Official proceedings of the annual meeting: 1929

HUMAN NATURE UNDER AUTHORITY

195

rect thing because it's in the Bible, but let someone try to tell them
that they should "resist not evil" and see how far he gets.
I'm sure there's something wrong with our prisons. Some
intelligent people say that the officers and guards should be reformed before trying to do anything with the prisoner. Confucius said, "Man differs only a little from the animal." I can testify from my own experience that jailers try to separate a man
from that "little" when he goes to jail.
George W. Wickersham says that experience has proved
that while to shut a man in prison for crime might deter others
from lawbreaking, so far as the immediate offender is concerned
the chances are that by subjecting him to prison influences society
has created a habitual offender and has saddled itself with a pensioner for life.
I like to quote from such an authority. There's no bias there,
and his opinions must be respected because he has never been under the frown of authority. There's a statement you can take
without question. My statements must be carefully weighed, because when an ex-prisoner talks or writes about prisons, police,
prosecutors, etc., too often it is his wounds that are speaking.
To get back to the prisons: What chance has the young boy at
San Quentin, with its three thousand prisoners milling around
like cattle, what chance has he to acquire right mental habits?
What chance has he at Jefferson City, at Statesville, at Leavenworth, or Atlanta-all big prisons? The dead weight of depravity pulls him down before his name is dry on the books.
It pulls down the guards, the officers, and the wardens. Furthermore, the moment he steps into prison he sheds all sense of
responsibility, and nothing is done while he is there to revive it.
His bed and board are furnished, he is bathed and shaved, and
his laundry is put in his cell. He knows that every jute bag he
turns out at San Quentin is made at a loss to the state. He is
taught nothing useful against the day of his discharge. It would
be bad enough if he were standing still, but he's not; he is going
backward and soon forgets the little he knew about getting along
in the outside world. Things change so rapidly today that a