment. Sir Alfred Wills' article gives proof how keenly they feel their powerlessness in this respect. They would grudge neither time nor trouble in investigating all that can be known about a culprit, if only they were empowered to deal with him as the result might demand. At present they must choose between discharging him or sending him to suffer penal discipline of the most rigid character. And in the latter case they must either let him escape with a term of imprisonment so brief as to be inadequate in the public interests, or else impose a punishment of excessive severity. Hence the importance of a scheme, which has now received Sir Alfred Wills' approval, of establishing asylum prisons for offenders of the type that may be described as moral lunatics. The effect of an intelligent and humane penology ought to be, as Sir Alfred says, to protect the public from their criminal acts and their evil influence by making provision for their prolonged detention, while at the same

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