Perhaps the deepest longing of the prisoner is for the right of self-expression. Little opportunity for self-expression is given in the most of our prisons. In the average prison no prisoner would dare express his real feeling toward certain of the prison rules. And the objection which most prisoners would voice toward most of the prison rules is that they had no part in making them. Men will submit to almost any set of rules if they have a part in making them. Those prisons which have tried out to any extent a wise form of "self-government" have found no reason for returning to "one man rule." Only recently a warden told me that he had established a dormitory in an old building out of which a cell block had been torn. When he was about to put some two hundred men in this dormitory certain of the prisoners went to him and said, "If you put a guard in that dormitory these men will kill him." The wise warden said, "We won't put a guard in there." He called the men together who were to occupy that dormitory and said to them, "I want you men to appoint a committee on rules and regulations for this dormitory." The men appointed such a committee and that committee suggested and the men adopted a set of rules far more stringent than any the warden would have framed if the matter had been left to him. But the men obey those rules cheerfully because they had a voice in making them.

Let the prison be a community within walls if necessary, and, as far as possible, let it administer to all its own needs and peculiar conditions. Combine the best in civil and military life by way of discipline, but give the prisoners some voice, if ever so little, in framing the regulations of the prison community, and one of the reasonable wants of the prisoner will be met in a way which will not interfere with genuine discipline but will foster the most constructive type of discipline.

Another longing of the prisoner is for a higher type of prison guard. No man should be employed in a prison, from warden or superintendent down to the most subordinate officer, who is not a man of such character that the prisoner will be benefited by contact with him. Every prison officer ought to be a man whom the prisoners may at least respect. But in the most of our prisons

are found guards to whom the prisoner must take off his hat, when he knows in his heart that the officer is his inferior, perhaps, in every particular except that he has never committed a crime. Too many prison guards are men of little education, culture or even common sense and all too often men with low moral standards. Such officers retard if they do not irrevocably prevent the reformation of prisoners under their care by counteracting the constructive work that is being undertaken by those connected with the prison who sincerely desire to help. When a prisoner desires to see the chaplain or the priest, such guards make fun of him and deride his efforts to reform. After being in the hands of such guards, when a prisoner does come into contact with his spiritual advisers it is with a mind full of suspicion and distrust, which makes the chaplain's work ineffective or at least exceedingly difficult. When such a guard ridicules the chaplain and tells the prisoner that the chaplain is a "hot air merchant" and "without influence" the prisoner is, to say the least, confused in his attitude toward the chaplain. It takes a long time for a prisoner to know who his real friends are, and in any institution which through political dominance or unawareness on the part of the management employs unfit guards if the prisoner reforms it is not because of the prison but in spite of it.

One way to make all our prisons go toward self-support as well as to make them more effective agents of reform would be to reduce the number of guards if need be and improve their quality. And to do this would be to meet another legitimate want of the prisoner. Prisoners want to be treated like men, not like children or beasts. They want men over them, besides the warden, deputy, doctor and chaplain, who are intelligently interested in them, who can sympathize with them and who desire to help them. They want men whom they can respect and trust, not men whom they hate and fear. They want men good enough and big enough to have faith. in them. They will not respect an officer who is not smart enough to know when they are trying to "put it over him", but they want officers wise enough to give them credit when they try to do right. They want over them an officer with whom they can talk a thing over if it appears to be wrong, not that they may talk themselves

out of just consequences of misdeeds but that they may defend themselves against unjust reports that are colored simply to make them stick. This is a perfectly legitimate want.

The prisoner also longs for the abolition of the pernicious rule of silence. The silent system is antiquated, and it does not promote genuine discipline. It is, on the contrary, a breeder of discontent and unhappiness. It is a cruel and unusual punishment. It is impracticable because it is impossible to make it universal throughout the prison and any other plan of using it is discriminating and therefore unfair. In all prisons I know about where the "rule of silence" still prevails the outside trusties may talk all day long. The men who do work about the offices may talk. Gangs of men at work in the yard may talk, while fellows working in the shops or on contracts may not. That is the rankest kind of discrimination. Silence makes a man introspective, morose and bitter. He meditates continually upon his wrongs and sorrows, and this is a continual drain on his moral strength. It would be far better for the man to let him talk even if for a time he talks of his troubles. Many a prisoner who thinks never a man bore so great a burden as his would find his own trouble small as compared with another man's burden.

To some extent many prisons still holding to the rule of silence in a general way have relaxed it on occasion. I know of one prison which allows its men to talk in the darkened recreation room while moving pictures are shown once each week during the winter and every Saturday afternoon during the summer while the baseball game is on, and the privilege has not been abused. I know another institution which allows its men to talk while at dinner on Sunday and yet another which permits the inmates to talk at the noonday meal every day. Having experimented to this extent without evil result, I wonder why these institutions do not abolish entirely the rule of silence. In these institutions if a prisoner should whistle or sing at his work in shop or factory he would be promptly reported and perhaps reduced to second grade "for the sake of discipline" and his release on parole would thereby be retarded for a full year. Little wonder that, from the prisoner's point of view, the rule of silence is indefensible. Of course there

is a suitable time to talk and laugh and whistle and sing, and prisoners would thoroughly respect any reasonable rules governing the matter, but to do all of these things at times is another reasonable want of the prisoner.

The prisoner longs for less iron-clad rules regarding the visits of relatives and friends. Perhaps the average prison rule is that prisoners in first grade may receive visitors twice each month for one hour per visit. Two hours a month allowed for contact with a good mother or a faithful friend! Does it not seem a pitifully small allowance? The average prison will make exceptions when relatives come from a great distance and permit two visits in a day and possibly one visit the next day. But perhaps that prisoner will not be visited again in six months. What prison official who has had at least ten years of experience cannot match this experience: Two desperate men planned an escape. They needed the assistance of a third prisoner. They talked a first offender into helping them. Plans were all made. The time for the attempt was set. On the afternoon of the day when all was to be risked there came to the prison the mother of the first termer who had pledged himself to assist in the desperate plan which involved the murder of an officer if need be. After the mother left the institution this prisoner made request to see the warden and confessed to him the plot to escape and frankly told his own part in it and asked for no concessions because he had revealed the plans. Who can tell the influence for good the frequent visits of a mother or a good wife may have on the prisoner! For the time of the visit the prisoner rises above his environment and when he returns to his tasks they do not seem so monotonous and so burdensome. Such a visit is an event in the life of the prisoner. Then, if he could just tell some other fellow of the good time he has had others would be cheered. I have often gone into the room where the members of the band were gathered to see the faces of the whole group alight with pleasure because one of their number was telling of a visit just made him. All were cheered and made happier because one of their number had such a privilege and could share it with the others.

The only real reasons for such a restricted visiting privilege

are based in greed and selfishness. Prison contractors resent the absence of the prisoner from his task and prison officers want their day off. But provision might be made for larger visiting privilege without working hardship to any one, without hurting "prison discipline", and so another legitimate want of the prisoner might be met.

Yet another longing of the prisoner is for a prison newspaper that will give him all the worth-while news or for an uncensored newspaper from the outside and a far more liberal writing privilege. In spite of the censored newspaper the news does get inin some form. Censoring papers is a failure and is thoroughly condemned by some very clear-thinking people among prison officials. It is a failure, because in spite of all vigilance some kind. of a report of startling and criminal news does slip through. And coming by word of mouth and with many repetitions it is usually a garbled report that finally goes the rounds. I dare say there is hardly a prisoner in any prison in the land who did not get some kind of an account of the murder of Mrs. Allen; the Frank case and the Becker execution. Would it not be far better to let the men have accurate reports as published in the press than to feed their minds on reports that creep among them in details so lurid and colored that the yellowest sensational Police Gazette account would read like a Sunday school paper in comparison?

Is it not better for all the prisoners in an institution to know that one or at most a few prisoners got away from some institution than to hear that a wholesale escape was made? Is it not better that they should read the facts as to the recapture of a prisoner, or even read that the prisoner was killed in the attempt to retake him, than to hear that the guards pursuing him were killed? When a prison guard, or an official, or a warden's wife is killed why not let the plain facts come in rather than a garbled, sensational account?

The theory is that to read such things puts criminal suggestions into the mind of the prisoner. If this be granted, how much worse must be the suggestions which do come through the garbled versions of criminal affairs which sneak in to the men! I know a prison that failed to censor its moving pictures very carefully