The Akaroa Mail. TUESDAY, JUNE 14.

Akaroa Mail and Banks Peninsula Advertiser, Volume V, Issue 513, 14 June 1881, Page 2

The Akaroa Mail. TUESDAY, JUNE 14.

The report of Captain Hume, the new Inspector of Prisons, has been laid before the Government and made public. Its perusal has certainly not impressed us very highly with the value of this new acquisition to the colony. What is train it is not new, and what is new is not true. Captain Hume commences by saying :—" Tho chief evils that have come under my notice aro that the prisons, as they at present exist, are neither deterrent nor reformatory." Very grave evils these, no doubt, in fact coy ring the whole ground ; but while Capt, Hume makes various suggestions as to achieving the first end, and to make prisons deterrent, he does not offer the slightest guidance to the latter, namely, the reformation process. We are aware that great differences of opinion exist on this head. An opinion is gaining ground, in which we confess we are inclined to share, that reforming a prisoner, if not impossible, is at any rate quite outside the functions of a prison. Let a criminal on his release have a wholesome dread of the inside of a gaol. Let him feel that for his own sake, he had better endure anything rather than make acquaintance with it again., and probably as great a " reform " as is reasonably to be expected will have been achieved.

We pass over the Inspector's recommendation as to classification of prisoners and the erection of a central establishment, where all prisoners sentenced to penal servitude would be kept, and where such servitude could be made a reality. This has long ago been an acknowledged necessity ; it lias been recommended by a Royal Commission and by more than one Select Committee, and would, we fully believe, have been carried into effect before now but for the miserable Provincial jealousies which stand in the way of much that would be to our advantage, could we but bring ourselves to think of our adopted country as a united whole, instead of an agglomeration of various communities having distinct, and oftentimes conflicting, interests. With regard to the dissociation of prisoners we agree with the cap

tain, who says :—" The district prisons shoul \ b'j large enough to accommodate, each in a separate cell, all prisoners sentenced to hard labor, debtors, romands awaiting trial, and youths. These prisoners should have their meals in their cells, and be kept quite separate, except when on the works, at exercise, or at Divine seivice. The existing system of prisoners having their meals and spare time in association, is most detrimental to prison discipline."

These recommendations, and those as to classification of prisoners, etc., refer to points on whicli all who have considered the subject are agreed. Other portions of the report and its schedules refer to mere matters of detail, and are simply rechauffes of regulations in force at Home. When Captain Hume breaks new ground, however, we must beg leave to differ from him most thoroughly, and we hope and believe that his recommendations will never be endorsed by the Legislature. Regarding corporal punishment he says : —" All prisoners should bo liable to undergo personal correction for prison offences, but as the law now stands corporal punishment can only be inflicted for repeated prison offences." Taken in connection with another paragraph of the report, in which it is recommended that gaolers should have power to punish without reference to a Visiting Justice, we understand Captain Hume to recommend the gaol officials being empowered to administer corporal chastisement at their own discretion. This is a most dangerous doctrine, and one directed entirely against the whole stream of modern opinion on the subject. Corporal punishment may be a necessity, and may be suitable for certain offences, but it should bo inflicted only by a tribunal which is able to come to a calm and deliberate decision on each case, uninfluenced by passion or irritation. A prisoner may be insubordinate or insolent, and to place his person at the mercy of the man he has offended for the purpose of summary vengeance would be to make our gaols veritable hells, and would be likely to pave the way for deeds of retaliation and horror, examples of which are not wanting in other countries, but which we should not seek to acclimatize here.

Another recommendation of the captain's we must venture to protest against. lie wants the term " gaoler " abolished and H superintendent " or " controller " substituted. The reason is not apparent at first sight, and standing by itself the recommendation appears at least harmless. But the next paragraph supplies the required reason. As vacancies occur, the captain would have the Superintendents ot Prisons selected exclusively from " retired naval and military officers.'' He is sure that if the new scale of pay he has submitted be adopted, the Government would procure officers " who have already served their country faithfully, again ready and willing to do so iv this department." Generous souls ! we have not a doubt of this. But why Lieutenant Fitz-Plantagcnet, who has gracefully retired from the cream-colored Plungers through excessive fondness for unlimited 100 should be considered the very man to take charge of a New Zealand prison, and to command men who have spent perhaps half a life time in the service is a mystery, the solution of which will not bo apparent to the outside public. Of course Fitz-Plantagenet could not condescend to be a "gaoler." But call him a " superintendent," make the pay good enough, give him plenty of fellows to do all the real work, and no doubt he would stick to his post, and draw his salary to the last. No, such retired officers as we could secure would probably be men who had made an utter failure of their profession, some of tho " Queen's bad bargains." The men who had achieved success in it wouid of course be out of the question, and we should have to content ourselves with FitzPlantagenet and his kin. Besides it is

paying our own public servants a very poor compliment to imagine that there is not sufficient intelligence a>liong them to qualify them for such '|osts. Let the ranks of the subordinate prison officers be exhausted for men of character before wo confess to the humiliating necessity of having to look abroad for the combination of qualities necessary to make a gaoler, or even a Superintendent.

Altogether we thiuk this first production of an imported expert is decidedly disappointing, and should not encourage us to continue, the system of importation. From his report, Captain Hume-strikes us as being a pipeclay martinet, quite Incapable of judging of real merit in subordinate oflieers, and in whose eves the most heinous offences would be coming info his presence with boots indifferently blacked or :i button awry.

We observe ttiat on Friday last three Justices, Messrs J. Olh'vier, R. Westenra, and J. E. Parker, sent a man to gaol for three years! The offence, one against public decency, was no doubt a serious one, but really the terrific powers assumed by these gentlemen are enough to take one's breath away. We are old-fashioned enough to believe in the necessity for the interposition of the time-honored jury before a freeman can bo deprived of his liberty for any length of time. An old document, dated somewhere about the reign of King John, says something to this effect. But society appears to be willing to allow these safeguards of the personal liberty to be dispensed with, one by one. Wo all know how the Roll of Justices is filled up. We are aware that to put a man on it is regarded by a Minister as a cheap way of rewarding political or personal services, and .hat the fitness or otherwise of the recipient of the honor is probably a matter quite outside the Minister's ken. All this being known, it really does seem, as we termed it, alarming, that it should rest with these gentlemen to send a fellow-citizen to herd with felons for no inconsiderable a portion of his life, and, if that life had hitherto been a reputable one, to blast the remainder of it effectually.

But while wo havo no doubt whatever that the Justices in question have violated the spirit of the law in passing such a sentence, we think it highly probable that they have also committed a breach of its letter. Not that this is an uncommon occurrence. And of course in the Cathedral City if a J.P. belonged to the proper '' set," and had tl tone," and all the rest of it, he might dance a hornpipe on the Bench, if he were so minded, without ever being called to order by its spaniel Press. But as to the legality of this monstrous sentence. The offence for which it was inflicted is specified in the Canterbury Police Ordinance, and the maximum penalty therein authorized is three months' imprisonment. It is possible that by a good deal of straining the Vagrant Act might be brought to bear, and this authorizes twelve mouths imprisonment. The prisoner in question pleaded guilty to three separate offences, and was sentenced to twelve months' imprisonment on each. Probably the Bench thought they were keeping within the law, but on this point we have grave doubts. It is evident that the Legislature meant to curtail the powers of the Justices within certain bounds, nnd prescribe certain maximum penalties which tbey were authorized to inflict. By separating the charges this limitation is evaded. Here is a case in point. Soliciting alms is an offence against the Vagrant Act, A sturdy beggar might easily commit this offence, say, twenty times in the course of an easy day's walk. Will it be contended that a Bench of Magistrates could send such an offender to pass twenty years of his life in gaol ? And yet, if the Christchurch decision was right, this is what it could do.

It may be urged that peaceable, lawabiding citizens have no concern with what happens to offenders Never was a greater mistake. We live under such a network of Acts an 1 Ordinances, many of them of a highly penal nature, that it is impossible to say when any one of us may be caught tripping. Any experienced police officer or Resident Magistrate will bear witness that if the law as it stands were invariably enforced life would not be worth living, so numerous would be its worries. Therefore, what happens to Brown to-day may be the portion of Jones to-morrow. Consequently it behoves us all, even on eelfish grounds, to keep a strict watch over those entrusted with large powers over our purses and persons, and if we find such powers to be excessive, to use our influence to have them substantially reduced.