The Daily News. THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 16, 1911. A QUAINT BELIEF.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIV, Issue 124, 16 November 1911, Page 4

The Daily News. THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 16, 1911. A QUAINT BELIEF.

The Judges of the Supreme Court Bench have in the past few years been given n very powerful weapon, and they have used it. In declaring persistent wrongdoers (who are unable to resist wrongdoing) "habitual criminals," they do so ostensibly to permanently protect society from a recognised scourge. The sentence passed on these criminals is called •'indeterminate,'' which simply means "never-ending." When New Zealand adopted the indeterminate sentence the police authorities were agreeably surprised at the effect. It did not make the slightest difference to the morals of habitual offenders, but it drove some of them out of the country. It is the business of all countries to "pass on" the wrong-doer. But there is not the slightest tittle of evidence that the New Zealand system of ''indeterminate" sentences are what they pretend to be. Thus an habitual criminal undergoing an "indeterminate" sentence may be released for good conduct within a shorter period than the ordinary wrongdoer who has not been proved an habitual offender. In order to reach the heart of the habitual offender he is excellently treated—better, indeed, than his less wicked fellow-prisoner. The habitual criminal is a specialist, and very rarely indeed a man who gives the gaol authorities trouble. This class of man is, inside gaol, absolutely free from the temptation that made him a criminal. There is no method known to criminologists of deciding that a criminal who is sheltered from temptation will not return to crime on release. At present it is only by observance of Hie "habitual's" gaol behaviour that the. authorities release him. At the Christchurch Supreme Court on Monday a man was declared an habitual criminal and "ordered to be detained in custody until such time as he had satislied the authorities that he had abandoned the course of life lie had in the past followed." If anything more absurd than this has been done by the authorities we would like to hear about it. A man is lacked up, and cannot commit a crime. The authorities say, ''lf you do not continue to be an habitual criminal while you are in gaol we will release you." Here is a parallel. A hoy has robbed an apple-tree. The owner captures the boy and locks hini m a stable. The owner says to the boy, "If during the time you are in this stable you do not rob the apple-trees in my orchard, I will forgive yo\>." The system is as useful as issuing a prohibition order against a man in the middle of the Sahara'desert, or of putting hobbles un pigs to prevent them climbing trees. How an habitual criminal can do anything but abandon his practices inside the four walls of a. gaol goodness

only knows. The public may be under the impression that the man who has made crime his hobby is being cured by the "Mavourecn" sentence. We fail—and all other countries fai—to understand tno reason or the cause o ; crime. It is impossible, for instance, by any course conceivable to repair the mental and physical defects of a degenerate who is the product of generations of gradual degeneracy. AH the combined experts in the world are unable to undo the gradual work of Nature. To presume that, say. a man of 50 who has spent his liberty in crime (and who cannot help spending it so) can be turned into a different being by a course of moral training is only possible to the person who believes that "badness" can be helped by the evil-doer. There is no great penologist who can be made to say that a criminal has power to control his inclinations, and no penologist or student of crime believes that an "indeterminate sentence" of, say, two years has any more curative effect than a mustard plaster on a broken ploughshare. Maybe judges are not always perfectly right in declaring a man an habitual criminal, but when they do they virtually declare that he is past redemption. This being so, they tell him that if he commits no false pretences in the gaol yard, is. not guilty of burglary in his cell, docs not assault peaceful citizens in the gaol garden, or embezzle funds in the exercise grounds, he will be allowed freedom to go out into the world, where he has the opportunity of committing hU special crime. And as we have seen, he takes advantage of this peculiar distortion of justice.

ADVANCING THE PORT. In one thing at least wo are in agreement with Mr. Okey. We refer to starting a local shipping company, a project we have been consistently advocating in these columns. The member referred to the early completion of the harbor and the possibilities of Xew Plymouth as a distributing port. We paint in roseate hues the future prospects of New Plymouth, we deplore the present state of stagnation, and we enquire as to what is wrong with the place, but as for getting a "move on"—doing tilings—that is quite a different matter. We do not know whether it has yet struck the average citizen of New Plymouth that within a few months there will be provided at the harbor facilities for the accommodation of the largest vessels trading to Xew Zealand and that we will be able to compete successfully with -any other harbor in the Dominion. What are we doing to take advantage of these facilities? Absolutely nothing. We are waiting, as usual, for something to turn up of its own accord that will lead us to prosperity and fortune. But this condition'will never be reached unless we bestir ourselves and get to work. As we have pointed out before, we have a magnificent chance with our harbor. By the lowncss of our harbor charges, compared with those of other places,°wc will be in the position to compete successfully with Wellington and Auckland for the transhipment trade of the whole of tho coast from Hokianga in the north to Foxton in the south and of that of the west coast of the other island., But the present shipping companies 'will provide what services are required, some say. It has to be rememberdd, however,' that the interests of these companies are not bound up with the interests of New Plymouth. The centres of the companies are Auckland and Wellington, and it is only natural that they will study these places first. No: if New Plymouth is to move forward as a shipping centre, if she is going to seize the advantages Nature has put in her way, the men of the district will need to form a shipping company of their own and work things in their own way, the way that will best serve New Plymouth. Wanganui lias its shipping company, Nelson has its company; so. too, lias little Waitara. None of them had better prospects when started than are before New Plymouth at the present time; indeed, they could not liave been nearly as good. We have everything in our favor: we have the centrality; the harbor accommodationand the trade is there for the picking up. The cost of starting a service nee<f not be very great. There would be no difficitlty about chartering a couple of beats for a commencement. There are men in the community who would gladly take up shares without looking for any return other than the; benefits the inauguration of such a service would confer on the town. A correspondent n. yesterday's News offered £IOO towards it, and there are others who would willingly take up shares. Newspapers may w.nte about it, politicians may orate the people may talk, But unless someone "gets down to it" and works to put the scheme into operation nothing will be done. We badly want a leade" one who will practise and work as well as talk and preach. Herein lies a chance for Mr. Okey to actually do something for the place, for the interests of which he professes such solicitude,