Prison_ReformB_19th_Century7

toc

**1) What historical forces led to the rise of the movement?**
 * 2) What methods/tactics were used to lead the movement?**
 * 3) What major figures involved in the movement?**
 * 4) Was/Is the movement successful in achieving its goals?**

= Prison Reform in the 19th Century = ​The living conditions for prisoners and the mentally ill in the 19th century were in desparate need of reform. Issues including disease, the Civil War, and the inhumane treatment of prisoners made 19th century prisons awful places to live. Many activists worked to improve these conditions, and while there were many successes, the end of the century left much to be desired.

** Auburn Prison **
Auburn Prison was authorized by the state of New York in the law of **1816**, and it opened in **1821**. The main focus of this reformatory was on solitary confinement. Even the architectural emphasis of the building was on the individual cells. Prisoners were subject to **10 hours** of harsh physical labor during the day, and they spent their nights completely alone. The goal of the institution was to set up an environment that stressed **reform and rehabilitation**. Because directors wished to separate the prisoners from all bad influences, the inmates were forbidden from communicating with each other. Prisoners walked everywhere in lockstep. This strict disciplinary system did influence many other correctional institutions, but many of the prisoners there were **driven insane** by its harshness.

** Eastern State Penitentiary **
Opened in **1829**, Eastern State Penitentiary still stands in Cherry Hill, Pennsylvania. Its thick, protective walls made it look very much like a **fortress**, and other prisons copied its architectural design. Like Auburn, there was a strict focus on **solitary confinement**. In fact, new prisoners were even forced to wear hoods to keep from seeing their inmates. Prisoners here were also required to walk in **lockstep** or to march in single-file lines. No visitors or mail were allowed. Inmates were even forbidden from reading newspapers. Being so disconnected from the relational and social aspects of living led many prisoners at Eastern State Penitentiary to struggle with **insanity** too.

** Elmira Prison **
A new wave of prison reform was triggered in 1870 by the National Congress on Penitentiary and Reformatory Discipline. This movement led to the opening of Elmira Prison in **1876**, and it housed younger prisoners who were generally between the ages of **16 and 30**. The directors at Elmira has a vision for rehabilitation that was practically the opposite of the Auburn system. A reformer named **Zebulon Brockway** (below) worked to have the prisoners at Elmira separated by their specific crimes. He wanted to have each prisoners treated in such a way to meet their specific reformative needs. The correctional methods at Elmira included vocational training, rewarding good behavior, granting parole, and giving prisoners indeterminate sentences. The focus was shifted from group punishment to **individual treatment**. Inmates at Elmira were offered many opportunities to begin making better lives. They were given the chance to be educated and attend classes, and some prisoners were even offered physical training. Unfortunately, these "nicer" methods did not work out the way that the directors had hoped, and many former Elmira prisoners **committed new crimes** upon their release.

Dorothea Dix
Dorothea Dix was born in Hampden, Maine. Her parents were incapable of raising a child, so she was raised by her grandmother. Even at a young age, Dix had a **passion for reform** and was interested in serving others. At age 14 she opened a school for young girls in Worcester, and later she ran one in Boston. When she was older, Dix was invited to teach Sunday School to the women in a prison in East Cambridge. When she arrived at the prison, she was appalled by the **horrible living conditions**. Many women in the prison were insane and were treated very poorly. She worked with a man named Samuel Howe to have the cells remodeled, and she was **successful** in her efforts. Her success in East Cambridge propelled her to continue working with prisons. Dix soon secured new funds for prisons in both Rhode Island and New York. She was also responsible for improvents in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and some areas of the south and midwest. She was often called upon by other reformers for aid in areas such as women's rights, abolition, and public education, but, while she did sympathize with each of these causes, she **kept her focus on the mentally ill** and prison reform. In 1845, she wrote a book titled, "Remarks on Prisons and Prison Discipline in the United States." In her book she discussed penal reforms, the education of prisoners and the separation of different kinds of offenders. Realizing the need for actual legislature, in 1853 she asked Congress to pass a bill that would devote 12 million acres of public land and other income to her cause. Unfortunately, the bill was **vetoed** by President Pierce. In June 1861, during the Civil War, she devoted some of her efforts to a volunteer nurse program she had started, but her poor health made it difficult for her to lead. When the war ended, she went back toadvocating for the mentally ill. In her lifetime she raised funds for more than **50 hospitals** and was essential to the prison reform efforts of 19th century.

Thomas Mott Osborne
Thomas Mott Osborne had himself incarcerated (imprisoned) in **Auburn Prison** for a week, taking the name "Tom Brown". Without disguise to the prisoners, he shared their life including **solitary confinement** and came out dedicated to prison reform. He reached front-page news and the book he wrote, Within Prison Walls (1914) commemorated the events. Osborne's main idea stated that convicts need to be treated **humanely** to keep their humanity. In **1916**, he created the Mutual Welfare League at Auburn based upon a concept that riled up critics, denouncing the idea of prisoners self-politics as a way to coddle prisoners (a thought that Osborne opposed). He became head warden of **Sing Sing Prison**, and was able to incorporate his ideas there.

Thomas Story Kirkbride
Thomas Story Kirkbride was born in 1809 and died in 1883. He worked and lived as a physician at the Pennsylvania Hospital as a resident physician in **1833** where he overlooked the treatment of the mentally ill. After working there for two years, he was appointed as physician-in-chief and superintendent of a separate department of the Pennsylvania Hospital especially for the insane, holding this position until his death. His position there and sympathy for the patients let him solve problems with influence and a **lasting effect** on the field of mental disorders. Kirkbride advanced his hospital with the ideas that mentally disturbed **should be treated in a hospital**, not an asylum and that patients should be **treated with respect** as people and that occupational therapy would "restore mental health, tranquilize the restlessness and mitigate the sorrows of disease". He came up with the **"Kirkbride Plan"**, a plan for building hospitals for mental patients based on his theory of **Moral Treatment**. Kirkbride contributed greatly to the field of medicine by writing for magazines and serving on boards and trustees.

Zebulon Brockway
Zebulon Brockway was a reformer who believed the purpose of punishment by prison was to **protect society** from crime. He believed this would happen by reforming the criminal. He was the first reformer to use the **indeterminate sentence**, a sentence that implied no specific time in a prison. Indeterminate sentences were given to prisoners because their reform depended on their cooperation which was determined by the administrators. If no change was seen in a criminal, he would be held indefinitely at the prison. Brockway believed prison treatment meant the "**education of the whole man**, his capacity, his habits and tastes, by a rational procedure, whose central motive and law of development are found". His methods included **physical, manual, and military training** along with ethical and aesthetic guidance.

Kirkbride Plan
Dr. Kirkbride imagined a hospital with a **central governmental building** with two wings spanning out, each with different sections. His plan created hierarchical segregation of patients by sex and illness. Men and women were split up in the **two wings** that were each subdivided into smaller sections. The most "excited" residents lived on the lower floors, furthest away from the central body, while the less troubled lived closer to the center. This would make the residents experience at the asylum **smoother** and **theraputic** because they would be separated from the patients who would aggravate their illness. All the patients were allowed fresh air, natural light, and views of the hospital grounds from all the windows. It was thought to be of utmost importance to keep the patients in a **natural environment** and away from hectic urban centers and pollutants. Plentiful **fresh air** and **light** not only contributed to their health but also helped make a cheerful atmosphere. The large hospital grounds with parks and vast farmland were beneficial because they calmed patients with the beauty of nature. Farmland also made the asylum more self-sufficient by providing food and other farm products.

Prison Labor
The Southern states let outsiders use **prisoners for labor** inside the prison for many years, but in **1858**, free black convicts were first taken out of the prison to do hard labor on the railroad and canals in Virginia. The system of renting out black convicts became more popular during the **Reconstruction Era** as the southern states tried to control the waves of freed blacks, previously held on individual plantations.

** Convict Leasing System **
The convict lease system, a popular way of forced labor, was associated with a huge difference in the racial population in prisons. Before the Civil War, whites had dominated the population, but after the Reconstruction era in 1880, **nine-tenths** of the prison population was black. Prisons removed almost all black convicts except for the sick out of prisons to maintain a racially segregated prison system. In the South, there were approximately **27,000 convicted laborers** in 1890. The convict leasing system came to an end when southern politicians organized investigative committees in the **1880's** because of mounting pressure from reformers to study the conditions of the camps. Their findings revealed the conditions and abuses of the system and stirred the media behind the reformers cause. The public opinion turned against the prison labor.

Chain Gangs
Many of the prisoners used for labor were young and endured horrible working conditions. Wearing leg irons **chained together** they were supervised by armed guard. They worked from **ten to fourteen hours** a day with only short lunch and dinner break. The prisoners lives were threatened by the terrible sanitary conditions and many died from **malnutrition and disease**. Others were killed by beatings and overwork. About half of the convicted "chain gang" was only serving for minor theft or burglary.

Conclusion was the reform successful?
Before the prison reformation, prison conditions were horrific. The reform movement did improve some aspects of prison life, but the reformers weren't unified in their cause. Although they worked hard to change the conditions of prisons, each reformer had their own idea of change. The reform movement would have been more successful if people had worked together towards a common goal. Some of the problems occurring in the 19th century continued to appear in later prisons and correctional institutions.

media type="custom" key="6075031"