An essay on separate and congregate systems of prison discipline : being a report made to the Boston Prison Discipline Society / by S.G. Howe.

  • Samuel Gridley Howe
Date:
1846
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: An essay on separate and congregate systems of prison discipline : being a report made to the Boston Prison Discipline Society / by S.G. Howe. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

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    a more charitable spirit did not pervade the criticisms bo publicly made, and that those who intended to bring the charge of misrepresentation had not first written to Phila- delphia for an explanation. The charge, as we said, arose from a misunderstanding ; the existence of which shows how important it is that those who write or speak publicly about prison discipline should be familiar with all that is published upon the subjecl in all languages. It appears that a charge of falsification of the record respecting recommittals, similar to the one made at our annual meeting, was brought against the Report of the Eastern Penitentiary ol Pennsylvania, in the Revut rff Le- gislation, published in Paris, in March. 1844 : hut it was immediately and satisfactorily refuted by M. Moreau Chris- tophe. Inspector-General of Prisons m France. He gave precisely the same explanation which occurred to us, and the same which the Directors of the Penitentiary save to us when we applied to them. His impartiality, and his fa- mdiarity with the different modes of calculating recommit- tals, enabled him at once to see the truth.* It is not our duty or wish to explain or defend the Re- port in cpiestion, any farther than to show that the charge of falsehood brought asainst the authors of it is groundless. But, from whatever motive the charge was made, your committee are sure that the Society will be ready to do all in its power to atone for any wromr which may have been done to the character of the Directors of the Eastern Peni- tentiary by any proceeding at its annual meeting. It owes this not only to those gentlemen, but to its own self-re- spect and sense of just ice.f * Beaumont and De Tocquevillr, in then greal work on thi this country, show that they could nol hav< -<> misunderstood the Phila- delphia Report. They say (page 72), — It general, those recommittals only, which frring back the 'prisoner to the prison where He was first confin- ed, are calculated in the United States. t The charge above alluded to was brought at the public annua] meet ing of the Society, in Park Street Church, before a vast audience. It
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