THE GLOBAL. SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 10. 1881. JUVENILE OFFENDERS.

Globe, Volume XXIII, Issue 2320, 10 September 1881, Page 3

THE GLOBAL. SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 10. 1881. JUVENILE OFFENDERS.

Among the documents relating to Industrial Schools which have lately been laid before the House is to be found an interesting paper by the InspectorGeneral of Schools bringing under the notice of the Government the method employed by the State of Massachusetts in dealing with its juvenile offenders. The system is so novel, and its success has been so marked that it will be well to call general attention to the matter. The broad principle laid down by the State of Massachusetts in reference to these children is that when one of them shows any indication of a desire to fall into vicious courses, then immediately the State should step in, and, for its own protection as well as for the good of the child itself, should subject it to a curative course adapted strictly to the phases of the disease. The gradations in the severity of the treatment are managed with great care, and there is none of that massing of the various stages of crime under one regime which tells so badly on the morale of badly brought up or vicious children. The machinery, which was matured in 1869 or 1870, is much as follows. The general care of juvenile offenders is committed to a special State Agency acting thus. “ Every complaint against any boy or girl under the age of seventeen must, before being brought into any Court, be first laid in writing before the State Agent, or one of his assistants, for investigation. When the case comes into Court (and special portions of the time in Courts are exclusively devoted to juvenile cases), the agent, or sub-agent, attends personally to act for the State as watchor, counsel, advocate, or prosecutor, according as the circumstances require. If the complaint is a first charge against the offender, and for a light offence, nothing follows but a simple admonition or the passing of a suspended sentence, a small fine for costs being, however, enforced, if needful, on the parents of the child, if not an orphan.” This is the first gradation. But, “if there appears to be a prospect that the child will need some further restraint or influence than its existing caretakers seem likely to exercise, the agent requests (and obtains from the Court) a sentence of probation for a given time, he undertaking (for the State) to bring up the young offender again, if needful, and meanwhile to watch over him and devise measures for his benefit.” This is the second gradation. The child is now placed formally under the supervision of the State, but still remains at home. But in cases where it is to bo apprehended that home influences are insufficient to mend the habits of the child, or keep it out of crime, the agent is authorised by the Court to take it away from home and put it entirely at the disposal of the Massachusetts Board of Health, Lunacy, and Charity. This is the third gradation. The Board has two ways of dealing with its young patients. It usually places them in private families, on the boarding-out system, under due official conditions and with regular supervision. But, if this is insufficient, recourse is had to a reformatory or industrial school. Finally, when the subject proves too intractable even for a reformatory, then, and only as a last means of control, a prison is resorted to. It would be difficult to devise any system which would incorporate more thoroughly than the one under review the leading idea which should guide a Legislature in dealing with its juvenile offenders. The person responsible for the conduct of the child is in the first place the parent. If he neglects his duty he should be compelled, as far as possible, to do it. If he totally refuses, or is incompetent, the control of the child should be taken out of his hands and undertaken by the State; and, lastly, the State should carefully vary its treatment according to the severity of the evil to be attacked. The wisdom of the Massachusetts’ system is proved by its success. Although about 75 per cent, of all the children brought before the Courts are convicted yet only about one-fifth of those convicted are sent into other houses or institutions, only one-ninth find their way to State schools or reformatories.

while very rarely indeed do any reach the prison stage. “ There were in 1880 three hundred fewer juvenile offenders nnder State care in Massachusetts than in 1870, notwithstanding the increase of population in the decade. The two school sh'ps have been given up as reformatories and sold. The number of children in the reformatories and indus trial schools has also diminished by 50 per cent.” And further we find that “ the criminal and neglected children of the State cost upwards of £IO.OOO more in 18G9 than ten years later, in 1879.” With regard to those children who are placed out in carefully selected houses, they are put under the supervision of unpaid but officially appointed visitors, who include, for the oversight of girls in particular, fifty ladies, each of whom acts nnder the authority of a warrant from the Chairman of the Board. All these visitors are, of course, subordinate to the paid State Agency,and their operations are found to be very valuable in increasing the efficiency of the influence of the homes chosen.

Mr. Habons, in his remarks, in the report, declares his belief that the Massachusetts’ method “ points to the great superiority of the prevention of juvenile

crime rather than its repression. It , proves that systematic individualisation, 3l at home or in selected households, hut under authority, is far more effectual for | the diminution of crime than either the reformatory, or even the industrial school, . a training ship, or the birch, to say nothing of the gaol, which is now all hut ' an obsolete institution for children in the fine old ‘ Bay State.’ ” The facts elucidated by the attention called to the above method of treating juvenile crime cannot but he useful at a time when the subject is calling for the most serious attention of all thoughtful men in New Zealand. They will probably realise that what is wanted is not so much additional funds for preventive and repressive purposes, as a carefully devised and judiciously carried out system. The wide-spread complaint of magistrates is that they can do nothing to stem the current of juvenile depravity. They are too often forced to overlook an offence altogether from the simple fact that they are unwilling to send comparatively innocent children into institutions where they will, ’n ell probability, pick up much that can do them no good. Thera is no graduated scale of prevention merged by degrees into a graduated scale of repression. And the cry is that more money is wanted before a perfect method can ho evolved. But the Massachusetts’ system shows that a nearly perfect system is infinitely cheaper than an imperfect one. Where the State takes a fatherly care of all its erring offspring the results are far and away beyond what is effected by putting all the youthful offenders into one mill for [ criminal repression. Juvenile offenders are of flesh and blood, and their lapses i into crime are generally attributable not so much to their own faults as to those of an imperfect training and education. They should be touched with a light, ; sympathetic, and discriminating hand, I and not thrown helter-skelter under the ! car of justice. ' To conclude, we may mention a singular , fact given by Mr. Habens: “ The results 1 of ‘ probation ’ and State Agents have 1 been so remarkably successful with * juvenile offenders that Massachusetts t has recently enacted a law to apply the < same principle to the treatment of adult £ misdemeanants.” c