Historical Origins and Evolution of Corrections

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3 Correctional History The 17th to 20th Centuries

© Mary Stohr

Media Library

CHAPTER 3 Media Library

P R E M I U M V I D E OP R E M I U M V I D E O

C a r e e r V i d e oC a r e e r V i d e o

Payne career video 3.1: Corrections Sergeant

S AG E N e w s C l i pS AG E N e w s C l i p

SAGE News Clip 3.1: Texas Prison Reform

SAGE News Clip 3.2: US Senate Criminal Justice

J o u r n a l A r t i c l eJ o u r n a l A r t i c l e

Journal Article 3.1: Broken Beyond Repair: Rehabilitative Penology and American Political Development

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LEARNING OBJECTIVES

• Describe the origins of early modern prisons

• Evaluate the two predominate prison systems of the early 1800s and their strengths and weaknesses

• Summarize what the social critics (Beaumont, Tocqueville, and Dix)

thought of the early prisons and why

• Explain why reform of prisons and jails was needed and how those reform efforts worked out

• Assess where we are today in America in terms of prison types and how we got there

• Describe the prevailing themes in correctional history

TEST YOUR KNOWLEDGE

Test your current knowledge of correctional history by answering the following questions. Check your answers on page 389 after reading the chapter.

1. What are the main differences between the Pennsylvania prison system and the New York prison system? Which system did most of America adopt and why?

2. Most scholars believe that the Walnut Street Jail, as refurbished, became the first American prison in 1790. (True or false?)

3. The Auburn Prison featured complete separation from other

inmates. (True or false?)

4. The complete separation of inmates was abandoned under the New York system of prisons. (True or false?)

5. After visiting the Eastern Pennsylvania Prison, Charles Dickens was an advocate for the “silent and separate” system of the Pennsylvania prisons. (True or false?)

6. To maintain control during the early years at the Auburn and Sing Sing prisons, the liberal use of “the lash,” along with other methods, was required. (True or false?)

7. Dorothea Dix favored the New York prison system over the Pennsylvania prison system. (True or false?)

8. The 1870 American Prison Congress was held to celebrate the successes of prisons. (True or false?)

9. The Elmira Reformatory used the marks system to encourage good behavior. (True or false?)

10. To be termed a correctional institution, a prison should have some rehabilitation programming for inmates. (True or false?)

JIM CROW TREATMENT IN PRISONS

A black Folsom [prison] inmate named W. Mills complained about this [the racial segregation of prison jobs in the 1940s] in a letter to the Governor’s Investigating Committee in 1943. “Our servitude here is limited to inferior work. The only work that is given to Negroes is such as porter work, digging in the ground and breaking rock or whatever else the white inmates don’t want to do.” Among the most powerful testimonies offered to racial segregation in the California Prison System came from Wesley Robert Wells, a black prisoner who contested the conditions of prison Jim Crow, and whose death sentence for throwing an ashtray at a guard became a rallying point for civil rights and radical labor advocates in the 1950s. Wells explained that racism abounded in the California Prison System when he arrived there in 1928. “There was a lot of jimcrow [sic] stuff in Quentin in those days— just like there is now, and if you objected you were a marked number. . . . I was young and I held my head up. I didn’t take no stuff from prisoner, stoolie, or guard. As a

result, I got it bad. I got the strap, the

rubber hose, the club, the curses” (Blue, 2012, pp. 66–67).

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INTRODUCTION: THE GRAND REFORMS

In this chapter, we review the attributes of the seminal prison models of the early 1800s known as the Pennsylvania prison system (including the Walnut Street Jail and the Western and Eastern Pennsylvania prisons) and the New York prison system (including the Auburn and Sing Sing prisons). We include the eyewitness accounts of the operation of such systems during their early years as these are provided by Beaumont, Tocqueville, and Dix.

Out of these two systems, the rampart for all American prisons, and many European prisons, was constructed. As it became clear that neither prison model accomplished its multifaceted goals, and that its operation was so distorted and horrific for inmates, changes were gradually made as new reform efforts ensued. The Elmira Prison in New York was perhaps the most ambitious of these efforts during the latter part of the 1800s, which in turn set the stage for the later

development of correctional institutions. Although the implementation of the reform ideals at Elmira is much critiqued, it certainly was much more humane than the convict leasing system that operated at that time in the South. The Folsom Prison in California during the 1940s, with its racial segregation, men laboring in rock quarries for lack of better work, and little programming (as described by inmate Wells), is representative of the Big Houses that preceded more concentrated efforts at rehabilitation that came with correctional institutions of the 1960s and 1970s. (More about these topics is presented later in the chapter.)

What does become crystal clear from this two-chapter review of the history of corrections in the United States is that there are several themes that run through it. One such theme, of course, is the cyclical need for reform itself, but to what purpose it is not always clear.

EARLY MODERN PRISONS AND THE PENNSYLVANIA AND NEW YORK MODELS

THE WALNUT STREET JAIL

The Walnut Street Jail was originally constructed in 1773 in Philadelphia and operated as a typical local jail of the time:

holding pretrial detainees and minor offenders; failing to separate by gender, age, or offense; using the fee system, which penalized the poor and led to the near starvation of some; and offering better accommodations and even access to liquor and sex to those who could pay for it (Zupan, 1991). It was remodeled in 1790, however, and reconceptualized so that many correctional scholars, but not all, regard it as the first prison.

The remodeled cell house was of frame construction and was built for the inmates of the “prison” section of the jail, with a separate cell for each inmate. Based on the reforms that Howard (and later Bentham and Fry) had envisioned for English and European jails, several reforms were instituted in this prison; the fee system was dropped, inmates were adequately clothed and fed regardless of their ability to pay, and they were separated by gender and offense. Children were not incarcerated in the prison, and debtors were separated from convicted felons. Although inmates were to live in isolated cells (to avoid “contaminating” each other), some work requirements brought them together. In addition, medical care was provided and attendance at religious services was required. The availability of alcohol and access to members of the opposite sex and prostitutes were stopped.

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I. N. Phelps Stokes. Collection of American Histori-

cal Prints

PHOTO 3.2: Drawing of the Walnut Street Jail (circa 1799).

The impetus for this philosophical change came from the reform efforts of the Philadelphia Society for Alleviating the Miseries of Public Prisons (or the Philadelphia Prison Society, currently known as the Pennsylvania Prison Society), led by Benjamin Rush, who was a physician, reformer, statesman, and signatory of the Declaration of Independence. Rush agitated for laws to improve the jail’s conditions of confinement and a different belief about correctional institutions— namely, that they could be used to reform their inmates (Nagel, 1973; Roberts, 1997). Ideally, the Walnut Street Jail (prison) was to operate based on the religious beliefs of the Quakers, with their emphasis on the reflective study of the Bible and abhorrence of violence that was so prevalent in other correctional entities. In 1789, the General Assembly of

Pennsylvania enacted legislation based on these recommendations and the Pennsylvania prison system was born (Nagel, 1973).

The Walnut Street Jail, as a prison, was also an entity with a philosophy of penitence that, it was hoped, would lead to reform and redemption. This philosophy was combined with an architectural arrangement shaped to facilitate it by ensuring that inmates were mostly in solitary cells. As Roberts (1997) aptly noted, the reason why the Walnut Street Jail’s new wing was the first real prison, as opposed to the other prisons such as Newgate of Connecticut that preceded it or some of the early European prisons, was “because it carried out incarceration as punishment, implemented a rudimentary classification system, featured individual cells, and was intended to provide a place for offenders to do penance—hence the term ‘penitentiary’” (p. 26).

But in reality, the Walnut Street Jail soon became crowded, reportedly housing four times its capacity. As Johnston (2010) noted, “At one point 30 to 40 inmates were sleeping on blankets on the floor of rooms [that were] 18 feet square” (p. 13). Moreover, the institutional industry buildings that provided work for inmates burned down, leading to idleness, and by 1816 the Walnut Street Jail (prison) was little different from what it had been

before the reforms (Harris, 1973; Zupan, 1991).

As Beaumont and Tocqueville (1833/1964) commented in 1831, after visiting and analyzing several prisons and jails in the United States, the implementation of the Walnut Street Jail had “two principal faults: it corrupted by contamination [of] those who worked together. It corrupted by indolence, the individuals who were plunged into solitude” (p. 38).

NEWGATE PRISON—NEW YORK CITY

Yet another Newgate Prison, in New York City (1797), was modeled after the Walnut Street Jail prison (as were early prisons in Trenton, New Jersey [1798]; Richmond, Virginia [1800]; Charlestown, Massachusetts [1805]; and Baltimore, Maryland [1811]) and even improved on that model in some respects (Roberts, 1997). Thomas Eddy, the warden of Newgate, was a Quaker. The focus at the Newgate Prison in New York was on rehabilitation, religious redemption, and work programs to support prison upkeep; it did not use corporal punishment. The builders of Newgate even constructed a prison hospital and school for the inmates. Unfortunately, because of crowding, single celling for any but the most violent inmates was not possible, and a number of outbreaks of violence erupted (such as a

riot in 1802).

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THE PENNSYLVANIA PRISON MODEL (SEPARATE SYSTEM)

The Western Pennsylvania Prison (1821) was built in Pittsburgh, followed by the Eastern Pennsylvania Prison (1829) in Philadelphia, which was to replace the Walnut Street Jail prison (Nagel, 1973). The Western Pennsylvania Prison, built 8 years before the Eastern Pennsylvania Prison, is little remarked on or studied in comparison with Eastern. It was devised to operate in a solitary and separate fashion. Even labor was to be prohibited because it was thought that this might interfere with the ability of the criminal to reflect and feel remorse for his or her crime (Hirsch, 1992). Despite the lessons learned from the Auburn prison—namely, that complete separation without labor can be injurious to the person and expensive for the state to maintain (a point made by Tocqueville and Beaumont)—the Western Pennsylvania Prison was built to hold inmates in complete solitary confinement (hence the use of the term separate system), with no labor, for the full span of their sentence. However, as Beaumont and Tocqueville (1833/1964) remarked about the Western Pennsylvania Prison, reducing all communication, and thus contamination in the authors’ view, was

almost impossible at this prison:

Each one was shut up, day and night in a cell, in which no labor was allowed to him. This solitude, which in principle was to be absolute, was not such in fact. The construction of this penitentiary is so defective, that it is very easy to hear in one cell what is going on in another; so that each prisoner found in the communication with his neighbor a daily recreation, i.e. an opportunity of inevitable corruption. As these criminals did not work, we may say that their sole occupation consisted in mutual corruption. This prison, therefore, was worse than even that of Walnut Street, because, owing to the communication with each other, the prisoners at Pittsburgh (Western Pennsylvania Prison) were as little occupied with their reformation, as those at Walnut Street. And while the latter indemnified society in a degree by the produce of their labor, the others spent their whole time in idleness, injurious to themselves and burdensome to the public treasury. (p. 44)

As a consequence of these problems of architecture and operation, the Western Pennsylvania Prison as a model was abandoned and the Eastern Pennsylvania Prison came to epitomize the

Mike Graham/Flickr

PHOTO 3.2: The Eastern Pennsylvania Prison was the largest building in America during the 1820s. (Lithograph, circa 1855)

“Pennsylvania System,” as opposed to the “New York System,” of building and operating prisons. At the Eastern Pennsylvania Prison, known as “Cherry Hill” for much of its 150 years of operation, the idea that inmates could be contaminated or corrupted by their fellow inmates was officially embraced.

The Eastern Pennsylvania Prison was designed and built by the architect John Haviland, a relative newcomer from England. It cost three-quarters of a million dollars to build, which was an incredible expenditure for the time. It was the largest building in America during the 1820s (Alosi, 2008; Orland, 1975). The prison itself was huge, with seven massive stone spokes of cells radiating off of a central rotunda, as on a wheel. A 30-foot wall was

The Pentonville Prison

constructed around the outside perimeter of the prison, thus physically and symbolically reinforcing the separation of the prison and its inhabitants from their community (Nagel, 1973). The cells were built large (15 by 7.5 feet with 12-foot ceilings), and those on the lowest tier had their own small outside exercise yard attached, so that inmates could do virtually everything in their cells (Harris, 1973; Orland, 1975). The cells had both hot water and flush toilets, reportedly the first public building in the country to have such amenities. There were 400 solitary cells in this prison (Orland, 1975). At first inmates were not to work, but that dictate was later changed and they were allowed to work in their cells (Harris, 1973). As Johnston (2010) explained,

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COMPARATIVE PERSPECTIVE

Although most American prisons of the 19th century ended up copying the Auburn and Sing Sing (New York model) prisons in design and operation, the Pentonville Prison, opened in London, England, in 1842, was modeled on the Pennsylvania prisons (Ignatieff, 1978). Inmates were confined in their rather large

cells for most of the day except for chapel (where they had their own solitary box) and recreation (where they had their own isolated yard). In their cells, inmates worked on crafts and at looms. As with the Pennsylvania prisons, at Pentonville silence was enforced and inmates were sent to solitary dungeon rooms for disobeying the rules. But also as with the Pennsylvania prisons, inmates devised ways to communicate between cells by tapping messages to each other at night. At first, as with the Pennsylvania prisons and initially with the Auburn Prison, inmates were confined completely to their cells for 18 months. However, as inmates experienced the predictable mental illnesses associated with this isolation, such periods were eventually reduced to 9 months for new inmates (Ignatieff, 1978).

The solution to the problem of criminal contamination for the reformers was to be a regimen of near-total isolation and absolute separation of prisoners from one another, the use of numbers rather than names, and a program of work, vocational training, and religious instruction, all taking place within the

inmate’s individual cell. (p. 13)

The only contact inmates were to have with the outside was with the clergy and some vocational teachers: “The reading of the Scriptures would furnish the offender with the moral guidance necessary for reform” (Nagel, 1973, p. 7). They had no access to visitors, letters, or newspapers. Even their exercise yards were surrounded by a high stone fence. When they were brought into the prison and were taken for showers or to see the doctor, they needed to wear a mask or a draped hood so as to maintain their anonymity and to prevent them from figuring out a way to escape (Alosi, 2008). As to how else they could occupy their time, “They made shoes, wove and dyed cloth products, caned chairs, and rolled cigars. Those products were sold to defray prison costs” (Roberts, 1997, p. 33).

The stated purpose of the solitary confinement was to achieve reform or rehabilitation. Quakers believed that God resides in everyone, and for a person to reach God he or she must reflect. Silence is required for self-reflection, the Quakers thought. The Quakers also believed that because God was in everyone, all were equal and were deserving of respect (Alosi, 2008).

Solitary confinement as a practical matter remained in existence at the Eastern Penitentiary until after the Civil War, but it

was not formally ended until 1913 (Alosi, 2008). When it was rigorously applied, there are indications that it drove some inmates insane. In fact, and tellingly, most of the European countries that copied the Eastern Pennsylvania model and its architecture did not isolate the inmates for this reason. Moreover, at a minimum, solitary confinement debilitated people by making them incapable of dealing with other people. For instance, the wardens’ journals for the Eastern Pennsylvania Prison during the early years indicate that it was not uncommon for an inmate to be released and then ask to be reinstated at Eastern because he or she did not know how to live freely. Some inmates, once released, would actually sit on the curb outside the prison because they said they no longer understood the outside world or how to function in it (Alosi, 2008).

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ETHICAL ISSUE

What Would You Do?

You are a new pastor in the Eastern State Penitentiary when Charles Dickens, the celebrated English author, visits the prison in 1842. Your position is tenuous at the prison, and you have been told it is dependent on

your meticulous adherence to the rule

of silence for inmates. Although you are not a proponent of this kind of control of inmates, the warden has made it clear to you that your livelihood and that of your family (you have eight children) depend on your complete compliance. For some reason, Dickens chooses to visit inmate cells and observe them while they work making shoes or weaving. You have been instructed to report whether inmates speak or even look at Dickens (because they have been instructed not to do so under penalty of confinement in a segregation cell for months with only food and water). During the course of your rounds you note that Dickens routinely and secretively—presumably so as to protect inmates from punishment— attempts to engage inmates in conversation. In a few instances, you have overheard inmates whisper responses to his queries. You cannot be sure that a guard has not also observed this behavior and has seen you in the vicinity when it occurred. What would you do? Would you report the offense? Would you ask Dickens to stop speaking to inmates (or would you just ask for his autograph)?

Although the separation of inmates under

the Pennsylvania prison system was to be complete, there are indications that it was not. In testimony before a special investigation by a joint committee of the houses of the Pennsylvania Legislature in 1834 (before the whole prison was even completed), it was noted that a number of male and female inmates (there were a small number of female inmates housed separately at the Eastern Pennsylvania Prison) were used for maintenance, cleaning, and cooking at the facility and roamed freely around it, speaking and interacting with each other and staff (Johnston, 2010). Moreover, there were indications from this testimony that inmates were tortured to maintain discipline; one prisoner had died of blood loss from the iron gag put in his mouth, and another went insane after buckets of cold water were poured on his head repeatedly. It was alleged that food and supplies meant for inmates were given to guards or community members by the prison cook (who was a wife of one of the guards). There were also indications of the use and abuse of alcohol by staff and inmates and of sexual improprieties involving the warden and his clerk, some male inmates, and the female cook. Although ultimately charges against the warden and his clerk related to these improprieties were dropped, the cook was blamed and the guards who testified about the scandal (the whistleblowers) were fired.

In addition to these problems of implementation at the Eastern Pennsylvania Prison, a debate raged among prison experts regarding the value of separation. As a result of the experiment with the Western Pennsylvania Prison and the early use of the Eastern prison and the Auburn prison (which we describe further on), the idea of “total separation” was under siege. As mentioned in the foregoing, it was observed that for those truly subjected to it, solitary confinement and separation caused serious psychological problems for some inmates. Despite these problems, about 300 prisons worldwide copied the Eastern Pennsylvania model, and tens of thousands of men and women did time there, including the 1920s gangster Al Capone. It was a famous prison worldwide because of its philosophy, its architecture, and its huge size. It even became a tourist attraction during the 19th century to the extent that famous English author Charles Dickens noted it as one of the two sights he wanted to see when visiting the United States (the other was Niagara Falls) (Alosi, 2008). It turned out, after a visit of a few hours and talking to inmates, keepers, and the warden, that Dickens was far from impressed with its operation (see In Focus 3.1).

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AUBURN, SING SING, AND THE

NEW YORK (CONGREGATE) SYSTEM

The New York model for imprisonment was preferred over the Pennsylvania system, and copied extensively by American prison builders, in part because it disavowed the solitary confinement that Dickens and others lamented in the Pennsylvania prisons. Beaumont and Tocqueville (1833/1964) commented that the use of solitary confinement as normal practice for all inmates was ended at Auburn because it drove inmates insane. But it is not that the builders and planners for the Auburn Prison in New York learned from the Pennsylvania system; rather, they learned from their own dalliance with solitary confinement. At first, the inmates of Auburn were housed in solitary confinement in their cells, a practice that was abandoned by 1822 because it led to mental anguish and insanity for inmates and it hampered the efficient production of goods that can be done only in the congregate. By 1822, a total of 5 prisoners had died, 1 had gone insane, and the remaining 26 were pardoned by the governor of New York because their mental faculties had deteriorated to such a great extent (Harris, 1973, p. 73). The governor ordered that inmates be allowed to leave their cells and work during the day, and a legislative committee in 1824 recommended the repeal of the solitary confinement laws (Harris, 1973).

Beaumont and Tocqueville (1833/1964) supported the practice of maintaining the solitude of inmates at night and their silence during the day as they worked because they believed, along with the Quakers of Pennsylvania, that solitude and silence led to reflection and reformation and also reduced cross-contamination of inmates. As to labor, they claimed, “It fatigues the body and relieves the soul,” along with supplementing the income of the state to support the prison (p. 57).

The Auburn (New York) Prison cornerstone was laid in 1816. It received its first inmates in 1817, but it was not finished until 1819 (Harris, 1973). Elam Lynds (1784–1855), a strict disciplinarian and former army captain, was its first warden in 1821. Auburn has been in existence ever since (202 years at the time of this writing in 2017), although its name changed to the Auburn Correctional Institution in 1970.

Auburn’s cells were built back to back with corridors on each side. The prison has always had a Gothic appearance, and its elaborate front and massive walls have been maintained up until today, with towers and a fortress facade.

The Auburn Prison has a storied history that spans the virtual beginning of prisons in the United States to the present day. As was already noted, Beaumont and

Tocqueville visited Auburn and recommended it over the Pennsylvania prisons. Auburn opened with a solitary confinement system, which was very quickly abandoned, and replaced it with the congregate, but silent, system, which formally lasted until the beginning of the 20th century. It was the progenitor of such widely adopted practices as the “lockstep” walk for inmates, the striped prison uniforms and the classification system that went hand in hand with them, and the well- known ball and chain. Warden Lynds believed in strict obedience on the part of inmates and the use of the whip by staff to ensure it (Clear et al., 2011). Under his regime, inmates were forbidden to talk to or even glance at each other during work and meals. Solitary confinement and flogging were used for punishing and controlling inmates. As noted in the foregoing, except for a few years at the beginning of Auburn’s history, inmates were single-celled at night and the cells were quite small, even coffin-like (7 × 7 × 3.5 feet), and during the day the inmates worked together, but silently, in factories and shops (Roberts, 1997).

© Philip Scalia/Alamy

PHOTO 3.4: Auburn Prison, built in 1816, is still in operation today, although its name has changed to the Auburn Correctional Institution.

Peter Greenberg

PHOTO 3.5: Sing Sing Prison, modeled after the Auburn Prison, was built by inmates from Auburn Prison in 1825.

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IN FOCUS 3.1

© iStockphoto.com/GeorgiosArt

PHOTO 3.3: Charles Dickens

IN FOCUS 3.1

Charles Dickens’s Impressions of the Eastern Pennsylvania Prison and the Silent System in 1842

In its intention, I am well convinced that it is kind, humane, and meant for reformation; but I am persuaded that those who devised this system of Prison Discipline, and those benevolent gentlemen who carry it into execution, do not know what it is that they are doing. I believe that very few men are capable of estimating the immense amount of

torture and agony which this dreadful punishment, prolonged for years, inflicts upon the sufferers; and in guessing at it myself, and in reasoning from what I have seen written upon their faces, and what to my certain knowledge they feel within, I am only the more convinced that there is a depth of terrible endurance in it which none but the sufferers themselves can fathom, and which no man has a right to inflict upon his fellow-creature. I hold this slow and daily tampering with the mysteries of the brain, to be immeasurably worse than any torture of the body: and because its ghastly signs and tokens are not so palpable to the eye and sense of touch as scars upon the flesh; because its wounds are not upon the surface, and it extorts few cries that human ears can hear; therefore I the more denounce it, as a secret punishment which slumbering humanity is not roused up to stay.

I was accompanied to this prison by two gentlemen officially connected with its management, and passed the day in going from cell to cell, and talking with the inmates. Every facility was afforded me, that the utmost courtesy could suggest. Nothing was concealed or hidden from my view, and every piece of

information that I sought, was openly and frankly given. The perfect order of the building cannot be praised too highly, and of the excellent motives of all who are immediately concerned in the administration of the system, there can be no kind of question. . . .

Standing at the central point, and looking down these dreary passages, the dull repose and quiet that prevails, is awful. Occasionally, there is a drowsy sound from some lone weaver’s shuttle, or shoemaker’s last, but it is stifled by the thick walls and heavy dungeon-door, and only serves to make the general stillness more profound. Over the head and face of every prisoner who comes into this melancholy house, a black hood is drawn; and in this dark shroud, an emblem of the curtain dropped between him and the living world, he is led to the cell from which he never again comes forth, until his whole term of imprisonment has expired. He never hears of wife and children; home or friends; the life or death of any single creature. He sees the prison-officers, but with that exception he never looks upon a human countenance, or hears a human voice. He is a man buried alive; to be dug out in the slow round of years; and in the mean time dead to everything but torturing anxieties

and horrible despair. . . .

My firm conviction is that, independent of the mental anguish it occasions—an anguish so acute and so tremendous, that all imagination of it must fall far short of the reality— it wears the mind into a morbid state, which renders it unfit for the rough contact and busy action of the world. It is my fixed opinion that those who have undergone this punishment, MUST pass into society again morally unhealthy and diseased. (Dickens, 1842, n.p.)

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The small cells like those at Auburn Prison were cheaper to build, and prisons could house more inmates in the same amount of space than prisons with larger cells. In addition, congregate work allowed for the more efficient production of more products, and thus more profit could be made (Roberts, 1997). However, putting all of these inmates together in one place presented some difficulties in terms of control and management. This is why the control techniques represented by the use of the lash, solitary confinement, and marching in lockstep and the requirement of silence came into play. As Roberts (1997) noted, “Ironically, whereas the penitentiary concept was developed as a

humane alternative to corporal

punishment, corporal punishment returned as a device to manage inmates in penitentiaries based on the Auburn System” (p. 44).

The Sing Sing Prison was modeled after the Auburn Prison architecturally in that the cells were small and there were congregate areas for group work by inmates, but its cell blocks were tiered and very long. Inmate management and operations exactly mirrored the Auburn protocols. In fact, Sing Sing was built by Auburn inmates under the supervision of Auburn’s Warden Lynds.

The prison was built on the Hudson River, near the town of Sing Sing and Mount Pleasant (and for many years the prison was referred to as Mount Pleasant), from locally quarried stone. Products produced at the prison could be transported to local towns via the river. Inmates sent there would refer to it as being sent “up the river” because it is 30 miles north of New York City (Conover, 2001). Its name derives from the Indian phrase Sint Sinks, which came from the older term Ossine Ossine and ironically means “stone upon stone” (Lawes, 1932, p. 68).

Warden Lynds picked 100 men from the Auburn Prison to build Sing Sing Prison in 1825. The story of its construction, in silence, as relayed by Lewis Lawes, a later

warden of Sing Sing, goes like this:

Captain Lynds, then the foremost penologist of the day, was insistent, to the point of hysteria, on silence as the backbone of prison administration. “It is the duty of convicts to preserve an unbroken silence,” was the first rule he laid down. “They are not to exchange a word with each other under any pretense whatever; not to communicate any intelligence to each other in writing. They are not to exchange looks, wink, laugh, or motion to each other. They must not sing, whistle, dance, run, jump, or do anything which has a tendency in the least degree to disturb the harmony or contravene to disturb the rules and regulations of the prison.” . . . The sea gulls in the broad river, darting in large flocks here and there on the water, chirped raucously at these strange creatures sweating at their tasks in silence. Stone upon stone. (Lawes, 1932, pp. 72–73)

Once Sing Sing Prison was constructed, it was noticed that with some effort inmates could communicate between the closely aligned cells, but nothing was done to rebuild the cells. Moreover, because the inmates from the old New York Newgate Prison were moved to Sing Sing right away, as were additional inmates from Auburn Prison, the prison was full at 800 inmates

by 1830 (Lawes, 1932).

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Prison labor during the early years of prisons (before the Civil War) was contract labor and subject to abuse. Contractors would pay a set amount for inmates’ labor and then would make sure they got the most work out of them, cutting costs where they could and bribing wardens and keepers when they needed to do so. Eventually, such contracts were ended because the cheap labor made prison- produced goods too competitive with products made by free workers (Conover, 2001).

When one thinks about old prisons, those castle-like fortress prisons, the image of Auburn and Sing Sing inmates and prisons come to mind, even unknowingly. So many U.S. prisons copied the New York design and operation of these prisons that even if one is not thinking of Auburn or Sing Sing per se, one is likely imagining a copy of them. By the time Beaumont and Tocqueville (1833/1964) visited the United States in 1831, they reported that the Auburn Prison had already been copied in prisons built in Massachusetts, Maryland, Tennessee, Kentucky, Maine, and Vermont.

It was not just the physical structure or the silent, but congregate, inmate

management that was copied from Auburn and Sing Sing prisons; it was the inmate discipline system as well. Orland (1975) summarized the Connecticut prison regulations of the 1830s, which were borrowed from the New York model:

Inmates were exhorted to be “industrious, submissive, and obedient”; to “labor diligently in silence”; they were forbidden to “write or receive a letter” or to communicate in any manner “with or to persons” without the warden’s permission; they were prohibited from engaging in conversation “with another prisoner” without permission or to “speak to, or look at, visitors.” (p. 26)

EARLY PRISONS AND JAILS NOT REFORMED

Lest one be left with the impression that all prisons and jails during the early 1800s in America were reformed, we should emphasize that this was not the case. Beaumont and Tocqueville (1833/1964) commented, for instance, on the fact that the New Jersey prisons, right across the river from the reformist New York system, were vice ridden and that Ohio prisons, although ruled by a humanitarian law, were “barbarous,” with half of the inmates in irons and “the rest plunged into an infected dungeon” (p. 49). But in New Orleans,

Louisiana, they found the worst, with inmates incarcerated with hogs. “In locking up criminals, nobody thinks of rendering them better, but only of taming their malice; they are put in chains like ferocious beasts; and instead of being corrected, they are rendered brutal” (p. 49).

As to jails, Beaumont and Tocqueville (1833/1964) noticed no reforms at all. Inmates who were presumed innocent, or if guilty had generally committed a much less serious offense than those sent to prison, were incarcerated in facilities far worse in construction and operation than prisons even in states where prison reform had occurred. During colonial times, inmates in American jails were kept in house-like facilities and were allowed much more freedom, albeit with few amenities that they did not pay for themselves. Dix (1843/1967) described many jails, particularly those that did not separate inmates, as a “free school of vice.” However, as the institutionalization movement began for prisons, jails copied their large locked-up and controlled atmosphere without any philosophy of reform to guide their construction or operation (Goldfarb, 1975). By mid- century, some jails had employed the silent or separate systems popular in prisons, but most were merely congregate and poorly managed holding facilities (Dix, 1843/1967). Such facilities on the East Coast by the latter quarter of the 1800s

were old, crowded, and full of the “corruptions” that the new prisons were trying to prevent (Goldfarb, 1975). In the end, Beaumont and Tocqueville (1833/1964) blamed the lack of reform of prisons in some states, and the failure to reform jails hardly at all, on the fact that there were independent state and local governments that handled crime and criminals differently: “These shocking contradictions proceed chiefly from the want of unison in the various parts of government in the United States” (p. 49).

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PRISONS: “THE SHAME OF ANOTHER GENERATION”

The creation of prisons was a grand reform promoted by principled people who were appalled at the brutality of discipline wielded against those in their communities. Prisons were an exciting development supported by Enlightenment ideals of humanity and the promise of reformation. They were developed over centuries, in fits and starts, and had their genesis in other modes of depriving people of liberty (e.g., galley slavery, transportation, jails, bridewells, houses of corrections, early versions of prisons), but they were meant to be much better—so much better—than these.

It is not clear whether the problems arose

for prisons in their implementation or in their basic conceptualization. In societies where the poor and dispossessed exist among institutions in which law and practice serve to maintain their status, it is no wonder that prisons, as a social institution that reflects the values and beliefs of that society, would serve to reinforce this status. All indications are that most prisons, even those that were lauded as the most progressive during an earlier age of reform, were by the mid- 19th century regarded as violent and degrading places for their inmates and staff.

IN FOCUS 3.2

Lewis E. Lawes’s Observations About Sing Sing History and Discipline

In 1920, Lawes began his tenure as Sing Sing Prison warden and later commented on how the severity of prison discipline had waxed and waned at this prison over the years. At first it was very severe, with the use of the “cat-of-nine-tails” whip. “It was made of long strips of leather, attached to a stout wooden handle, and was not infrequently wired at the tips. The ‘cat’ preferred its victim barebacked” (Lawes, 1932, pp. 74– 75). Under a warden in 1840,

however, the cat was retired and inmates could have a few visits and letters. A Sunday school and library were constructed, and the warden walked among the men. Within a few years, however, a new warden was appointed with a new political party in power, and all of the reforms were abandoned and the cat was resurrected. A few years later, when a reportedly insane inmate was literally whipped to death, the public was outraged and the use of the lash declined for men and was prohibited for women. The prison discipline was consequently softened, and this cycle continued for the rest of the 1800s, from severe to soft discipline. Lawes maintained, after reviewing all of the wardens’ reports since the opening of Sing Sing, that escapes were highest during times of severe punishment despite the risks inmates took should they be caught.

He also observed that the prison had problems with management and control in other ways, noting that by 1845 an outside accountant found that the prison held 20 fewer female inmates and 33 fewer male inmates than it had officially on the books, that $32,000 was missing, and that there was no explanation as to where these people were or where the money had gone (Lawes, 1932, p. 82).

The warden’s and other official reports indicated that inmates were poorly fed and that diseases were rampant at Sing Sing. By 1859, some of Sing Sing’s small cells became doubles to accommodate the overcrowding, and the punishments got worse. By 1904, the official report was that the prison was in a disgraceful condition. Lawes (1932) wrote, “Such was the Sing Sing of the Nineteenth Century. A hopeless, oppressive, barren spot. Escapes were frequent, attempts at escape almost daily occurrences. Suicides were common” (p. 88).

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DOROTHEA DIX’S EVALUATION OF PRISONS AND JAILS

Dorothea Dix was a humanitarian, a teacher, and a penal and insane asylum reformer who, after 4 years of studying prisons, jails, and almshouses in northeastern and midwestern states, wrote the book Remarks on Prisons and Prison Discipline in the United States in 1843 (revised in 1845 and reprinted in 1967). The data for her book were assembled from multiple observations at prisons; conversations and correspondence with staff, wardens, and inmates in prisons; and a review of prisons’

annual reports.

Dix tended to prefer the Pennsylvania model over the New York model because she thought inmates benefited from separation from others. However, she forcefully argued that both prison models that had promised so much in terms of reform for inmates were in fact abject failures in that regard. She found these and most prisons to be understaffed and overcrowded and with inept leadership that changed much too often. She noted that at Sing Sing Prison about 1,200 lashes, using the cat-of-nine-tails whip, were administered every month to about 200 men, an amount she thought was too severe even though she believed the use of the lash, especially in understaffed and overcrowded prisons like Sing Sing and Auburn, was necessary to maintain order (Dix, 1843/1967). In contrast, at the Eastern Penitentiary she commented that punishments included mostly solitary confinement in darkened cells, which to her appeared to lead to changed behavior of recalcitrant inmates. Dix (1843/1967) argued that, as far as inmate discipline goes, “Man is not made better by being degraded; he is seldom restrained from crime by harsh measures” (p. 4).

Thus, Dix argued against the long sentences for minor offenses that she found in prisons of the day (e.g., Richmond, Virginia; Columbus, Ohio; Concord,

Library of Congress

PHOTO 3.6: Dorothea Dix was a humanitarian, a teacher, and a penal and insane asylum reformer who, after 4

Massachusetts; Providence, Rhode Island) and the disparity in sentencing from place to place. She thought that such sentences not only were unjust but also led to insubordination by inmates and staff who recognized the arbitrary nature of the justice system. On the other hand, in her study of prisons, she found that the pardoning power was used too often, and this again led, she thought, to less trust in the just and fair nature of the system and to insubordination of its inmates.

years of study of prisons, jails, and almshouses in northeastern and midwestern states, wrote the book Remarks on Prisons and Prison Discipline in the United States in 1843.

Dix also remarked on the quality and availability of food and water for inmates in early correctional facilities. She found the food to be adequate in most places except Sing Sing, where there was no place to dine at the time of the second edition of her book (1845), and the water to be inadequate in most places except the Pennsylvania prisons, where it was piped into all of the cells. Her comments on the health, heating, clothing, cleanliness, and sanity of inmates were also detailed by institution and indicated that although there were recurrent problems with these issues in prisons of the time, some prisons (e.g., Eastern Penitentiary) did more than others to alleviate miseries by changing the diet, providing adequate clothing, and making warm water for washing available to inmates.

She did not find that more inmates were deemed “insane” in Pennsylvania-modeled prisons based on her data, or at least not more than one might expect, even in the Pennsylvania prisons. Given the history of the separate system being linked to insanity, she was sensitive to this topic. However, by 1845, when she published the

second edition of her book, inmates at Eastern Penitentiary were not as “separate” from others as they had been, both formally and informally, and this might explain the relative paucity of insanity cases in her data. By this time, inmates were allowed to speak to their keepers (guards) and to attend church and school.

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Dix also explored the moral and religious instruction provided at the several state prisons and county prisons (jails) that she visited. Except for the Eastern Penitentiary, she found all of them to be deficient in this respect and found that the provisions of such services were severely lacking in the jails.

Dix studied a peculiar practice of the early prisons—that of allowing visitors to pay to be spectators at the prisons. Adults were generally charged 25 cents and children were charged half price in some facilities. In Auburn in 1842, the prison made $1,692.75 from visitors; in Columbus in 1844, the prison made $1,038.78; and Dix (1843/1967) documented five other prisons that allowed the same practice, one she thought should be “dispensed with” because it “would not aid the moral and reforming influences of the prisons” (p. 43). Of course, this fascination with watching inmates continues today with

reality-based television shows filmed in prisons and jails.

Finally, Dix (1843/1967) tried to explore the idea of recidivism or, as she termed it, reform. She wanted to know how many inmates leave their prison and are reformed or “betake themselves to industrious habits, and an honest calling; who, in place of vices, practice virtues; who, instead of being addicted to crime, are observed to govern their passions, and abstain from all injury to others” (p. 66). When she asked about how many inmates were reformed, she found that none of the prisons had records in that regard but that wardens tended to think most inmates were reformed because they did not return to those particular prisons. She was doubtful that this failure of inmates to return to the same prisons should be regarded as an indication of low recidivism because she suspected that inmates got out, changed their names, and dispersed across the countryside where they could return to crime undetected. In most respects, in all of these areas, she concluded from her study of several prisons that the Eastern Penitentiary was far superior to most prisons and that the Sing Sing Prison was far inferior, but she thought even the Eastern Penitentiary was far from perfect. Rather, she called for more focus on the morals and education of the young and on preventing crime as a means of improving prisons and reducing

their use—a call that sounds very familiar today.

THE FAILURE OF REFORM IS NOTED

Dix’s writings foretold the difficulties of implementing real change even if the proposal is well intentioned. Simply put, prisons during the latter half of the 19th century were no longer regarded as places of reform. As Rothman (1980) stated,

Every observer of American prisons and asylums in the closing decades of the nineteenth century recognized that the pride of one generation had become the shame of another. The institutions that had been intended to exemplify the humanitarian advances of republican government were not merely inadequate to the ideal, but were actually an embarrassment and a rebuke. Failure to do good was one thing; a proclivity to do harm quite another—and yet the evidence was incontrovertible that brutality and corruption were endemic to the institutions. (p. 17)

Newspapers and state investigatory commissions by the mid-19th century were documenting the deficiencies of state prisons. Instead of the relatively controlled atmosphere of the Pennsylvania and Auburn prisons of the 1830s, there was a

great deal of laxity and brutality (Rothman, 1980). Prisons were overcrowded and understaffed, and the presence of prison contractors led to corruption such as paying off wardens to look the other way as inmate labor was exploited; alternatively, the wardens and staff used inmates and their labor for their own illegal ends. At Sing Sing Prison, an 1870 investigation found that inmates were largely unsupervised, had access to contraband, and were unoccupied for most of their sentences (Rothman, 1980). A lack of space and staff was likely to lead to more severe punishments to deter misbehavior. Therefore, when their keepers did pay attention to inmates, it might be to administer brutal, medieval- style punishments where inmates were hung by their wrists or their thumbs (the “pulley”), were forced to wear the iron cap or cage on the head that weighed 6 to 8 pounds, or were tied up by their hands so high behind them that they needed to “stand” on their toes, or where the guards resorted to the “lash and paddle” (Rothman, 1980, p. 19). Solitary confinement in a dark, dungeon-like cell was popular, too, especially with little sustenance (water and bread) and a bucket. A Kansas prison employed the “water crib”:

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ETHICAL ISSUE

What Would You Do?

You are Dorothea Dix, the American humanitarian and penal and insane asylum reformer, and you are visiting prisons and jails in the United States during the 1840s. The task you have set for yourself is to document what appears to be working, and what does not, in the facilities you visit. You pride yourself on maintaining high moral standards. You are not opposed to the use of the lash in some circumstances, but you think its overuse is counterproductive in that it turns men “into brutes” rather than reforming them. During the course of your visit to Sing Sing Prison, where the lash is used for the smallest offenses, you notice that an emaciated inmate steals a piece of bread off a tray. The warden, although known for his harsh treatment of inmates, has treated you with every courtesy and you know that he would expect you to report this offense. What would you do and why? Do you think that your decision is colored by the time period in which you live? Why or why not?

The inmate was placed in a coffin-like box, six and one-half feet long, thirty inches wide, and three feet deep, his face down and his hands handcuffed behind his back. A water hose was then turned on, slowly filling the crib. The resulting effect of this procedure was the sensation of slowly drowning, with the inmate struggling to keep his head up above the rising water line. (Rothman, 1980, p. 20)

THE RENEWED PROMISE OF REFORM

THE 1870 AMERICAN PRISON CONGRESS

The first major prison reform came about 50 years after the first New York and Pennsylvania prisons were built, and doubtless as a result of all those calls for change. The 1870 American Prison Congress was held in Cincinnati, Ohio, with the express purpose of trying to recapture some of the idealism promised with the creation of prisons (Rothman, 1980). Despite their promises of reform and attempts at preventing “contamination,” the early prisons had become, by the 1860s, warehouses without hope or resources. All of the themes mentioned at the beginning of Chapter 2—save the desire for reform, and that was remedied with the next round of

reforms to follow the Congress—applied to the operation of the 19th-century prisons; they were overcrowded, underfunded, brutal facilities where too many inmates would spend time doing little that was productive or likely to prepare them to reintegrate into the larger community.

Appropriately enough, then, the Declaration of Principles that emerged from the Prison Congress of 1870 was nothing short of revolutionary at the time and provided a blueprint for prisons we see today (Rothman, 1980). Some of those principles were concerned with the grand purposes of prisons—to achieve reform— while others were related to their day-to- day operation (e.g., training staff, eliminating contract labor, treating the insane) (American Correctional Association, 1983).

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ELMIRA

As a result of these principles, a spirit of reform in corrections again spurred action, and the Elmira Reformatory was founded in 1876 in New York (Rothman, 1980). The reformatory would encompass all of the rehabilitation focus and graduated reward system (termed the marks system, as in if one behaves it is possible to earn marks that in turn entitle one to privileges). The marks system, as mentioned in Chapter 2,

was practiced by Maconochie, and later by Crofton in Irish prisons, and was promoted by reformers. Elmira was supposed to hire educated and trained staff and to maintain uncrowded facilities (Orland, 1975).

Zebulon Brockway was appointed to head the reformatory, and he was intent on using the ideas of Maconochie and Crofton to create a “model” prison (Harris, 1973, p. 85). He persuaded the New York legislature to pass a bill creating the indeterminate sentence, which would be administered by a “board” rather than the courts. He planned on the reformatory handling only younger men (ages 16–30 years) because he expected that they might be more amenable to change. He planned to create a college at Elmira that would educate inmates from elementary school through college. He also sought to create an industrial training school that would equip inmates with technical abilities. In addition, he focused on the physical training of inmates, including much marching but also the use of massages and steam baths (Harris, 1973). The marks system had a three-pronged purpose: to discipline, to encourage reform, and to justify “good time” in order to reduce the sentence of the offender. Brockway did not want to resort to the use of the lash.

Much lauded around the world and visited by dignitaries, the Elmira Reformatory, and

Brockway’s management of it, led to the creation of good time, the indeterminate sentence (defined in Chapter 5), a focus on programming to address inmate deficiencies, and the promotion of probation and parole. “After Brockway, specialized treatment, classification of prisoners, social rehabilitation and self- government of one sort or another were introduced into every level of the corrections system” (Harris, 1973, pp. 86– 87).

Unfortunately, and as before, this attempt at reform was thwarted when the funding was not always forthcoming, and the inmates did not conform as expected. The staff, who were not the educated and trained professionals that Brockway had envisioned, soon resorted to violence to keep control. In fact, Brockway administered the lash himself on many occasions (Rothman, 1980). It should not be forgotten, however, that even on its worst day the Elmira prison was likely no worse, and probably much more humane, than were the old Auburn and Sing Sing prisons.

THE CREATION OF PROBATION AND PAROLE

As indicated in Chapters 7 and 10, probation and parole were developed during the first half of the 19th century, and their use spread widely across the

United States during the early 20th century. The idea behind both was that programming and assistance in the community, while supervising the offender, could result in the reduction in the use of incarceration and help the offender to transition more smoothly back into the community. Doubtless, the intent was good, but the execution of this reform was less than satisfactory; however, it did represent an improvement over the correctional practices that preceded it (Rothman, 1980). For a full discussion of the history and current operation of probation and parole, or community corrections, see Chapters 7 and 10.

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SOUTHERN AND NORTHERN PRISONS, THE CONTRACT AND LEASE SYSTEMS, AND INDUSTRIAL PRISONS

Southern prisons, because of the institution of slavery, developed on a different trajectory from that of other prisons. As indicated by Young’s (2001) research, prisons were little used before the Civil War. In agriculturally based societies, labor is prized and needed in the fields, particularly slave labor, and that served as a basis for the southern economy. Once slavery was abolished with the Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, southern states during the

Reconstruction period following the Civil War began incarcerating more people, particularly ex-slaves, and recreating a slave society in the corrections system. As Oshinsky (1996) documented for Mississippi prisons, blacks were picked up and imprisoned for relatively minor offenses and forced to work like slaves on prison plantations or on plantations of southern farmers.

The northern and midwestern states, and later the western states, built prisons somewhat on the Auburn model, but for the most part they abandoned the attempt to completely silence inmates. It was no longer emphasized because maintaining such silence required a large staff and constant vigilance, and these were usually not available in the understaffed and overcrowded facilities (J. Jacobs, 1977). Inmates in such prisons worked in larger groups under private or public employers, and order was maintained with the lash or other innovations in discipline, as discussed in Chapter 2 (see also Lawes [1932] regarding the management of Sing Sing Prison). Although there was no pretense of high-minded reform going on in these prisons, their conditions and the accommodations of inmates were thought to be far superior to those provided in southern prisons of the time. Conditions under both the contract and lease systems could be horrible, but they were likely worse under the southern lease

system, where contractors were often responsible for both housing and feeding inmates. Such contractors had little incentive for feeding or taking care of inmates because the supply of labor from the prison was almost inexhaustible.

INDUSTRIAL PRISONS

The contract system morphed into industrial prisons during the latter part of the 19th century and first few decades of the 20th century in several states. Inmates were employed either by outside contractors or by the state to engage in the large-scale production of goods for sale in the open market or to produce goods for the state itself. Eventually, as the strength of unions increased, and particularly as the Depression struck in 1930, the sale of cheap, prison-made goods was restricted by several state and federal laws, limiting the production of goods in prisons to just products that the state or nonprofits might be able to use.

CORRECTIONAL INSTITUTIONS OR WAREHOUSE PRISONS?

In James Jacobs’s classic book Stateville: The Penitentiary in Mass Society, the author describes the operation of and environmental influences on the Stateville Prison in Illinois (Jacobs, 1977). It was built as a panopticon in 1925 in

reaction to the deplorable conditions of the old Joliet prison built in 1860. Joliet was overcrowded, and the Stateville Prison was also built to relieve that overcrowding, but by 1935 Stateville itself was full at 4,000 inmates and the population at Joliet had not been reduced at all.

Career Video Payne career video 3.1: Corrections Sergeant

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In a reformist state such as Illinois at the time (the juvenile court reform began there, and it was one of the first states to initiate civil service reforms), Stateville Prison was conceived as a place where inmates would be carefully classified into treatment programs that would address their needs and perceived deficiencies and where inmates could earn good time and eventual parole. Inmates were believed to

be “sick,” and a treatment regimen provided by the prison would address that sickness and hopefully “cure” them so that they might become productive members of society. Thus, correctional institutions would use the “medical model” to treat inmates. Even though it was built as a maximum-security prison, Stateville’s conception fit the definition of a correctional institution, where inmates were not to be merely warehoused but rather to be corrected and treated. However, although inmates in the Illinois system were classified and good time was available for those who adhered to the rules, there was little programming available, the prison was crowded, it was understaffed, and the staff who were employed were ill trained (J. Jacobs, 1977). Moreover, the first 10 years of operation were filled with disorganized management and violent attacks on staff and inmates in a prison controlled by Irish and Italian gangs.

JOURNAL ARTICLE Journal Article 3.1: Broken Beyond Repair: Rehabilitative Penology and American Political Development CLICK TO SHOW

In essence, and despite the intent to create a correctional institution, Stateville became what is termed a Big House prison. These facilities, according to Irwin (2005), are fortress stone or concrete

prisons, usually maximum security, whose attributes include “isolation, routine, and monotony” (p. 32). Strict security and rule enforcement, at least formally, and a regimentation in schedule are other hallmarks of such facilities. The convict code, or the rules that inmates live by vis- à-vis the institution and staff, is clear-cut: “1. Do not inform; 2. Do not openly interact or cooperate with the guards or the administration; 3. Do your own time” (p. 33).

The next 25 years of the Stateville Prison (1936–1961) were marked by the authoritarian control of one warden (Joseph Ragen), the isolation of staff and inmates from the larger world, strict formal rule enforcement, and informal corruption of those rules. Some of the trappings of a correctional institution were present (i.e., good time for good behavior and parole), but for the most part inmates were merely warehoused and double- or triple-celled. Those inmates who were favored by staff and the warden were given better housing and a whole array of privileges. Corruption seethed under the surface with the relaxation of rules for tougher inmates, black market trade by both staff and inmates, and the warden turning his head when beatings of inmates by staff occurred. By the mid-1950s, Ragen, who had been appointed director of corrections for the state in 1941, was redefining its purpose as one of

rehabilitation (J. Jacobs, 1977). So that his prisons would appear to be at the forefront of the move to a rehabilitative focus, the numbers of inmates in school and in vocational programming did increase, although staff, under the guise of providing vocational training, were able to use the inmate labor to repair their appliances and cars for free.

By the 1960s, Stateville and other Illinois prisons, much like those in the rest of the country, were under pressure internally by more career-oriented professionals interested in management of prisons and externally by greater racial consciousness and an emerging inmates’ rights movement. Eventually, such prisons needed to open their doors to other ideas and perspectives, and sometimes the press, as well as court-mandated legal review of their practices (J. Jacobs, 1977).

The 1960s through the 1990s saw a boom in prison building across the country, most of the medium- and minimum-security variety, which were more likely to classify inmates according to both security and treatment needs, institute rehabilitative programming (although the amount and value of this have varied from state to state and by time period), and employ the use of good time and parole (except in those states that abolished it) as part of a determinate sentencing schema; see Chapter 4. Thus, by the 1960s and 1970s,

the ideal of a correctional institution had been more fully realized in many parts of the country and in some prisons. However, the extent to which it truly was realized is in doubt. Staff hired to work in these prisons, other than the few treatment staff, tended to have only a high school diploma or GED and were not paid a professional wage. The prisons were understaffed. They were also often crowded, and educational and other treatment programs, even work programs, were limited. Good time was usually a given, although one could lose it. One did not in fact earn it; rather, one did time and got it. Parole was typically poorly supervised, and by the 1970s and through the 1980s and early 1990s several states and the federal government had eliminated it as they moved to determinate sentencing (see Chapter 5).

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By the mid-1970s, a conservative mood regarding crime had gripped the country and skepticism had developed about the value of rehabilitative programming. The media and politicians played on the fear of crime, and despite the fact that overall street crime had been decreasing since the early 1980s and violent crime had been decreasing since the mid-1990s in the United States, a prison building boom ensued (Irwin, 2005). Prisons of the 1980s and 1990s and into the 2000s reflect all of these earlier trends and influences. The

maximum- and super-maximum-security prisons of today (and possibly some medium- and minimum-security prisons) are merely warehouse prisons where inmates’ lives and movement are severely restricted and rule bound. There is no pretense of rehabilitation in warehouse prisons; punishment and incapacitation are the only justification for such places. The more hardened and dangerous prisoners are supposed to be sent there, and their severe punishment is to serve as a deterrent to others in lesser security prisons.

These lesser security prisons, the medium- and minimum-security prisons that comprise roughly two-thirds of all prisons, do still have the trappings of rehabilitation programming, although it is limited in scope and funding, and they usually afford good time and even parole (most states still have a version of these). They, too, are often crowded and understaffed, and their staff are not as educated or well paid as one might wish. However, such prisons do approximate the original ideal of a correctional institution.

The rest of this book will be primarily focused on the correctional institution model as it is often imperfectly implemented in the United States. There are some who argue (e.g., Irwin, 2005) that the rehabilitative ideal is not realized in prisons and instead that programming is

too often used to control inmates rather than to help locate for them another life path that does not involve crime. Correctional institutions intended to rehabilitate instead end up warehousing the “dangerous classes” (Irwin, 2005) or the poor and minorities. Of course, our history of corrections would lead us to be skeptical of any easy claims to rehabilitative change. (For a fuller discussion of rehabilitative programming, see Chapter 15.) As will be explored in this book, too often a plan, although well intentioned, is inadequately conceived and executed, and as a result nothing changes or, worse, we achieve precisely the opposite results.

THEMES THAT PREVAIL IN CORRECTIONAL HISTORY

There are several themes interwoven throughout the history and current operation of corrections in the United States. The overriding one, of course, has been money. Operating a correctional institution or program is a costly undertaking, and from the first those engaged in this business have needed to concern themselves with how to fund it. Of course, the availability of funding for correctional initiatives is shaped by the political sentiments of the time. Not surprisingly, schemes to fund correctional operations have often included ways to use

inmate labor. Complementary themes that have shaped how money might be made and spent, and how inmates or clients might be treated, have included a move to greater compassion and humanity in correctional operation; the influence that the demographics of inmates themselves has had (e.g., race, class, gender); religious sentiments about punishment and justice; architecture as it aligns with supervision; the pressure that crowding places on correctional programs and institutions; and the fact that although reforms might be well intentioned, they do not always lead to effective or just practice. Again, this list of themes is not exhaustive, but it does include some of the prevailing influences that span correctional history in the United States and that require the attention of each successive generation.

SAGE News Clip SAGE News Clip 3.1: Texas Prison Reform

SAGE News Clip SAGE News Clip 3.2: US Senate Criminal Justice

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PERSPECTIVE FROM A PRACTITIONER

Pat Mahoney, Alcatraz Corrections Officer

Po s i t i o n :Po s i t i o n : Corrections Officer and Boat Captain

Lo c a t i o n :Lo c a t i o n : Alcatraz Federal Penitentiary

How long were you a Corrections Officer on Alcatraz?

From 1956 to 1963, so 7 years—the best 7 years of my career. Alcatraz was a special place, from the guards to the convicts.

The primary duties and responsibilities of a Corrections Officer on Alcatraz were:

About 15 positions, from tower, to kitchen, to garbage truck, to prison industries, supporting food and water deliveries, and supervising convict efforts for cleanup and all the other daily requirements. It was surprisingly busy. Corrections officers also manned the gun gallery in the cell house. Roles were changed about every 3 months. I was originally a corrections officer; then I was promoted to boat captain. I was also always on call if any work had to be done. I also supervised a crew that did maintenance for the actual prison.

In general, a typical day for a Corrections Officer on Alcatraz included:

In the cell house, there were several

in charge of convict teams that

cleaned the cell house continuously. They supervised or conducted inmate counts. They also had to get convicts from their cells to visiting attorneys, to the barbershop, showers, meals, and work locations. The hours were always busy. Boredom was not ever a factor. Everyone had things to do at all times. The tower guards were the least active but had regular duties and communication with others. Tower guards also watched the bay and occasionally saw a boat in distress, so they became a primary communicator to the Coast Guard for boats around Alcatraz.

Life on the Rock was fun when not on duty. We had a social hall, two bowling lanes, commissary for food, a playground for the kids, a handball court, and regular family dinners. About every 3 weeks, we had an island-wide dinner for all guards and families at the social hall. The view from the island was always tremendous. We looked right on downtown San Francisco.

My advice to someone either wishing to study, or now studying, criminal justice to become a Corrections Officer would be:

The key is to be honest. If convicts think for a second that you are not honest, they will try to work you until you get fired or hurt. They can sense if someone is not honest. It is an exciting role, meeting some of the best and worst of society at Alcatraz. In the prison, there are no weapons for the guards on the floor. All know this, so there is a common respect. You need good people skills to work with some who may have issues.

Note: Words written by Steve Mahoney

(born on Alcatraz) as given by Pat Mahoney

(corrections officer and boat captain,

Alcatraz).

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SUMMARY

• Howard, Beaumont and Tocqueville, and Dix all conducted studies of corrections in their day and judged the relative benefits of some practices and institutions over others, based on their data.

• The Pennsylvania and New York early prisons were the models for

most American prisons of the 19th century.

• The ideal conception of prisons was rarely achieved in reality.

• The Elmira Prison arose out of a prison reform movement that occurred roughly 50 years after the Auburn Prison was built.

• The southern and northern versions of prisons that followed the Civil War were not like Elmira and were instead focused on using inmate labor for the production of goods for private contractors.

• The Stateville Prison, although conceived as a correctional institution and all that implies, for the most part became a Big House prison.

• Correctional institutions, as a type of prison, do exist in a less than perfect form in the United States.

• Correctional institutions, as that term has been expanded to apply generically to jails, prisons, and some forms of community corrections, have been shaped by several themes throughout their history. These themes, although apparently constant, are a product of the times. For

instance, the Eastern Penitentiary would not be built today as a general use prison because it would be considered cruel to isolate inmates from other human contact. Yet this kind of isolation, sometimes even with tiny cells, is seen as beneficial by those who today build and operate super- maximum-security prisons for “special uses” to control “incorrigible” inmates (Kluger, 2007).

• In the following chapters, we will see such themes and the history of corrections, as detailed here, dealt with again and again. However, although we continue to repeat both the mistakes and successes of the past, that does not mean we cannot make, and have not made, any progress in corrections. There is no question that on the whole the vast majority of jails and prisons in this country today are much better than those for much of the last 200 years, although the unprecedented use of correctional sanctions in the United States would be regarded by some as overly harsh and thus a regressive trend. These themes presented here represent ongoing questions (e.g., how

much money, compassion, or religious influence is the “right” amount), and as such we are constantly called on to address them.

KEY TERMS

Big House prisons, 59

Contract and lease systems, 58

Convict code, 59

Correctional institutions, 44

Elmira Reformatory, 57

Marks system, 57

Medical model, 59

Stateville Prison, 58

Walnut Street Jail, 44

Warehouse prisons, 60

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

1. Discuss the relative benefits and drawbacks of the Pennsylvania and New York models of early prisons. What did Beaumont and Tocqueville and Dix think of them and why? Which type of prison would you rather work in, or be incarcerated in, and why?

2. Why did prison and jail managers like to require silence, and why did they eventually end that requirement? Why is it so difficult to control human behavior?

3. How has the question of inmate labor shaped the development of prisons over time?

4. Note why there is often a disconnect between the intentions of reformers and the ultimate operation of their reforms. Why is it difficult for theory to be put into practice? How might we ensure that there is a truer implementation of reforms?

p.63

5. How are the “themes” that run through the history of corrections represented in current practices today? Why do these themes continue to have relevance for correctional operation over the centuries?

R ev i e wR ev i e w → P ra c t i c eP ra c t i c e → I m p r oveI m p r ove

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F O R F U RT H E R E X P LO R AT I O NF O R F U RT H E R E X P LO R AT I O N A N D A P P L I C AT I O N , TA K E AA N D A P P L I C AT I O N , TA K E A LO O K AT T H E I N T E R AC T I V ELO O K AT T H E I N T E R AC T I V E E B O O K F O R T H E S E P R E M I U ME B O O K F O R T H E S E P R E M I U M R E S O U RC E S :R E S O U RC E S :

C a r e e r V i d e o 3 . 1C a r e e r V i d e o 3 . 1 Corrections

Sergeant

S AG E N e w s C l i p 3 . 1S AG E N e w s C l i p 3 . 1 Texas

Prison Reform

S AG E N e w s C l i p 3 . 2S AG E N e w s C l i p 3 . 2 U.S.

Senate Criminal Justice

J o u r n a l A r t i c l e 3 . 1J o u r n a l A r t i c l e 3 . 1 Broken

Beyond Repair: Rehabilitative Penology and American Political Development