PREFATORY. THE leading ideas expressed in the following pages, in regard to the nature and appropriate treatment of crime, were enunciated by the writer more than forty years ago in giving instructions to juries in the trial of criminal cases, and in the sentencing of persons convicted of crime, and have been publicly expressed by me hundreds of times in the presence of thousands of people during the long period of my service as a judge, without eliciting, so far as I have ever heard, any serious dissent or adverse criticism. Jurors were advised that their duties required no violation of the golden rule; that the prisoner was alleged to be morally diseased, and that they were summoned as a council of physicians to diagnose his case, and determine whether or not he was really diseased as supposed; and that if such was proven to be his condition, the proper treatment ought to be administered for his cure and the protection of the community upon the same principle in all respects as in the case of an insane person. Juries were further instructed that if in fact the prisoner was found to be thus diseased, it was most merciful as well as just to the prisoner himself that they should so declare by their verdict, in order that he should receive the treatment his condition required; and that though it were better that ninety and nine guilty persons should escape than that one innocent person should suffer, yet it were still better that no guilty person should be allowed to escape the just consequences of his evil conduct. Deeply impressed with the truth of these propositions, I had for several years contemplated preparing an essay for the purpose of illustrating and enforcing them, when I should be able to find the necessary time and opportunity to do so. While engaged in the attempt to prepare such an essay, the idea of a more comprehensive work on the subject of crime occurred to me, and the following treatise on the nature, causes, treatment, and prevention of crime has been the result. It was commenced without any definite idea of its publication. I was then seventy-eight, and might not be able to complete it. But favorable conditions have enabled me to present it to the public. It was, as I believed, the last work I should attempt to write, and as it progressed I became intensely interested in the subjects treated of, and inspired with the hope that it might be of some value in aiding to solve some of the great social problems that are now agitating the civilized world. The treatment and cure of those moral diseases from which all sin and crime proceed are subjects of more interest and importance to mankind than all others. Sin may never be entirely eliminated from this world, but I believe that, by means which have been proven to be practicable, it may be reduced to a small fraction of its present magnitude; and if this book shall be a means of contributing in some small degree to that end, I shall be more than satisfied with the result of my labor. Some apparent anachronisms will be found in references made to recent or transpiring events. These are explained by the fact that the preparation of the work has extended over some four years, and the events thus referred to were recent or passing at the time of the allusions made to them. I avail myself of this occasion to express my most sincere thanks to those friends who have aided me in this work by candid criticisms and suggestions, and by assisting me in my researches after historical and scientific facts. BAY CITY, October, 1889. THE AUTHOR. A TREATISE ON THE NATURE, CAUSES, TREATMENT, AND PREVENTION OF CRIME. ARTICLE I OF THE NATURE OF CRIME. "THIS grim topic still claims precedence over all others, whether personal or general. It is at once the most catholic and the most individual of human attributes. It confronts us alike in crowded cities and on lonely prairies, in peaceful villages and on stormy oceans; and when we seek the privacy of our chamber it passes with us across the threshold. Its beginning was in the earliest dawn of history, and he were a bold optimist who should foretell the day of its departure. It was a mystery at the first, and, after so many thousand years of experience and analysis, we still ask ourselves what it is, and why? It is the darkest and the hardiest growth that has ever sprouted from the human heart. All the nostrums of the usual pharmacopoeia have been tried upon it, with scarce an abatement of its sinister luxuriance. No other phenomenon is so bewildering in its manifestations. Civilizations have been based upon it, and it has destroyed civilizations. We call it the child of ignorance, but many of the most highly trained and gifted minds have been steeped in this sable vat of crime. . . . Paganism suckled it, but Christianity has slain for it the fatted calf."-JULIAN HAWTHORNE, "Address on Crime before the National Conference of Charities and Correction," at Washington, 1885. ... CHAPTER I. NATURE OF CRIME. CRIME is said to consist of those wrongs which the government notices as injurious to the public, and punishes in what is called a criminal proceeding in its own name. A |