Criminal Anthropology from a Canadian View-Point

Mr. President and Gentlemen,--

It would be an act of presumption to attempt to treat: exhaustively in a single address so comprehensive a subject as criminal anthropology; for a thorough consideration of the subject involves studies in zoology, human and comparative anatomy, physiological treatment, normal or morbid, and pathological psychology. Likewise, a review of the social customs of man from primeval periods down to the present time. There has been so much said and written, especially during the past half century, about the betterment and reformation of the criminal, that if words, or plans or specifications, could have accomplished it, the criminal world of today would have been transformed. But it has not been so, simply because, " theory has never made a barrel out of a bunghole," and there are grave doubts now entertained if it ever will. The criminal is a factor in human life, and he is here to stay, and it is a fact that we find him stolidly staying, despite the law, the police, the reformatories, the penitentiaries, and all efforts philanthropic made for his betterment; notwithstanding all the barking done to frighten him, all the love lavished to save him, and all the moral and religious analysis to which he has been subjected. He stays, and the only time one of a certain class of criminals doesn't stay is after he has undergone a post mortem examination for heart disease, the effect of suspended sentence on a rope from the gallows.

Criminal bacteria develop when nourished by the best blood of society. They fatten on crowded civilization. A community of criminals without feeding ground) would soon die for want of nourishment. Our Canadian 142 cities are the hot-beds for the production of these obnoxious excresences. The communities of honest and upright men (if such exist) must, as far as possible, undertake to solve the criminal problem. The press could take up the question with ungloved but patriotic hands, and give the public something more than the sensational side of criminal life. The pulpit could touch these unpalatable truths more than once a year, even should it prove necessary to use a disinfectant in stirring up a community of worshippers on vital ethics and accepted conduct in life. The general public should become more interested in criminalogical and penological questions, for no reform of any value can be successfully accomplished without the cooperation of society, irrespective of creed or nationality.

Then again, the importance of full and complete materials necessary for the study of crime cannot be overestimated. The work of our criminal courts and o£ our penitentiaries affords an opportunity for the study of a number of vital problems which affect the whole life and future of our Dominion. The frequency of offences serves as a barometer reflecting the moral state of our communities, and the form which crime assumes reveals the weakly construction of our social organisms. The personal characteristics of the criminal, if studied, give us the form or motive force of their attack. The repetition of crime by the same individuals shows clearly how faulty is the treatment administered. Why should an individual offender be punished, "thirty days, or a dollar and costs," five, ten, fifteen, and as high as twenty, times a year, swelling the volume of crime, when it is the individual who counts twenty offences committed, and the punishment acts as an incentive to crime rather than a cure or a deterrent? Could not a sentence be added to a recidivist criminal who is determined to live and thrive by crime that would at least make some little impression on the delinquent?

A number of general and special problems are attached to the study of crime, but our material for its study is scanty and inadequate. I think I am rational in saying that the treatment of the prisoner and his crime suffers more from a general ignorance and apathy than, from any public opposition based upon logic, or from a knowledge of the situation. He who handles facts with intelligence, even though an opponent, can do better service to the cause of penology, than he who knows it all and is generally filled with fad notions and prejudices about imprisonment and the treatment of the criminal. We are prone to follow popular tendencies rather than to lead public sentiment and opinion in the right direction, and I would, as far as I possibly could, educate the public on these growing and absorbing questions. We must not be blind to the advances made and to the general interest manifested lately by the best minds of the Dominion in penological matters, and this fact is an incentive and an encouragement to those who have these vital questions always at heart.

There is the Annual Report of the Inspectors of our penitentiaries, throwing the light and the experience of years upon the treatment of the criminal as well as practical matters of the penitentiaries, a review of offences and punishments, and the general effect of imprisonment. Yet, I doubt if the people even consider the report seriously, much less study for themselves, and form an independent opinion on these questions affecting the general and vital interests of the state. Only a few months ago I met a man, while travelling, who is supposed to be posted on public matters, and in conversation he said: " We should have farm lands and have them cultivated by the prisoners of the penitentiaries. We should have advanced trades taught of high-grade industry, and adopt the classification of our prisoners." My reply was rather a surprise. We already have large farms well cultivated, good trade instructors, and varied industries; and what he termed advanced classification has resulted, where it has been tried, in giving but little satisfaction in the management of our institutions. Conduct in prison is an unsafe index to real character.

The study of crime is essential to the problems of our social life and the certain bases of operation produce good and lasting results. First is the basis of individual analysis. In painstaking fidelity one must study, at first hand, the criminal, his mental, normal and physical peculiarities, his parents, their character, environment of his home life, his companionship and the first steps made in the criminal life. Following this system we locate the beginning of his crime, and get to the base of heredity or environment. However valuable this study may be, however absorbingly interesting the study of pathological humanity, it cannot of itself be made the basis of repressive measures until corroborated and reinforced by such a number of similar instances as will prove the case normal and not exceptional. On this basis we must then fall back on figures. The observation of large numbers is necessary and a system is not complete until it has embraced all possible cases. The larger the number, the more trustworthy the results. The object of statistics is to prove on a larger scale what in a limited field may have been surmised. All figures given should reflect the bare truth of the situation, and their proof is a necessity to the researches of criminal anthropology. The individual analysis is largely experimental and apt to over-reach the limits of possibility, but with statistics we grasp general truths. Both should develop side by side.

Allow me to call attention to some of the results obtained from figures. Comparing the number of criminals with the population from year to year, we observe how passion and immorality grow or decrease. By comparing different crimes with each other we learn the shape or form they take in the passions; by comparing the crimes with the punishments, in different sections of the Dominion, we learn how popular opinions will estimate the gravity of specific offences; by comparing one Province with another, we learn the peculiarities of the moral condition of each. Those who look at the diversity of sentences or punishments are apt to become entangled in a mass of exceptional anomalies. We can by the proper combination of data, trace the connection of race, age, sex, social condition and other circumstances with the commission of crime. By- this means valuable material is furnished upon which is based the treatment of crime by the Court and by the penal institutions. All cannot be accomplished in a day. Hard tasks are given to those who are willing to solve then, and it is much better in the final analysis to have it shown that your toil and your devotion have been worked out on strong and righteous principles, even if but little result is perceptible, than to get some sensational reform fad and work a life-time to do a little selfish thing and then fade into oblivion.

What then are the factors which enter into the reformation of criminals, and to what extent does the reformation of a criminal depend on religion? The elements which enter into reformation are: good treatment, a strong and healthy discipline, fair dealing, the criminal's recognition of his own criminality, his desire and willingness to reform, a recognition of the criminal as a human being by outside society, and -a recognition by the hand of justice that, while it is necessary and just to punish crime, yet the clemency of a parole is not to be withheld from any really hopeful case. There are occasions when the criminal is only an offender against human law, and may cease from offending by his own act and become reconciled to such law, independent of influence or religion. Men cease to do evil in limited ways without religious motives, but the limits of all such reforms are narrow. When persons are criminal in thought and intent, they need a thorough change to make their thoughts and motives pure. When the turpitude of individuals is greater than the evil of their acts (which is generally the case), then is the basis of their reformation dependent upon a higher force than is found in the human heart to make the change thorough, complete and permanent. The function of true religion in the human heart is to overthrow the evil and bring the thought and the life into touch with the Creator. Christ said on this matter: " Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, with all thy soul, and with all thy mind " and the second is like unto it, "Thou shall love they neighbor as thyself." "Up on these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets."

Complete and sure reform is dependent upon the religion of these two commandments. Obedience to the first puts man right with his Maker, obedience to the second puts a man in right relationship with his fellows. Under the sway of these two commandments no crime could exist, for it is an utter impossibility for a man to commit a crime and love his neighbor as himself. If a person is a criminal, he ceases to be such the moment he can love his Creator with all his heart and his neighbor as himself. If religion is a necessity then for those who are not criminals, is it not essential for those who are? Religious workers are prone to overlook all other systems but their own, and maudlin sentimentalists have no use for law, Divine or human. Any system that is not operating in touch with the whole law or body politic is a hindrance rather than a help in the reformation and the rehabilitation of our convicts. There should be harmony and sympathy between all efforts if we are to expect lasting and beneficial results from the general treatment.

From one of the German works on pathological research I quote the following synopsis which will throw light on this special treatment: " Human conduct is a resultant of the human organism and of energy. The apparatus by which purposive movements are actuated is the nervous system, and also, the muscles into which the nerve fibre is so intimately interlaced.;These act only when stimulated by some form or force, not steadily employed, but in shock or in a number of shocks. Of force, the brain is rated as an accumulator or distributor of energy, while the nerves and channels are vehicles and avenues in which it is conveyed. Energy is stored along the nerve cells and transmitted along the series of molecules in manner as the impulse is communicated from one billiard ball to another. The channels into which currents frequently pass are channels which have become, frown the operation of this channel, worn to the appropriate calibre, and able to convey the accustomed currents without leakage. The repetition of impressions stimulating the flow of energy between centres enlarges and adjusts the channel until the sympathy between them becomes thoroughly organized, and the course of action becomes habitual, resulting in new modes of reaction from the course of thought or a new conduct."

Pram this argument, the activity of the highest nerve centres are operated by a nerve current, set in motion by sense-perception, which is attended by a corresponding variation on the mental activities. Molecular changes in what we call mind or nerve currents are attended by changes in what we call feelings, volitions, or ideas, and it is constantly affirmed that there is no mental condition without a nervous process. The evolution of character, then, and the reformation of it, is but the creation of habitudes, which might be placed in the following order: impressions, repetition, practice, custom, propensity, habit, habitude or character. The doctrine of tissue degeneration, whether atavistic or by environment, as in a case of anti-social conduct, is attracting attention, especially in Europe, and while there are different schools of criminal anthropology, they all agree that the source of conduct, including criminal conduct, is to be sought for in the material substance of a being and is to be found in an undeveloped, dormant, or diseased nerve tissue. This system then begins the work of reforming a man by the scientific application of treatment to the life physical, with modern appliances when such treatment is required.

I have been led to the opinion, lately, that the real criminal, he of subjective criminous character, must be treated scientifically as well as from the lofty viewpoint of religion. Both, if administered rightly, harmonize and produce good results. Both have their place in the reconstruction and redemption of delinquent humanity. The state has to do with all that tends to public welfare, whether domestic; social or political, and therefore, directly or indirectly, it has to deal with its defective members. We must look to and hold individuals responsible for an accepted life or conductaccording to the community's ideals of citizenship. The loosening of a single stone in a mighty foundation may be slow in bringing down the whole wall, but it will accomplish this destruction in the course of time, unless repairs be made. So in society, whether domestic, civil or political. The imperfections of the individual must affect and tell on the whole fabric of life. Therefore, when we find it necessary to punish any member of the human family, we should have in view his correction, also to punish sufficiently to make the lesson lasting and a deterrent to others who may be like tempted. One of the best agencies operated by the Dominion authorities will be found by a careful study of the Parole system, and while we can hardly hope for the remarkable percentage to hold as good in the future extension and development of this system, the principle of conditional liberation has proven beyond a doubt, without prejudice, to be sane and beneficial. The following figures give the operation of this law since its inception in Canada, some eight years ago, and form a digest for those interested in the reformation of our criminal classes

Number of prisoners released on parole for year ending March 31st, 1907-

Penitentiaries.

Number of prisoners released from jails, prisons and reformatories

Operation

Total number of paroles granted from year 1899 to March 3lst,1907

SYNOPSIS FROM THE INSPECTOR'S REPORT ON PENITEN

TIARIES, YEAR ENDED MARCH 31ST, 1907.

Daily average population of the penitentiaries

Educational

NOTE.-The number of absolutely illiterate is equal to about seventeen percent,

while not more than ten percent have the advantage of a good common school education.

Note.-Lads under 20 years of age constitute eleven per cent. of the total.

NATIONALITY.

Much has been said against the immigration of the Japanese, but will some of these agitators take a look at the percentage of the Japanese in our prisons, and compare them carefully with our coloured population and their quota of criminals. Some fifty years ago, when care for the unfortunate imbecile and the idiotic first laid hold of the scientific spirit, a young man went to Paris to study how to treat those in the prison-house. of despairing imbecility. On his return he advertised for the most hopeless victim of mental and bodily weakness, and in answer they brought to him one who answered the conditions in every way, a child who was simply animated flesh, unable to walk, to stand, to sit or to talk. He could only lie in dumb imbecility, having been born so, and as far as their treatment went he would have remained so to the end. The young man put him in his own bed, and lay by his side every day for an hour to try and awaken dormant life or feeling, if such existed, by the touch of another life for six weeks his toil was unrewarded. One day as he lay beside the imbecile child, being weary, he omitted to read to him, as had been his custom while watching his companion. Suddenly the child stirred, and when the physician turned to him, the child touched his lips with his fingers. He had missed the human voice. The dead began to live. Life and intelligence gradually came from out their grave, evoked by a human touch and a human voice, and by a devoted patience. The first sign of feeling was the beginning of an education which transformed the idiot child into an intelligent boy, able to speak and read, and to answer historical questions before an audience in which stood the distinguished prelate who relates this amazing story.

So will the human heart and intelligence respond to the touch of kindness and devotion even among the most depraved and degenerate of our criminals. Have we not the right to expect that the treatment of the criminal should represent the best thought and the best experience of our age? Just in proportion as we expect our public schools and hospitals to express what we Canadians are at our best, so the treatment of our delinquent forces forms the criterion of our national character and our general standing in civilization. My thought in conclusion is this-that God is just as truly in every process of reform, from the humblest and the simplest effort to the highest and most profound study and research made through the science of psychology or pathology for the treatment of the criminal; and while there may be varied avenues of approach or attack on criminality in its loathsome, heinous, and destructive forms in the human family, there is unity of effort in all and something accomplished, though not to the extent we desire, in the reconstruction and rehabilitation of our anti-social fellow citizens.