THE BEST METHOD OF DISPOSING
OF
OUR PAUPER AND VAGRANT CHILDREN.
THE recent burning of the Reform School in Westborough (Mass.)
by one of the lads confined there, the destruction of the Reformatory
Institution on Deer Island by some of the inmates, and the
statement ofGov. Banks in hisMessage to the Massachusetts Legis
lature, that " one-tenth of the graduates of the Reform School are
inmates of the States prisons," have called public attention anew
to the questions of the treatment ofyouthful poverty and crime.
Such questions belong to the region of the most difficult problems
inhumannature and society. How to minister even to the young
mind, diseased; how, still farther, to prevent the attack of the malady;
how to prune dangerous impulses and yet not plant mechanical
virtues; how to meet the neglect ofparents and yet not lessen
parental responsibility ; how to manage numbers of persons, under
asystem, and yet have the system work in accordance with the
providential laws of society; how to use moral machinery, and yet
regard the peculiarities of the individual ; how to make our legislation,
our reformatory expedients, and our charity, not exceptional
and temporary, but in harmonywith the great principles ofpolitical
economy and the great impulses of human nature-these are all
difficulties which come up continually, in considering the different
modes of treating the young criminal and vagrant.
There is a popular impression, that all methods of treatment are
about equally good for the reforming of vicious children, or for
preventing crime among them; and, so that the original purpose be
kind and unselfish, the public look on all such efforts as equally
laudable. But inpoint offact, the systems of reform and prevention
differ almost as much in their real value, as different systems of
medicine, or the various methods of education, in different countries.
They vary in their expenses to the public, in the principles which
animate them, and in their results. As a mere matter of economy,
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it is important that the cheapest and most efficient method of treating
the evils ofyouthful crime and poverty, should be adopted by
the community.
Andnow, in laying the foundation ofafuture system of Reform,
and Prevention ofjuvenile crime and vagrancy-one which shall
make America as much a blessing to the neglected classes, as it has
been to the favored classes-it is doubly important that the principles
of treatment should be clearly understood and carefullyweighed.
It must be remembered, that the whole subject, though difficult,
is in no way abstruse, or removed from the experience of common
life. The children of the poor are not essentially different from
the children of the rich; the same principles which influence the
good or evil developmentof every child in comfortable circumstances,
will affect, in greater or less degree, the child ofpoverty. Sympathy
and hope are as inspiring to the ignorant girl, as to the educated;
steady occupation is as necessary for the street-boy, as the
boy ofa wealthy house ; indifference is as chilling to the one class,
as to the other; the prospect of success is as stimulating to the
young vagrant, as to the student in the college.
The great mistake we make in regard to the children of
the poor, is our too rigid classification. It is true there is a
certain similarity among them, but the grand truth more and
more forces itself upon us, that each poor, deserted, unfortunate
little creature in the streets is an individual, like no other being
whom God has created. He has his own tastes-his own habits
-his peculiar temptations-his especial weaknesses, and his own
virtues. We may class him, from certain external resemblances,
with a hundred or a thousand other lads, and yet he is still
distinct and individual. Perhaps one grand distinction of man
from all other animals, and the pledge of his immortality, is his
individuality-or the infinite variety which the Creator has impressed
upon his nature, and which makes it impossible ever
absolutely to include him within the machinery of a system .
This grand fact must especially be considered in any method of
reform for his vices, or of education for his faculties.
Nature seems especially to indicate small groups of parents and
children, or old and young, as the best forming-institution for
young minds. Children in large numbers together, in constant
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intercourse, appear never to exert a healthful influence on each
other: in the higher classes, habits of deceit, and unnatural vices
are spread among them; and in the lower, all the seeds of vice
which might otherwise lie dormant, spring up and grow noxiously .
Another great error committed in our systems of Juvenile Reform,
is in not following the natural laws which Providence has
established in human nature. It was long ago discovered in the
system of Prison Discipline in England, that if the prison-life did
not offer stimulants to good conduct, and apply to the convict's
mind, the two great motors, Hope and Fear, and establish some
resemblance to the discipline and temptation of common life, it
would fail of its great object-the reform of the prisoner.
It was this that gave rise to the celebrated system of Captain
Machonikie. But whatever was the result inEngland, the correct
ness of the principle is manifest. If the object of an institution,
or amethod of treatment, be Reform, it is evident there must be
some species of discipline, trial, or temptation; reward for good
conduct, success for industry, hope and applause for honesty and
virtue, and pain and loss and disapprobation for idleness and dishonesty
and vice.
The life in the Asylum or Refuge must correspond somewhat
with the life outside. Labor should have reward, and virtue,
honor. Laziness should bring after it suffering; and vices, disgrace.
The virtues must not be drill-virtues; they must spring from the
heart, and be exposed to the strain of temptation. Amere treadmill
goodness, which has gone through a daily round ofobservances,
under the pressure of force, is oflittle worth for every-day life. In
every institution of reform, also, there should be allowed somewhere
with the inmates, the sense of property, that with it may be
cultivated the instinct of economy. Wherever the Reformatory
fails of these stimuli to the character, it fails of one essential
object of the treatment.