Academy of the Holy Angels - Echoes Yearbook (Fort Lee, NJ)

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rx C' -A-. i n as . . . Q EcHoEs 2,5 ,ggi X 1 9 9. s If f - 5 N, ' 'fs,X, -f J. flflffnu nf, fig xxxxxxx . .T uxuxnxw xuxxxu The greater mass of people today realizes that there is no such thing as a criminal type. Even disregarding the greatest refutation of the criminologist's argument, its denial of free will, its error has become immediately apparent by considering the criminals of today. They are not degenerate men and women with traces of atavism or lunacyg nor are the majority found to be of the lower classes of society or among the extreme poor. On the contrary, they are ordinary men and women, perfectly sane, with no traces of degeneracy, they are distributed among all classes of society, and, finally, the most violent criminals are not produced from the extreme poor. The sympathy for the criminal arises from the realization of the falsity of the criminolf ogist's argument. We know that there is in all of us a tendency to deviate from the straight road, that the germ of crime is universally present in mankind, and that if we consider our evil inclinations as such, we all have criminal tendencies. It is this knowledge that has given rise to the sympathy for the criminal. In addition to this, society realizes that our present method of dealing with crime may be compared to the action of the woodsman who allows all his trees to grow without any care or attention, and when they are full grown, proceeds to rid himself of the bad ones by simply cutting them down. It goes without saying that it is generally acknowledged that the proper training of young men and women will do much toward alleviating crime, for crime is largely a prob' lem of youth. The juvenile delinquent of today becomes the criminal of tomorrow. We all know that it is not the lack of education that causes crime, but the lack of moral training, and the subsequent lack of character. Still another and more specific cause of the sympathy with the criminal lies in the defectiveness of our present criminal laws. There are so many types of criminals, so many different forms of crime, so many varying circumstances, and only one law or punishment to apply to all of them. Then, instead of reforming the criminal and deterring crime, our treatment of criminals does exactly the opposite. When a man commits a crime like theft, embezzlement, forgery, etc., it does not follow that he is a professional criminal. If he can be helped, saved the shame of exposure, and eventually reformed, he may never commit a crime again. But if he is haled into prison, measured and photographed, and his disgrace published, we are doing our best to help him to remain a criminal, for when he does come out of prison, if he endeavors to live up to the standards of the community, he will find every door shut against him, and he will never be allowed to forget his prison record. That man will continue to commit crime. But by far the most vicious part of our criminal law is its injustice, which allows one man, who is competently shielded by expert criminal lawyers and wealth and standing, to go free, and condemns another man, with no money or standing, to the electric chair. In summing up, then, we might say that the sympathy for the criminal is not the expression of a sloppy sentimentalityf' but rather the expression of a genuine regret at the conditions made evident by crime, at the civilization which produces criminals, at the society which maintains them, at the laws which have proved ineiiicient to cope with the criminals, and at the injustice and incompetency of these same laws, and finally, this symf pathy is the expression of a genuine desire to remove these conditions and eventually to destroy crime altogether. As for the direction of this sympathy, it does not tend so much towards benefiting the criminal, as toward benefiting society itself. For, by destroying crime, society protects itself from criminals. Now the point is, just what has this sympathy accomplished? Has it actually in- creased crime? I do not think that the sympathy has increased crime, but I do believe that, 74

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B c x::37.k 'S 6 Q EcHoEs . ri 3 . 1-9'2'8 Q 9, 'u Q e I nuun 1ll1r111ll141lA Y The Current of Sympathy with the Criminal CPrize Essayj There can be no doubt that the attitude of society toward the criminal has changed. It was not so very long ago that the combat with crime was waged with most inhuman cruelty. Extreme and barbarous penalties were inflicted, since it was thought that these constituted the best means of checking or deterring crime. Indeed, the whole action of the law was instigated by the principle of vengeance. Today, as we know, all this has changed. There is no longer a spirit of vengeance in the infliction of punishment. As a matter of fact, the very principle behind the administration of the law has changed. It is directed now, not only towards punishing the criminal, but, in a larger measure, towards reforming him, and most of all, towards deterring the mass of potential wrongfdoers. As I have said above, there can be no doubt that the attitude of society towards the criminal has changed. This changed attitude has not only manifested itself in the preceding reforms, which I have but touched upon, but in many ways besides. At the present time there appears to be a general tendency on the part of society to side with the criminal. This tendency exists to such a degree that today we speak of the current of sympathy for the criminal. By this expression we mean, of course, the same general tendency to side with the criminal. In a more specific way, we mean the lenient treatment of prisoners, the juries' recommendations to the presiding judges for leniency, the light sentences imposed, and Hnally, the many loopholes of escape from punishment open to the criminal. Sympathy for the criminal has actually grown out of the realization that the harsh methods formerly in use did not constitute the best means of checking and deterring crime. These harsh methods and laws had an effect, of course, upon those persons who come under their immediate jurisdiction, but they accomplished nothing towards reforming the criminal and deterring those who were at liberty to commit crimes. Society realized that the law had a higher mission than merely punishing wrongfdoers. That higher mission was, not only to punish the criminal, but to reform him and, if possible, to send him out of conf finement fitted to again take his place in the community. To accomplish this difficult but, on the whole, praiseworthy plan, milder penal laws and punishments have been introduced. Now the question is, just what is this sympathy? Is it actually the expression of a sloppy sentimentalityf' as some have termed it? It is highly improbable that any humane civilization would deliberately sympathize with a criminal and seek to ameliorate his conf dition and lighten his punishment, disregarding the consequences of his crime and the fact that he deserves a punishment in proportion to his crime. Humanity condemns the crimif nal for his crime. At the same time, it cannot check the natural feeling of pity that arises from the realization that, in spite of all, the criminal is a human being like the rest of hu' manity, and that if he had been rightly directed in his youth, he would never have been guilty of his misdeeds. Indeed, this realization is actually the foremost cause of the symf pathy for the criminal. There are, of course, certain people today who cling to the argument introduced by criminologists like Lombroso and Fererro, and propagated today by Charles Darrow, that the criminal is a special type of the human race, half lunatic, half savageg in short, that there is a criminal class who, because of certain conditions of heredity, poverty, and environment, cannot be classed with the rest of humanity, but must be regarded as a special type. But the people who uphold this argument are relatively few. 73

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' 4 F-7, 4 41 X 125 5 mi' ,fm if ,ala Mans Ill :nuuunnu nun 4 -+'E ,s,sef -Z WF: xxxnxx ua uw xx xx i 5 fy, Q 1 xffzf 5 i C1 of fi!fuf 1.9.Q. 8 E rw 4 ' ' -.11 I f' . si- Hb' ,NY-rfzf I 3, 1 'A 'E , ,V ,Vw 3-:Ei 1 113 'b' c..t 1 XX Y to a certain extent, it has been harmful-not in itself, but in its misdirection. For example, I have said that one of the chief causes of the sympathy for the criminal lies in the realiza' tion of the injustice and incompetency of our present criminal laws. Nevertheless, in spite of its defectiveness, nothing can be accomplished by abolishing overnight the present system of dealing with criminals. And this is what society, actuated by sympathy, is now tending to do. just now there is a widespread movement for the abolition of capital punishment. Disregarding the arguments for and against capital punishment, if it were abolished and life imprisonment substituted, it would mean that every murderer in the United States would be sentenced to the average confinement of from ten to fourteen years, under our present criminal law. Such would be the whole chaotic state of affairs if society were to succeed in abolishing our present criminal system. We all know that this criminal system is defective. Nevertheless, as yet it can only be modified, and only gradually can it be reformed. Imperfect as it may be, it at least affords more protection to society than would some of the more humane but impracticable schemes for its improvement. And, after all, this is the most important thing to be conf sidered-the protection of humanity. Then again, here is another proof of the misdirection of the sympathy for the criminal. We all know, of course, that the proper training of young men and women will solve the problem of crime. But, in the meantime, what are we to do about the girls and boys who have matured into womanhood and manhood only to menace society? Are we to allow them to kill and plunder while we placidly wait for the time when the perfect moral train' ing for the younger generation shall be found and put into effect? Whatever can be said in extenuation of criminals, it must be admitted that there are certain criminals today who cannot be reformed, and if society is to preserve itself from destruction, it must apprehend and convict those members of the community who have become menaces to the rest. If, in the future, this sympathy is rightly directed, it will succeed slowly but surely in revolu- tionizing our whole system of treating criminals, until a method has been found that will ful6ll the true purpose of our criminal law-to reform the criminal so that he can again take his place in society and, most of all, deter the mass of potential wrongfdoers. -HELEN OLIVA, '28 Winter If you listen, you'll hear some good news- King Winter is on his way, In his regal robes of ermine, Trimmed with crystals, sparkling and gay. His retinue accomp'nies him hither, Earls Skating, Tobogg'ning, and Skiing, And a whirl of merry festivities Will now spring into being. So go, spread abroad the message That the North Wind gave to meg Then, carefully groom for his advent, That you also may join in the glee. -MARGARET M. EISENMANN, '28 75