Various - Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 58, Number 358, August 1845

"In the infancy of society," reasons Captain Maconochie, "and under every form of pure despotism, the individual is nothing, and the commonwealth, or its chief, every thing. But just as intelligence and true knowledge of state policy extend, does this state of things become reversed; and in England already, the maxim is become almost universal, that private rights are never to be invaded without compensation. In two departments only is there still a systematic deviation from this rule in practice. Impressment, in which the compensation made, though it has increased much of late years, must still be considered inadequate—for otherwise the act itself would be unnecessary; and the punishment of offenders with a view to example only, in which they have no concern, and to which their individual interests are yet unhesitatingly sacrificed. In both cases the same plea of state necessity is offered in justification; but it will not do. As society advances, and individuals become more sensible of their own worth, their claims to regard above such abstractions become more and more evident."—( General Views , &c., p. 11.)

We would modestly suggest that before this curious analogy can be made complete, government ought to press for hanging as well as the sea service. If the sheriff and his bailiffs sallied forth, and seized upon some hapless wight, thrust the king's money into his hand, and thus enlisted him into the hanging corps for the benefit of the community, the resemblance would be perfect. But no one, not even the high-sheriff himself, has the least desire to obtain a single recruit for this forlorn service; the members of which force themselves in a most unwelcome manner upon the state. Still less, if possible, does the government desire to be at the expense of erecting large buildings, and maintaining numerous garrisons of all species of felons. "Banishment of offenders, with a view to example only, in which they have no concern , and to which their individual interests are yet unhesitatingly sacrificed!" Indeed, but they have! He who is punished for theft has still his life to be preserved, and may one day have his property also to be protected by the same law under which he is suffering. One can imagine the strange effect it would produce upon the ignoble army of martyrs which throng our jails, to be told that they were sacrifices to society—victims whom the community was offering up, most unjustifiably, on the altar of its own interests! At first, the idea would be a little dim and mysterious; but, after a short time, the flattering nature of the doctrine would doubtless be sufficient to insure its reception. They would, thereupon, call in the jailer, and the chief spokesman of the party would thus address him:—"We perceive, O jailer! that society is consulting its own interests in our punishment, and not, as it is bound to do, our especial benefit and advantage. As we have learned that stripes and bondage are to be inflicted on no man but for his own good, and as we are all agreed, after considerable experience, that we derive no benefit whatever from them, and you, O jailer! must be satisfied that, as medical treatment, they are worse than inefficacious, we demand, in the name of justice and human reason, our immediate dismissal."

To those who value no information but such as assumes the shape of detail of facts, or can be reduced to figures, and exhibited in the shape of statistical tables, we shall perhaps appear to be wasting time in examining the mere errors of reasoning on this important subject of penal discipline. We think otherwise. We apprehend there is nothing more necessary than to keep active and zealous men steady to first principles in subjects of great general interest. We are not guilty of underrating the value of statistical tables; albeit we have seen figures arrayed against figures, as if there were two arithmetics, as if there were two churches in the doctrines of addition and multiplication; but the truth must be kept in view, that to read statistical tables aright, something more is required than a knowledge of the rules of arithmetic. A few sound principles, based on a knowledge of human nature, and the elementary bonds of human society, may often preserve us from false deductions, which seem to be the sure product of the array of figures that are presented to us.

We intimated that Captain Maconochie's pamphlet contained what appeared to us a valuable contribution towards a good prison discipline. That contribution is simply—the commutation of time of imprisonment for quantity of labour to be performed. The amount of work done by the prisoner could be estimated by certain marks awarded or reckoned to him, and the duration of imprisonment measured by the number of those marks to be earned, instead of a certain fixed number of months or years. This is a very simple idea, and is all the better for its simplicity. The punishment would be probably rendered more effective as a threat, and the moral effect of the punishment, when inflicted, would be much improved. A compulsion to labour (which becomes, in fact, a compulsion of moral motive, as well as of sheer external control) may lead to a permanent habit of industry. There would be all the difference between the listless and disgustful labour of enforced time-work, and a labour in part prompted by the hope of expediting the term of release. An idle vagabond might thus be disciplined and trained into an industrious workman.

We have no doubt that this principle has already been partially applied in the management of our prisons, and perhaps in more instances than we at all suspect; but that it has not yet been extensively applied, or received the trial which it appears to merit, is certain—because such an experiment must have been preceded by a very notorious and signal alteration in our laws.

We should be doing an egregious injustice to Captain Maconochie if we were to judge of him only by the instances we have given of his powers of general reasoning. The perusal of his pamphlets has left in our mind a strong impression of the manly character and practical ability of their writer. If his abstract reasonings are sometimes perverse, we are convinced that his practical good sense is such, that in the management of any enterprise, he would in reality so order his proceedings, that, whatever his pen might do, his conduct would contradict no sound principle of expediency. If it were the object to reclaim a set of felons or vagabonds, and fit them—say for the naval and military service—we are persuaded that the task could not be confided to better hands than those of the gallant Captain. During his residence at Norfolk island, he seems to have obtained the esteem of even the worst of the sad crew he had to discipline; and this, it is evident, without sacrificing a jot of the duties of his station. He is plainly not the man to make any boast of such a matter, or to feel too highly flattered by it. "Instances of individual attachment to myself," he says, at the conclusion of his pamphlet On the Management of Transported Convicts , "I could multiply without number; but these, for obvious reasons, I forbear to quote; and in truth they as often pained me as pleased me, by being too deferential. It is a great and very common mistake, in managing prisoners, to be too much gratified by mere obedience and servility: duplicity is much encouraged by this; and, of two opposite errors, it is better rather to overlook a little occasional insubordination. I cannot refuse, however, to cite two traits, whose character cannot be mistaken. I had a large garden within a few hundred yards of the ticket-of-leave village at Cascade, where from 300 to 400 men lived, four to six in a hut, never locked up, nor under other guard through the night than that of a police sentry, one of their own number. The garden was by the road-side, very imperfectly fenced with open paling, and fully stocked with choice fruit and vegetables, bananas, pine-apples, grapes, melons, and others, which to men on a salt ration must have offered a great temptation; these were constantly under view, yet I scarcely ever lost any. And by a letter, received a few weeks ago, I learn that five men, having picked up an old black silk handkerchief that had belonged to me, have had their prayer books bound with it." 1 1 Amongst the anecdotes which are told in this concluding portion of the pamphlet, we were struck with the following, which affords a striking instance of that tendency to run a-muck from time to time by which some men are unhappily afflicted:—"One of them, at length, showed strong indications of approaching insanity. He became moody, and twice attempted to destroy himself. I thought that possibly change of occupation and diet might benefit him; and I brought him to my own garden in consequence, and sought to feed him up. But he rather got worse. I remonstrated with him; and his answer was a striking one—'When I used to be in this way before, I could get into trouble, (commit an offence, and incur a severe punishment,) and that took it out of me; but now that I try to behave myself, I think that I am going mad altogether.'"