"SOCIETY AND ITS CRIMINALS*
[* Col. Robert G. Ingersoll was greatly interested in
securing for Chiara Cignarale a commutation of the death
sentence to imprisonment for life. In view of the fact that
the great Agnostic has made a close study of capital
punishment, a reporter for the World called upon him a day
or two ago for an interview touching modern reformatory
measures and the punishment of criminals. Speaking
generally on the subject Colonel Ingersoll said:]
I suppose that society—that is to say, a state or a nation—has the right of self-defence. It is impossible to maintain society— that is to say, to protect the rights of individuals in life, in property, in reputation, and in the various pursuits known as trades and professions, without in some way taking care of those who violate these rights. The principal object of all government should be to protect those in the right from those in the wrong. There are a vast number of people who need to be protected who are unable, by reason of the defects in their minds and by the countless circumstances that enter into the question of making a living, to protect themselves. Among the barbarians there was, comparatively speaking, but little difference. A living was made by fishing and hunting. These arts were simple and easily learned. The principal difference in barbarians consisted in physical strength and courage. As a consequence, there were comparatively few failures. Most men were on an equality. Now that we are somewhat civilized, life has become wonderfully complex. There are hundreds of arts, trades, and professions, and in every one of these there is great competition.
Besides all this, something is needed every moment. Civilized man has less credit than the barbarian. There is something by which everything can be paid for, including the smallest services. Everybody demands payment, and he who fails to pay is a failure. Owing to the competition, owing to the complexity of modern life, owing to the thousand things that must be known in order to succeed in any direction, on either side of the great highway that is called Progress, are innumerable wrecks. As a rule, failure in some honest direction, or at least in some useful employment, is the dawn of crime. People who are prosperous, people who by reasonable labor can make a reasonable living, who, having a little leisure can lay in a little for the winter that comes to all, are honest.
As a rule, reasonable prosperity is virtuous. I don't say great prosperity, because it is very hard for the average man to withstand extremes. When people fail under this law, or rather this fact, of the survival of the fittest, they endeavor to do by some illegal way that which they failed to do in accordance with law. Persons driven from the highway take to the fields, and endeavor to reach their end or object in some shorter way, by some quicker path, regardless of its being right or wrong.
I have said this much to show that I regard criminals as unfortunates. Most people regard those who violate the law with hatred. They do not take into consideration the circumstances. They do not believe that man is perpetually acted upon. They throw out of consideration the effect of poverty, of necessity, and above all, of opportunity. For these reasons they regard criminals with feelings of revenge. They wish to see them punished. They want them imprisoned or hanged. They do not think the law has been vindicated unless somebody has been outraged. I look at these things from an entirely different point of view. I regard these people who are in the clutches of the law not only as unfortunates, but, for the most part, as victims. You may call them victims of nature, or of nations, or of governments; it makes no difference, they are victims. Under the same circumstances the very persons who punish them would be punished. But whether the criminal is a victim or not, the honest man, the industrious man, has the right to defend the product of his labor. He who sows and plows should be allowed to reap, and he who endeavors to take from him his harvest is what we call a criminal; and it is the business of society to protect the honest from the dishonest.
Without taking into account whether the man is or is not responsible, still society has the right of self-defence. Whether that right of self-defence goes to the extent of taking life, depends, I imagine, upon the circumstances in which society finds itself placed. A thousand men on a ship form a society. If a few men should enter into a plot for the destruction of the ship, or for turning it over to pirates, or for poisoning and plundering the most of the passengers—if the passengers found this out certainly they would have the right of self-defence. They might not have the means to confine the conspirators with safety. Under such circumstances it might be perfectly proper for them to destroy their lives and to throw their worthless bodies into the sea. But what society has the right to do depends upon the circumstances. Now, in my judgment, society has the right to do two things—to protect itself and to do what it can to reform the individual. Society has no right to take revenge; no right to torture a convict; no right to do wrong because some individual has done wrong. I am opposed to all corporal punishment in penitentiaries. I am opposed to anything that degrades a criminal or leaves upon him an unnecessary stain, or puts upon him any stain that he did not put upon himself.
Most people defend capital punishment on the ground that the man ought to be killed because he has killed another. The only real ground for killing him, even if that be good, is not that he has killed, but that he may kill. What he has done simply gives evidence of what he may do, and to prevent what he may do, instead of to revenge what he has done, should be the reason given.
Now, there is another view. To what extent does it harden the community for the Government to take life? Don't people reason in this way: That man ought to be killed; the Government, under the same circumstances, would kill him, therefore I will kill him? Does not the Government feed the mob spirit—the lynch spirit? Does not the mob follow the example set by the Government? The Government certainly cannot say that it hangs a man for the purpose of reforming him. Its feelings toward that man are only feelings of revenge and hatred. These are the same feelings that animate the lowest and basest mob.
Let me give you an example. In the city of Bloomington, in the State of Illinois, a man confined in the jail, in his efforts to escape, shot and, I believe, killed the jailer. He was pursued, recaptured, brought back and hanged by a mob. The man who put the rope around his neck was then under indictment for an assault to kill and was out on bail, and after the poor wretch was hanged another man climbed the tree and, in a kind of derision, put a piece of cigar between the lips of the dead man. The man who did this had also been indicted for a penitentiary offence and was then out on bail.
I mention this simply to show the kind of people you find in mobs. Now, if the Government had a greater and nobler thought; if the Government said: "We will reform; we will not destroy; but if the man is beyond reformation we will simply put him where he can do no more harm," then, in my judgment, the effect would be far better. My own opinion is, that the effect of an execution is bad upon the community—degrading and debasing. The effect is to cheapen human life; and, although a man is hanged because he has taken human life, the very fact that his life is taken by the Government tends to do away with the idea that human life is sacred.
Let me give you an illustration. A man in the city of Washington went to Alexandria, Va., for the purpose of seeing a man hanged who had murdered an old man and a woman for the purpose of getting their money. On his return from that execution he came through what is called the Smithsonian grounds. This was on the same day, late in the evening. There he met a peddler, whom he proceeded to murder for his money. He was arrested in a few hours, in a little while was tried and convicted, and in a little while was hanged. And another man, present at this second execution, went home on that same day, and, in passing by a butcher-shop near his house, went in, took from the shop a cleaver, went into his house and chopped his wife's head off.
This, I say, throws a little light upon the effect of public executions. In the Cignarale case, of course the sentence should have been commuted. I think, however, that she ought not to be imprisoned for life. From what I read of the testimony I think she should have been pardoned.
It is hard, I suppose, for a man fully to understand and enter into the feelings of a wife who has been trampled upon, abused, bruised, and blackened by the man she loved—by the man who made to her the vows of eternal affection. The woman, as a rule, is so weak, so helpless. Of course, it does not all happen in a moment. It comes on as the night comes. She notices that he does not act quite as affectionately as he formerly did. Day after day, month after month, she feels that she is entering a twilight. But she hopes that she is mistaken, and that the light will come again. The gloom deepens, and at last she is in midnight—a midnight without a star. And this man, whom she once worshiped, is now her enemy— one who delights to trample upon every sentiment she has—who delights in humiliating her, and who is guilty of a thousand nameless tyrannies. Under these circumstances, it is hardly right to hold that woman accountable for what she does. It has always seemed to me strange that a woman so circumstanced—in such fear that she dare not even tell her trouble—in such fear that she dare not even run away—dare not tell a father or a mother, for fear that she will be killed—I say, that in view of all this, it has always seemed strange to me that so few husbands have been poisoned.
The probability is that society raises its own criminals. It plows the land, sows the seed, and harvests the crop. I believe that the shadow of the gibbet will not always fall upon the earth. I believe the time will come when we shall know too much to raise criminals—know too much to crowd those that labor into the dens and dungeons that we call tenements, while the idle live in palaces. The time will come when men will know that real progress means the enfranchisement of the whole human race, and that our interests are so united, so interwoven, that the few cannot be happy while the many suffer; so that the many cannot be happy while the few suffer; so that none can be happy while one suffers. In other words, it will be found that the human race is interested in each individual. When that time comes we will stop producing criminals; we will stop producing failures; we will not leave the next generation to chance; we will not regard the gutter as a proper nursery for posterity.
People imagine that if the thieves are sent to the penitentiary, that is the last of the thieves; that if those who kill others are hanged, society is on a safe and enduring basis. But the trouble is here: A man comes to your front door and you drive him away. You have an idea that that man's case is settled. You are mistaken. He goes to the back door. He is again driven away. But the case is not settled. The next thing you know he enters at night. He is a burglar. He is caught; he is convicted; he is sent to the penitentiary, and you imagine that the case is settled. But it is not. You must remember that you have to keep all the agencies alive for the purpose of taking care of these people. You have to build and maintain your penitentiaries, your courts of justice; you have to pay your judges, your district attorneys, your juries, you witnesses, your detectives, your police—all these people must be paid. So that, after all, it is a very expensive way of settling this question. You could have done it far more cheaply had you found this burglar when he was a child; had you taken his father and mother from the tenement house, or had you compelled the owners to keep the tenement clean; or if you had widened the streets, if you had planted a few trees, if you had had plenty of baths, if you had had a school in the neighborhood. If you had taken some interest in this family—some interest in this child—instead of breaking into houses, he might have been a builder of houses.
There is, and it cannot be said too often, no reforming influence in punishment; no reforming power in revenge. Only the best of men should be in charge of penitentiaries; only the noblest minds and the tenderest hearts should have the care of criminals. Criminals should see from the first moment that they enter a penitentiary that it is filled with the air of kindness, full of the light of hope. The object should be to convince every criminal that he has made a mistake; that he has taken the wrong way; that the right way is the easy way, and that the path of crime never did and never can lead to happiness; that that idea is a mistake, and that the Government wishes to convince him that he has made a mistake; wishes to open his intellectual eyes; wishes so to educate him, so to elevate him, that he will look back upon what he has done, only with horror. This is reformation. Punishment is not. When the convict is taken to Sing Sing or to Auburn, and when a striped suit of clothes is put upon him—that is to say, when he is made to feel the degradation of his position—no step has been taken toward reformation. You have simply filled his heart with hatred. Then, when he has been abused for several years, treated like a wild beast, and finally turned out again in the community, he has no thought, in a majority of cases, except to "get even" with those who have persecuted him. He feels that it is a persecution.
Question. Do you think that men are naturally criminals and naturally virtuous?
Answer. I think that man does all that he does naturally—that is to say, a certain man does a certain act under certain circumstances, and he does this naturally. For instance, a man sees a five dollar bill, and he knows that he can take it without being seen. Five dollars is no temptation to him. Under the circumstances it is not natural that he should take it. The same man sees five million dollars, and feels that he can get possession of it without detection. If he takes it, then under the circumstances, that was natural to him. And yet I believe there are men above all price, and that no amount of temptation or glory or fame could mislead them. Still, whatever man does, is or was natural to him.
Another view of the subject is this: I have read that out of fifty criminals who had been executed it was found, I believe, in nearly all the cases, that the shape of the skull was abnormal. Whether this is true or not, I don't know; but that some men have a tendency toward what we call crime, I believe. Where this has been ascertained, then, it seems to me, such men should be placed where they cannot multiply their kind. Women who have a criminal tendency should be placed where they cannot increase their kind. For hardened criminals —that is to say, for the people who make crime a business—it would probably be better to separate the sexes; to send the men to one island, the women to another. Let them be kept apart, to the end that people with criminal tendencies may fade from the earth. This is not prompted by revenge. This would not be done for the purpose of punishing these people, but for the protection of society —for the peace and happiness of the future.
My own belief is that the system in vogue now in regard to the treatment of criminals in many States produces more crime than it prevents. Take, for instance, the Southern States. There is hardly a chapter in the history of the world the reading of which could produce greater indignation than the history of the convict system in many of the Southern States. These convicts are hired out for the purpose of building railways, or plowing fields, or digging coal, and in some instances the death-rate has been over twelve per cent. a month. The evidence shows that no respect was paid to the sexes—men and women were chained together indiscriminately. The evidence also shows that for the slightest offences they were shot down like beasts. They were pursued by hounds, and their flesh was torn from their bones.
So in some of the Northern prisons they have what they call the weighing machine—an infamous thing, and he who uses it commits as great a crime as the convict he punishes could have committed. All these things are degrading, debasing, and demoralizing. There is no need of any such punishment in any penitentiary. Let the punishment be of such kind that the convict is responsible himself. For instance, if the convict refuses to obey a reasonable rule he can be put into a cell. He can be fed when he obeys the rule.
If he goes hungry it is his own fault. It depends upon himself to say when he shall eat. Or he may be placed in such a position that if he does not work—if he does not pump—the water will rise and drown him. If the water does rise it is his fault. Nobody pours it upon him. He takes his choice.
These are suggested as desperate cases, but I can imagine no case where what is called corporal punishment should be inflicted, and the reason I am against it is this: I am opposed to any punishment that cannot be inflicted by a gentleman. I am opposed to any punishment the infliction of which tends to harden and debase the man who inflicts it. I am for no laws that have to be carried out by human curs.
Take, for instance, the whipping-post. Nothing can be more degrading. The man who applies the lash is necessarily a cruel and vulgar man, and the oftener he applies it the more and more debased he will become. The whole thing can be stated in the one sentence: I am opposed to any punishment that cannot be inflicted by a gentleman, and by "gentleman" I mean a self-respecting, honest, generous man.
Question. What do you think of the efficacy or the propriety of punishing criminals by solitary confinement?
Answer. Solitary confinement is a species of torture. I am opposed to all torture. I think the criminal should not be punished. He should be reformed, if he is capable of reformation. But, whatever is done, it should not be done as a punishment. Society should be too noble, too generous, to harbor a thought of revenge. Society should not punish, it should protect itself only. It should endeavor to reform the individual. Now, solitary confinement does not, I imagine, tend to the reformation of the individual. Neither can the person in that position do good to any human being. The prisoner will be altogether happier when his mind is engaged, when his hands are busy, when he has something to do. This keeps alive what we call cheerfulness. And let me say a word on this point.
I don't believe that the State ought to steal the labor of a convict. Here is a man who has a family. He is sent to the penitentiary. He works from morning till night. Now, in my judgment, he ought to be paid for the labor over and above what it costs to keep him. That money should be sent to his family. That money should be subject, at least, to his direction. If he is a single man, when he comes out of the penitentiary he should be given his earnings, and all his earnings, so that he would not have the feeling that he had been robbed. A statement should be given to him to show what it had cost to keep him and how much his labor had brought and the balance remaining in his favor. With this little balance he could go out into the world with something like independence. This little balance would be a foundation for his honesty—a foundation for a resolution on his part to be a man. But now each one goes out with the feeling that he has not only been punished for the crime which he committed, but that he has been robbed of the results of his labor while there.
The idea is simply preposterous that the people sent to the penitentiary should live in idleness. They should have the benefit of their labor, and if you give them the benefit of their labor they will turn out as good work as if they were out of the penitentiary. They will have the same reason to do their best. Consequently, poor articles, poorly constructed things, would not come into competition with good articles made by free people outside of the walls.
Now many mechanics are complaining because work done in the penitentiaries is brought into competition with their work. But the only reason that convict work is cheaper is because the poor wretch who does it is robbed. The only reason that the work is poor is because the man who does it has no interest in its being good. If he had the profit of his own labor he would do the best that was in him, and the consequence would be that the wares manufactured in the prisons would be as good as those manufactured elsewhere. For instance, we will say here are three or four men working together. They are all free men. One commits a crime and he is sent to the penitentiary. Is it possible that his companions would object to his being paid for honest work in the penitentiary?
And let me say right here, all labor is honest. Whoever makes a useful thing, the labor is honest, no matter whether the work is done in a penitentiary or in a palace; in a hovel or the open field. Wherever work is done for the good of others, it is honest work. If the laboring men would stop and think, they would know that they support everybody. Labor pays all the taxes. Labor supports all the penitentiaries. Labor pays the warden. Labor pays everything, and if the convicts are allowed to live in idleness labor must pay their board. Every cent of tax is borne by the back of labor. No matter whether your tariff is put on champagne and diamonds, it has to be paid by the men and women who work—those who plow in the fields, who wash and iron, who stand by the forge, who run the cars and work in the mines, and by those who battle with the waves of the sea. Labor pays every bill.
There is one little thing to which I wish to call the attention of all who happen to read this interview, and that is this: Undoubtedly you think of all criminals with horror and when you hear about them you are, in all probability, filled with virtuous indignation. But, first of all, I want you to think of what you have in fact done. Secondly, I want you to think of what you have wanted to do. Thirdly, I want you to reflect whether you were prevented from doing what you wanted to do by fear or by lack of opportunity. Then perhaps you will have more charity.
Question. What do you think of the new legislation in the State changing the death penalty to death by electricity?
Answer. If death by electricity is less painful than hanging, then the law, so far as that goes, is good. There is not the slightest propriety in inflicting upon the person executed one single unnecessary pang, because that partakes of the nature of revenge—that is to say, of hatred—and, as a consequence, the State shows the same spirit that the criminal was animated by when he took the life of his neighbor. If the death penalty is to be inflicted, let it be done in the most humane way. For my part, I should like to see the criminal removed, if he must be removed, with the same care and with the same mercy that you would perform a surgical operation. Why inflict pain? Who wants it inflicted? What good can it, by any possibility, do? To inflict unnecessary pain hardens him who inflicts it, hardens each among those who witness it, and tends to demoralize the community.
Question. Is it not the fact that punishments have grown less and less severe for many years past?
Answer. In the old times punishment was the only means of reformation. If anybody did wrong, punish him. If people still continued to commit the same offence, increase the punishment; and that went on until in what they call "civilized countries" they hanged people, provided they stole the value of one shilling. But larceny kept right on. There was no diminution. So, for treason, barbarous punishments were inflicted. Those guilty of that offence were torn asunder by horses; their entrails were cut out of them while they were yet living and thrown into their faces; their bodies were quartered and their heads were set on pikes above the gates of the city. Yet there was a hundred times more treason then than now. Every time a man was executed and mutilated and tortured in this way the seeds of other treason were sown.
So in the church there was the same idea. No reformation but by punishment. Of course in this world the punishment stopped when the poor wretch was dead. It was found that that punishment did not reform, so the church said: "After death it will go right on, getting worse and worse, forever and forever." Finally it was found that this did not tend to the reformation of mankind. Slowly the fires of hell have been dying out. The climate has been changing from year to year. Men have lost confidence in the power of the thumbscrew, the fagot, and the rack here, and they are losing confidence in the flames of perdition hereafter. In other words, it is simply a question of civilization.
When men become civilized in matters of thought, they will know that every human being has the right to think for himself, and the right to express his honest thought. Then the world of thought will be free. At that time they will be intelligent enough to know that men have different thoughts, that their ways are not alike, because they have lived under different circumstances, and in that time they will also know that men act as they are acted upon. And it is my belief that the time will come when men will no more think of punishing a man because he has committed the crime of larceny than they will think of punishing a man because he has the consumption. In the first case they will endeavor to reform him, and in the second case they will endeavor to cure him.
The intelligent people of the world, many of them, are endeavoring to find out the great facts in Nature that control the dispositions of men. So other intelligent people are endeavoring to ascertain the facts and conditions that govern what we call health, and what we call disease, and the object of these people is finally to produce a race without disease of flesh and without disease of mind. These people look forward to the time when there need to be neither hospitals nor penitentiaries.
—New York World, August 5, 1888."
Reference: http://www.gutenberg.org/files/38808/38808-h/38808-h.htm#link0049
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