Woodrow Wilson’s Appeal
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but what he is now should obviously be the real test of his fitness to rejoin his fellow men. Prison life has not necessarily reformed him or dragged him deeper, but he has changed one way or the other. It is obvious that a board constituted as is that of Minnesota has not leisure to determine this most essential point, and it should be possible to select a board not merely competent to pass upon facts brought before it, but also able to devote time to ascertaining the merits of each in dividual case. "The theory of the indeterminate sentence, which allows for the possibility of a prisoner's reformation, is excellent. In practice it would be necessary to guard very carefully against abuses. For many reasons it would be
sentence has a reasonable basis other than the mental discomfort of not knowing whether he is serving one year or ten. It should also be recognized that the majority of serious offenses against discipline are the efiects of a hasty temper, and should not be regarded as infallible indices of an evil disposition. “In suggesting improvements on the ad vanced position taken by the warden of the Stillwater prison, I am aware that I tread on dangerous ground. It seems to me, how ever, that more opportunity should be granted to the prisoner to breathe the fresh air, which doctors agree is the best of all medicines. Drill, from being a weekly function, should become a daily institution. Even half an hour at noon or in the evening would prove of
unadvisable to place the power of releasing
inestimable value, and would result in in
offenders in the hands of any one man, much
creased efiiciency. I have already stated my opinion that the men should be permitted to talk within reasonable bounds, and I shall merely add that it should be possible to extend further privileges for exceptionally good conduct. A common reading-room in which men might smoke, read, and play games could be held out as one of these rewards. So, too, a gymnasium or a baseball field might be introduced with advantage. In the Oregon penitentiary, baseball is permitted, besides a much greater liberty in receiving presents from friends; a result brought about, it is interesting to note, by the publication of a sensational book dealing with life in that priwn."
less of any one prison ofl‘icial.
The warden
of a prison, for instance, knows as little, in most cases, of the character of those under
his charge as the head of a great university knows of the individual undergraduate’s character. He must be dependent, in large measure, on the reports of subordinates. Were the average prison otficial a master of psychology and of whatever kindred sciences may be necessary to judge character, the indeterminate sentence would be un assailable.
As it is, he is usually very honest
and well-meaning, but there his qualifications end. Hence the unswerving hostility which
the prisoner feels toward the indeterminate
Woodrow Wilson's Appeal for the Lawyers Skill in Meeting the Problems of Social Change R. WOODROW WILSON'S annual ad dress at the meeting of the Amerimn Bar
Association,
delivered
in
the
largest
theatre in Chattanooga, was a very strong paper, marked by its clear discernment of the serious extent to which social and eco
nomic change is forcing readjustment of the law to meet altered conditions, and by its emphasis upon the duty of the lawyer to lend his skill to the solution of the stupend ous problems of law reform,—problems which must have a skillful and deliberate solu
tion, and must not be trusted to be solved
merely by the unpremeditated expression of the popular will; in this way lawyers, he said, could turn the impending peaceable revolution into a wise reform, and ensure the symmetry and beauty of the completed structure of law. The theme of the address was "The Lawyer and the Community." To quote :— “Society is looking itself over. in our day, from top to bottom, is making fresh and critical analysis of its very elements, is
