The Press FRIDAY, JUNE 28, 1946. “In Prison”

Press, Volume LXXXII, Issue 24913, 28 June 1946, Page 6

The Press FRIDAY, JUNE 28, 1946. “In Prison”

The Controller-General of Prisons, Mr B. L. Dallard, whose protest against a recent leading article on his address to Wellington Rotary we gladly print to-day, does not contest two of the three examples of what we considered to be his misrepresentation of Mr Ormond Burton’s book, “In Prison ” The third was provided by Mr Dallard’s suggestion that Mr Burton consistently and deliberately disparaged prison warders, and made a” point of calling them “screws”. His lecture offered no other evidence of this disparagement than the use—frequent and sneering, as he implied—of that word, which in fact is used once and then clearly without wounding intent or effect; the statement printed to-day offers as further evidence the “ grossly ‘ wicked libel ” of three or four disconnected sentences. *lt will be well to quote the consecutive sentences which precede these:

First of all. taking them as a class, they are not a truculent nor a sadistic crowd. There are such among them, of course, but you will get worse examples of this type among schoolteachers. (I commend to you the appalling type of ruthless go-getter in this profession who will wade through pain and tears, blunging and crushing the love of learning in his children to get another grading mark as a steppingstone to a headmesterslup or to the inspectorate.) They are not the

successful martinets of the Base Camps in retirement, as I had expected them to be. They are often not very effective but by no means unkindly folk. A good many of them have not much more idea of how they got into prison than have some of the convicts. Somehow, as with a lot of thieves in the beginning, it just happened. and then of course went on happening. They found themselves in brown pants with purple stripes down the seams with something like the bewilderment in which many of their charges found themselves in white moleskins without stripes. For the rest, Mr Dallard omijs essential words. Mr Burton’s statement, “ A small percentage will be " homo-sexuals ”, reads straight on, “ not necessarily criminal, attracted “by an environment that is en- “ tirely masculine ”. He does not say arbitrarily and summarily that all higher officials in the gaols are simply promoted turnkeys but that, promotion in the service being from the ranks up without any specialised training, “as though a “ man could rise from being a pri- “ vate to the rank of lieutenant- “ colonel without having to go “ through a stiff O.T.C. course and “in addition a yet stiffer senior “ officer’s course ”, the prison system “means that all higher officials “ in the gaols are simply promoted “ turnkeys without any special “ qualifications in delinquent “ psychology or any special training in reformative methods ” Mr Dallard’s method of proving “ grossly wicked libel ” could be explored further; but that is enough to illustrate its careful crudity. We have persevered with him bq far, on this point, in order to be brief with him on others; but two more examples will help to make it clear that Mr- Dallard *O3OOOl be trusted either to understand what he reads or to comment fairly on it if he does understand it. Mr Dallard “ questioned the truth of “Mr Burton’s assertion that ‘Not “ ‘ many cases -of assault are re- “ ‘ garded as very serious ’ and gave “ examples to show that assaults “ are very grave ”, This is what 'Mr Burton said, clearly referring to the view of the Courts. Not many cases ot assault are regarded as being very serious. Liquor is usually a contributing factor and sentences rarely exceed three months. ... We have very few men of the “bhsher” type. In his lecture, Mr Dallard left to the judgment of the “ body of re- “ sponsible citizens ” before him Mr Burton’s statement that “ Generally “ speaking, the conviction for “ drunkenness is not due to the “vicious behaviour but to the nujs- “ ance value of the drunk ”, but could not avoid delivering his own judgment and betraying in it his failure to grasp what Mr Burton meant. °lt is wrong”, Mr Dallard said, “to minimise the social harm “that ensues from drunkenness”, and went on heavily to speak of property destroyed, death and injury, and the origin of other offences in drunkenness. Which is precisely what Mr Burton said: drunkenness is reprobated and punished by society, not because it is personally disgraceful, but because, and as, it is troublesome. When Mr Dallard challenges us, therefore, on the “ philosophies ” he finds in Mr Burton’s book, in regard to sex perversion and rape, we are content to say: First, we never set out to defend Mr Burton’s “ philosophies ” but to show that Mr Dallard seriously mis--1 epresented him, in particular and in general. We have taken the demonstration further. Second, before Mr Dallard challenges anybody, the author or another, to defend Mr Burton’s “ philosophies ”, as he interprets them, he should himself study them with greater care and present them correctly and justly. Why, for example, quoting Mr Burton’s suspicions about some cases of rape, does he not quote also, “ That there “ are cases of brutal rape of en- “ tirely innocent and defenceless “ girls, sometimes accompanied by “ murderous action, is of course un- “ fortunately true ”? Does not Mr Dallard see that, in omitting the quotation marks which Mr Burton placed about the word “ crime ”, in the sentence about perversion, he distorted Mr Burton’s meaning? Third, we have nothing to retract and nothing to apologise for. It is agreeable, in rejecting Mr Dallard’s demand, to point out that he urged it with another misquotation.