The Voyage of Governor Phillip to Botany Bay | Page 9

impenetrable forests which impeded all cultivation, was
willing, from very early times, to receive as servants, those English
criminals whom our Courts of Law deemed not sufficiently guilty for
capital punishment.* The planters hired their services during a limited
term; and they were latterly sent out under the care of contractors, who
were obliged to prove, by certificates, that they had disposed of them,
according to the intention of the law.
[* Banishment was first ordered as a punishment for rogues and
vagrants, by statute 39 Eliz. ch. 4. See Blackst. Com. IV. chap. 31. But
no place was there specified. The practice of transporting criminals to
America is said to have commenced in the reign of James I; the year
1619 being the memorable epoch of its origin: but that destination is
first expressly mentioned in 18 Car. II. ch. 2.--The transport traffic was
first regulated by statute 4 George I. ch. II. and the causes expressed in
the preamble to be, the failure of those who undertook to transport
themselves, and the great want of servants in his Majesty's plantations.
Subsequent Acts enforced further regulations.]
The benefits of this regulation were various. The colonies received by it,
at an easy rate, an assistance very necessary; and the mother country
was relieved from the burthen of subjects, who at home were not only
useless but pernicious: besides which, the mercantile returns, on this
account alone, are reported to have arisen, in latter times, to a very
considerable amount.* The individuals themselves, doubtless, in some
instances, proved incorrigible; but it happened also, not very
unfrequently, that, during the period of their legal servitude, they
became reconciled to a life of honest industry, were altogether
reformed in their manners, and rising gradually by laudable efforts, to
situations of advantage, independence, and estimation, contributed
honourably to the population and prosperity of their new country.**

[* It is said, forty thousand pounds per annum, about two thousand
convicts being sold for twenty pounds each.]
[** The Abbe Raynal has given his full testimony to the policy of this
species of banishment, in the fourteenth Book of his History, near the
beginning.]
By the contest in America, and the subsequent separation of the thirteen
Colonies, this traffic was of course destroyed. Other expedients, well
known to the public, have since been tried; some of which proved
highly objectionable;* and all have been found to want some of the
principal advantages experienced from the usual mode of
transportation.--The deliberations upon this subject, which more than
once employed the attention of Parliament, produced at length the plan
of which this volume displays the first result. On December 6, 1786,
the proper orders were issued by his Majesty in Council, and an Act
establishing a Court of Judicature in the place of settlement, and
making such other regulations as the occasion required, received the
sanction of the whole legislature early in the year 1787.
[* ¶ Particularly, the transporting of criminals to the coast of Africa,
where what was meant as an alleviation of punishment too frequently
ended in death.]
To expatiate upon the principles of penal law is foreign to the purpose
of this work, but thus much is evident to the plainest apprehension, that
the objects most to be desired in it are the restriction of the number of
capital inflictions, as far as is consistent with the security of society;
and the employment of every method that can be devised for rendering
the guilty persons serviceable to the public, and just to themselves; for
correcting their moral depravity, inducing habits of industry, and
arming them in future against the temptations by which they have been
once ensnared.
For effectuating these beneficial purposes, well regulated penitentiary
houses seem, in speculation, to afford the fairest opportunity; and a
plan of this kind, formed by the united efforts of Judge Blackstone, Mr.
Eden, and Mr. Howard, was adopted by Parliament in the year 1779.
Difficulties however occurred which prevented the execution of this
design: a circumstance which will be something the less regretted when
it shall be considered, that it is perhaps the fate of this theory, in
common with many others of a very pleasing nature, to be more

attractive in contemplation than efficacious in real practice. A perfect
design, carried on by imperfect agents, is liable to lose the chief part of
its excellence; and the best digested plan of confinement must in
execution be committed, chiefly, to men not much enlightened, very
little armed against corruption, and constantly exposed to the danger of
it. The vigilance which in the infancy of such institutions effectually
watches over the conduct of these public servants, will always in a little
time be relaxed; and it will readily be conceived that a large
penitentiary house, very corruptly governed, would be,