VOLUNTARY REFORM OF CRIMINALS.
TICE anxiety on the subject of criminal discipline increases with' the suggestion that Government, in some way or other, means to retreat from the comparatively intelligent position to which it had advanced. The anxiety exhibits itself in many forms, and the very diversity assists in showing the spontaneous character of the feeling. "A Magistrate," who writes to the Times controvert- ing Colonel Jebb, shows that while Government appears to be abandoning the system that the Colonel defends, the suspension of the ticket-of-leave practice is inconsistent with his own argument that it was intended as a substitute for transportation. The Ma- gistrate insists that Government is bound, to the prisoners as well as to the public, to continue the conditional release which the Legislature contemplated. A correspondent of our own has chal- lenged us for want of sufficiently accurate expressions in reference both to the ticket-of-leave and to reformatory institutions, and is anxious that the Recorder of Birmingham should not be represented as having "condemned the ticket-of-leave system." If our noble correspondent had a little more attended to that exactness which he demands, he might have found that there was less difference between us than he seems desirous to establish. What we wrote last week was in continuation of previous remarks, and we believe that no careful reader will understand us to have misrepresented Mr. Hill; who condemns the practice as it is under the existing ticket-of-leave system, while vindicating the essential principles so imperfectly carried out in that system. The discussion continues in the press ; yet the printed is but a faint reflex of the more anxious discussion among the best-informed circles in private. At present we keep up two kinds of schools,—preparatory schools, for the training of young thieves; and adult colleges, for the training both of professors in the arts of crime and of its gra- duates and under-graduatei. We may fairly say that society does this, for " qui facit per alium, facit per se." " Society " does not consist only of virtuous and selected persons, but it consists of the whole community ; and if the virtuous, selected, and influential persons, permit the low, vicious, and uninfluential, to excel them 111 competition for pupils, under-graduates, graduates, and profes- sors in this matter of crime, Society must take the consequences. The criminal Opposition decidedly beats us. It has more inven- tion in its measures. We have recently invented this ticket-of- leave plan,—very imperfect and limited in its scope and working; but it has evidently suggested a new branch of professional ac- tivity. The ticket-of-leave man being under a certain surveil- lance, in many cases forbears from direct meddling in crime ; but where he cannot practise he can teach; and, as Sergeant Adams well observes, each criminal represents not only his own person and his acts but the numbers that he can teach and the con- federates that he can aid. The ticket-of-leave man, let loose pre- maturely, is the equivalent of new schools for the young and of many new confederates of adult age. The ticket-of-leave man de- tained in prison, without hope of working his way out or of re- gaining an honest position, is either a permanent burden on the State for his keep, or, ultimately released, he is an exasperated, desperate, and determined enemy to the virtuous and select side of society—a hardened leader for the criminal Opposition. The organization kept up on our side is manifestly too weak for its purpose ; and partly because we only deal with the matter in an amateur style, while the criminal Opposition deal with it scientifi- cally. They perhaps discuss theory less than we do, preach prin- ciples less, and stumble upon their science by rule of thumb; but they are the positive philosophers, while we are only the negative. The Magistrates of Worcester, it appears by Lord Lyttelton's ac- count, have had a Committee of Quarter-Sessions "on the subject" of Reformatory Schools; but our noble critic—who objects to the expression "failure of the attempt to establish a school," tells us that this Committee has been "discontinued, after doing little or nothing"; and that, since Parliament has given no power to esta-
blish a school out of the rates, it is to be established on "the vo- luntary principle." Thus we leave the training of the youthful to the voluntary system, and abandon the recovery of the adult, whom we hand over to a principle the most involuntary. Re- formers try to move in the county ; but our wretched county sys- tem is too weak for any effectual action. They try to move in Parliament, and think that they have succeeded in establishing the instalment of a system, to learn after all that it can be fehbed !
Meanwhile, the ticket-of-leave class is constantly figuring by its representatives in our criminal courts; and the best remedy that Government seems able to invent is, to detain the ticket-of-leave man and ultimately substitute for him a hardened convict—a re- cruit of the rapacious class preying upon the society that breeds them—a deferred ticket-of-leave man, only not under conditions or surveillance. This is disagreeable enough, and it would be alarming if we could suppose that Colonel Jebb, in his apologetical letter of last week, was really authorized to speak on behalf of the Government: but that is a supposition which we cannot entertain. Let us see how we have arrived at the present stage of the dis- cussion. Ever since the ticket-of-leave men began to be scattered amongst the town population, there have been complaints, gra- dually rising in strength, that these men had become a nuisance. Recently, Mr. Jardine, the Police Magistrate, gave great empha- sis and distinctness to this complaint, by declaring that there were forty ticket-of-leave men haunting the neighbourhood of his court, a terror to the neighbourhood. This created a profound impres- sion in the public, much strengthened by the remarks that followed about the same time from Mr. Recorder Hill, Mr. Recorder Jardine, Mr. Sergeant Adams, and other authorities on the subject. Evidently, the sense of the nuisance was confirmed; and we may infer that the Home Office saw the necessity of stopping that inconvenient effect of the present imperfect and ill-designed arrangement. Colonel Jebb, Chairman of the Prison Board, receives an order to stop the issue of tickets-of-leave; he couples with the announcement of that fact his own rather gossiping apologies for the system as it stands; and he speaks of the suspension of the conditional release as if that principle were to be permanently abandoned. There is, how- ever, no reason for supposing that Colonel Jebb is authorized to make any public statement on the legislative part of the business. All we know at present is, that practically the system has broken down, and that it is in part suspended. It cannot remain in that state; something must be done by next session. There really is no evidence that Government would take a position hostile to the best authorities, to sound sense, or to the substantial interests of the country. Lord Palmerston has shown a distinct perception on this very subject, and the statement to Parliament will have to be made by some member connected with the Home Office, not by Colonel Jehb. It is quite possible that the initiative might be ad- vantageously taken by an independent Member. Such a step might relieve the Government of some difficulty, some responsi- bility, and some labour. We adhere to our original impression,- - that the most practical course would be to move for the "appoint- ment of a Commission, to inquire, report, and suggest. it would- be easy to select men who would possess the public confidence,- ' and who would use their authority independently of party or of any consideration but the interests of the country. There are men like Mr. Adderley, Mr. Recorder Hill, Mr. Frederic Hill, Lord Lyttelton, and Mr. Stuart Wortley, from whom it would be easy to select a proper number, whose judgment on the appeal thus specifically made would be trusted both by the Government and the country.
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