Indeterminate Sentence | Page 2

of those arrested for
felonies are discharged convicts. This is an unmistakable evidence of
the growth of the outlaw classes.
But this is not all. Our taxes are greatly increased on account of this
class. We require more police to watch those who are at large and
preying on society. We expend more yearly for apprehending and
trying those caught, for the machinery of criminal justice, and for the
recurring farce of imprisoning on short sentences and discharging those
felons to go on with their work of swindling and robbing. It would be
good economy for the public, considered as a taxpayer, to pay for the
perpetual keep of these felons in secure confinement.
And still this is not the worst. We are all living in abject terror of these

licensed robbers. We fear robbery night and day; we live behind bolts
and bars (which should be reserved for the criminal) and we are in
hourly peril of life and property in our homes and on the highways. But
the evil does not stop here. By our conduct we are encouraging the
growth of the criminal class, and we are inviting disregard of law, and
diffusing a spirit of demoralization throughout the country.
I have spoken of the criminal class as very limited; that is, the class that
lives by the industry of crime alone. But it is not isolated, and it has
widespread relations. There is a large portion of our population not
technically criminals, which is interested in maintaining this criminal
class. Every felon is a part of a vast network of criminality. He has his
dependents, his allies, his society of vice, all the various machinery of
temptation and indulgence.
It happens, therefore, that there is great sympathy with the career of the
lawbreakers, many people are hanging on them for support, and among
them the so-called criminal lawyers. Any legislation likely to interfere
seriously with the occupation of the criminal class or with its increase
is certain to meet with the opposition of a large body of voters. With
this active opposition of those interested, and the astonishing
indifference of the general public, it is easy to see why so little is done
to relieve us of this intolerable burden. The fact is, we go on increasing
our expenses for police, for criminal procedure, for jails and prisons,
and we go on increasing the criminal class and those affiliated with it.
And what do we gain by our present method? We do not gain the
protection of society, and we do not gain the reformation of the
criminal. These two statements do not admit of contradiction. Even
those who cling to the antiquated notion that the business of society is
to punish the offender must confess that in this game society is getting
the worst of it. Society suffers all the time, and the professional
criminal goes on with his occupation, interrupted only by periods of
seclusion, during which he is comfortably housed and fed. The
punishment he most fears is being compelled to relinquish his criminal
career. The object of punishment for violation of statute law is not
vengeance, it is not to inflict injury for injury. Only a few persons now

hold to that. They say now that if it does little good to the offender, it is
deterrent as to others. Now, is our present system deterrent? The statute
law, no doubt, prevents many persons from committing crime, but our
method of administering it certainly does not lessen the criminal class,
and it does not adequately protect society. Is it not time we tried,
radically, a scientific, a disciplinary, a really humanitarian method?
The proposed method is the indeterminate sentence. This strikes
directly at the criminal class. It puts that class beyond the power of
continuing its depredations upon society. It is truly deterrent, because it
is a notification to any one intending to enter upon that method of
living that his career ends with his first felony. As to the general effects
of the indeterminate sentence, I will repeat here what I recently wrote
for the Yale Law Journal:
It is unnecessary to say in a law journal that the indeterminate sentence
is a measure as yet untried. The phrase has passed into current speech,
and a considerable portion of the public is under the impression that an
experiment of the indeterminate sentence is actually being made. It is,
however, still a theory, not adopted in any legislation or in practice
anywhere in the world.
The misconception in regard to this has arisen from the fact that under
certain regulations paroles are granted before the expiration of the
statutory sentence.
An indeterminate sentence is a commitment to prison without any limit.
It is exactly such a commitment as the court makes to an asylum