"TRANSPORTATION NOT NECESSARY." (From the Spectator, Jan. 25 )

New Zealander, Volume 7, Issue 546, 9 July 1851, Page 3

"TRANSPORTATION NOT NECESSARY." (From the Spectator, Jan. 25 )

This is the title of an admirable treatise, of littls bulk, with which Mr. Adderley, the Conservative Member for North Staffordshire, has occupied a poi tion of his autumnal leisure, Its philosophy is only too sound, its sentiment too elevated, for immediate success. The thoroughness of the leasoning, the transparent good sense and practical drift of the argument, will be apt to miluato against its influence upon those to whom it is directed— the Executive and the Legisl&tme. It speaks a higher language than the patois current in the Commons of our day ; and it aims at a class of statesmanship winch in its largeness would seem to have deolined and at last fairly expired. In searching out proofs for his proposition that " transportation is not necessary," the writer goes back not only to that which has been assumed to render transportation indispensable — the number of criminals — but beyond that to the nature and causes of crime ; and although the work is comprised within the Bpace of seventy p-iges, he is able to deal very effectually with the classification and analysis of the causes, and thus to clear away much of the difficulty which hangs over the subject. No doubt, this is the sensible method; we only doubt whether it is the House of Commons method. Although he is not without illustrations, Mr. Adderley does not stung together from blue books and newspapers a number of individual anecdotes — and so it will be eaid that he is "abstract;" there are no sarcasms levelled either at the Treasury bench or tho Anti-Trea-sury bench — so that it cannot be "statesmanlike; ''no personalities — so that it lacks " vigour." In shoit, it is not empirical, but scientific ; which in House of Commons language is the antithesis of " practical." Mr. Addeiley shows that tian«portation has virtually been given up, as a practice oppressive to the Colonies, and bad in itself, while it is ostensibly ictained by Government on the pita that it cannot be avoided, otherwise what could we do with our criminals. That tiansportation is VMy ineffectual as a penalty, is pretty generally admitted ; even the rpcent attempt to render it somewhat ruoie stern m f.ict, and more terrible in aspect, by authoi itative descuptions of its haidships, has been defeated by tho widely varying conception of it which vnrious judges have foimcd. From the Report on Prison Discipline Mr. Adderley culls some examples of those disciep.tncies :: — • "Mr. Hill suggests, that 'it would be a groat improvement if those who, like himself, are obliged to pass the sentence of transportation, h;id the means of knowing what would be the effect of their sentences.'

The late M-. Law, even after piofessing approb..tun ol'o 1 ' the punhhniP'i', dpehreJ thai fir several jPiirs Ie bad awtvs mm c » point of exphuniiig each successive meaning of the whenever ho pa^ed it, 'in ouler/ said he, 'to satisfy the people that it was not the t ifling thing they thought ; for many weiein touil ignorance what the punishment was, and were rather de-s-irous of encountering it than of remaining hpie w ithout a-iy means of employment.' Another Recorder «j(vms io have taken upon himself to abandon all uio of the punishment with respect to juveniles, and to Lava preieued impunity, sending all such offenders back totheir parents; whilst, on the contrary, Judge Aldeison 'makes a point of passing sentence of transportation on a/i juveniles,'-— but only 'because the sentence means what it does not piofess, an ordeal iii penitential ies previous to the removal fiom this country.'" If judges on the bench have these lax notions, what must be the ideas prevalent among the class represent- • 1 by the gentlemen in the dock? If judges, wl.o bave crammed to get up a dreadful picture of pennl expa'ration, have, such vague and conflicting ideas, how can the criminal world at large, unlettered, not conveisant with blue books nor learned in the social geography of the antipodes, acquire any distinct ideas— any sucb precise and active terror as shall outweigh the immediate temptation to prig a purse or perchance to snatch a mouthful for a hungry stomach? Even the improved form of transportation, so systematically deaenbed by Sir George Grey to the House of Commons, is still to that wide public but a new form of the old thing — a companion to colonization, a gratuitous emigration, a free list to the adventurous theatre of colonial life. Sir George Grey's imposing description might serve to keop Honourable Membeis ft om picking and stealing, but the terrors of his warning would reach little further than his voice. All hut useless— patched up to save appearances as much as possible — to pass current the more readily with critics, rather than to be more effectual in the working — transportation is really retained ou the helpless plea of necessity. It is a shovelling out of culprits ; the culprits gi owing upon our hands in such overwhelming numbers that we can only push them off. This plea of necessity Mr. Addeilpy most effectually grapples. It is based on two assumptions, which he meets by the two questions — first, ought not the present number of those classed as '' criminals" io bo gieatly reduced ? Second, aie theie not other punishments effectual for the con crol of the reduced number? In analyzing the mass of the so-called criminal population, you find that it consists of elements so extremely heterogeneous in their nature and origin, that, if only for the sake of more suitable classification, a more disci iminating treatment of the multitude is needed. i Criminality cannot in many cases be morally charged upon individuals, and in whole classes the criminality i which does exist is factitiously produced. In children, the criminal intent is for the most part absent : this is established beyond contradiction by the concunent testimony of the Judges, The childish trespasses which are chastened by domestic conection among the rich, I among the- poor become the occasion for exposing the young to the most destructive influences; and thus large numbers are deliberately educated, under state laws, into hardened criminals. It not unfrequently | happens to these unfortunates, that observance of one [ commandment enforces the breach of another, and that obedience to the criminal parent will compel the child to commit a crime against society. For the whole class of juvenile offenders, with the comparatively few exceptions of bad organization, or utterly depraved mind, the sound process is noc peaal t eatment, but betti r training. As to the que-t on of equity, in making education a premium to crime, by bestowing it on "juvenile offenders," Mr. Addei ley effectually disposes of that, by insisting on the necessity of education for all, at public schools : but in this first notice of his statesmanlike essay, so biief in compass but so full in matter, we cannot pause upon the separate sections. In like manner he shows how crime is factitiously produced, without moially criminal intent, through those laches of society which neglect to restrain pauperism by working out every possible incentive to industry, which neglect to countervail demoralization by sanatory regulations in our overcrowded [towns ; which neglect to promote moral and physical health by providing means of public recreation. He rebukes the remissness of the higher cl.isses, who justify democratic doctrines by rendering themselves useless as the patrons and guides of the j poor; that treachery of the clergy to their own cause j which has made them abandon their proper posts a<? teachers of morality; and, among other causes which multiply the number of crimm-ils, or aggravate the criminal disposition, he counts the unreformed prisons, which are real adult schools of crime — the licensing system, which takes becrsbops out of ordinary police control, and makes them houses of call for criminal hades — game-preserving, and legal difficulties which check the poor in. acquiring property interests by investment of savings or by purchase of land. Remove even the more obvious causes of crime, and you would diminish the number of criminals by four-fifths. For the correctional control of thia diminished number ther • are ample resources at horne — in imprisonment, which may be rendered far more effectual and self-sup-porting; in corporal punishments specially applicable to •' those who act upon low motive*, and to those who are sensitive to disgrace." " I have shown," says Mr. Adderley in conclusion, " that one-fifth of those we treat as criminals, we m our very treatment confess deserve a wholly different estimation. I have shown that there aie causes of a large proportion of our crimes which might immediately be stopped, and counter-stimulants of industry and vn tuous action, now dormant, which might be called into play. The last defence of transportation fail* when we cannot even plead our own necessities for our brothers' injury. Thank heaven that we see daylight through so foul a cloud upon our national honour!"