The history of the tread-mill : containing an account of its origin, construction, operation, effects as it respects the health and morals of the convicts, with their treatment and diet. Also, a general view of the penitentiary system, with alterations necessary to be introduced into our criminal code, for its improvement / by James Hardie, A.M.
- James Hardie
- Date:
- 1824
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: The history of the tread-mill : containing an account of its origin, construction, operation, effects as it respects the health and morals of the convicts, with their treatment and diet. Also, a general view of the penitentiary system, with alterations necessary to be introduced into our criminal code, for its improvement / by James Hardie, A.M. 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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![ry little hope of penitence or reformation, so long as there is hope of escaping punishment. A single spark H>f hope will support amine], which without it would sink into contrition and repentance. It is probable that pardons have been granted more lavishly in this state than in any other in the Union, and the consequence has been peculiarly disastrous. In a very interesting and luminous report, presented to the Honourable the Senate by Samuel M. Hopkins Esq. on the Penitentiary System in our own state, in the session of 1821. It states the overwhelming fact, that since the State-Prison was opened in the year 1796, till that peri- od, the total number of convicts committed to the State- Prison, was 5,069, of whom more than one half have been pardoned ; that is 2,819. But for this excessive liberality of our governors in granting pardons, no great blame can be attached to them, as they were frequently driven to the measure by imperious necessity. Our State-Prison had been built to accommodate 300 persons, and more than 700 have been confined in it at once. From this crowded state of the prison, as is observed in a report to the legislature in 1817, the Judges of the Supreme Court have been obliged to recommend for pardon, and the executive to exercise his constitutional power of pardoning, merely for the purpose of making room for the reception of new offenders. The sentence of the law must, in the first in- stance, be complied with ; the convicts must be received in the prison, and put to labour ; but before their time of service has half expired, it has been found indispensa- ble to get rid of them, in order to make room for others, under similar circumstances. Since this report was made, however, some mitigation of the evil must have taken place, in consequence of the erection of the new prison at Auburn. On the whole, this abuse of executive justice strikes at the root and contravenes the end of all criminal codes. This truth has been seen andfelt in o her countries be- sides our own. Beccaria, Sir Samuel Romily, and Mr, Colquhoun, reprehended it on the other side of the wa>](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b21126458_0053.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
