The English Prison System

Evelyn Ruggles-Brise

• Publisher: Library of Alexandria
• Year: 2021
• ISBN:
  9781465661425
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: Literature General
• Index: Literature

Prison Reform is a phrase of many meanings. It is used indifferently by the publicist who is seeking a correct definition of the function of punishment: by the utilitarian who doubts if the official system of administration is fulfilling its State purpose: by the humanitarian whose pity is stirred by the inevitable austerity of a system, inflexibly applied to all who suffer deprivation of liberty, and whose mechanical operation might, in their opinion, be relaxed relatively to the vastly different mental and physical states of all the categories of human beings coming, in one way or another, within the domain of the criminal law. All agree that the System should be, as far as possible, 'Reformatory, ' but many are tempted to overlook that it must be also, if punishment is to have any meaning, coercive, as restraining liberty; deterrent, as an example; and retributory, in the sense of enforcing a penalty for an offence. When Plato said that the object of punishment is to "make an offender good, " he did not intentionally underestimate the 'retributory' theory of punishment. He only meant that, in the language of modern philosophy, we must respect the reversionary rights of humanity, and while inflicting punishment for an anti-social act, must not lose sight of the duty of restoring, if possible, the offender to society as a better man or woman. As stated by the Committee of 1894, we must not regard him or her as "a hopeless and worthless element of the community." It must be admitted that chastisement by pain (i.e. temporary deprivation of liberty and all that that implies) appeals only to the lower nature, but it is effective in suggesting the consciousness of what the system of human rights means—the system which is maintained by a strong collective determination that it shall not be violated with impunity. This is commonly called 'retribution, ' but it has nothing to do with vindictiveness or private vengeance. Society without such a collective determination to resent and punish anti-social acts would be a welter of anarchy and disorder. Let us not then be tempted in the goodness of our hearts, and in the strength of our human pity and sympathy, to overlook the necessary foundation of punishment, which is the assertion of the system of rights by pain or penalty—not pain in its physical sense, but pain that comes from degradation and the loss of self-respect.