New Prison Facilities for Specialized Offenders

Reformers after the Civil War were particularly concerned with the treatment of women and youthful offenders. The prevalent cult of domesticity created special concerns about female felons, whose behavior seemed to threaten the moral foundations of the nation. Reformers like Dwight and Wines had another concern: widespread accusations of sexual debauchery in prisons and jails. Because one of the cardinal features of the rehabilitative ideal was instilling a moral code in prisoners, sexual immorality in prison was considered especially corrosive. In early prisons, men and women were not fully separated, and such segregation as did exist was usually by departments (separate wings of a main prison facility) rather than separate institutions. Massachusetts was the lone exception in the mid-nineteenth century, ordering that all female offenders be confined in county houses of correction, a practice that spread rapidly after the Civil War.

Separate female facilities developed slowly because there were so few female offenders. Nineteenth-century crime was a man's world that women seldom entered. In Oakland, California between 1872 and 1910, nine of ten arrests were of men. At least in Oakland, women most often were arrested for drunkenness and public disorder rather than for serious felonies or morals charges, such as prostitution. Women who did behave in disorderly ways incurred far more public wrath than did men, of whom such behavior was almost expected.

Lawmakers after the Civil War gradually realized that successful rehabilitation of female offenders required separate facilities. Indiana in 1873 opened the nation's first women's prison, followed by Massachusetts four years later and then New York in 1881. In each instance a private philanthropic movement committed to the well-being of women persuaded legislators to establish the new institutions. Prisons for female offenders mirrored in their programs the larger assumptions of society, seeking to inculcate in women convicts Victorian attitudes toward sexuality, personal discipline, and the proper habits of mother and wife.

State lawmakers also became sensitive to the plight of young adult offenders, who were often thrown into prison with more experienced criminals. New York in 1825 provided that male first offenders under the age of twenty-one were to be confined in local houses of correction if the space was available. Michigan in 1861 opened the Detroit House of Corrections with the objective of providing a supportive environment to young adult offenders. The most famous response was Brockway's Elmira Reformatory, into whose plans the New York legislature wove "all the best ideas of the day." ³²

The Elmira Reformatory became a national model. The New York legislature mandated that the facility was to house only individuals between the ages of sixteen and thirty who had been convicted of their first felony. Elmira practiced conditional- release programs, and its regimen of work and education sought to equip inmates for productive lives. Brockway pioneered the use of prison industries as vocational training grounds. His goal was total rehabilitation of the individual.

Date: 2015-01-29; view: 688