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VOL. XVI., NO. XI
ESTABLISHED IN 18S6
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LINCOLN. NBBR., SATURDAY, MARCH 10, 1901.
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:
OBSERVATIONS.
1
4oo
The Penitentiary.
The good people of New York tire
shocked to tlnd out that Sing Sing is
breeding tuberculosis and typhoid
fever. In spite of all the efforts to
lessen the ravages of pulmonary con
sumption the ratio of deaths from this
disease has steadily increased in the
prison. Expert investigation into the
very favorable conditions for theprop
agation of this disease in the SingSing
prison, has established the fact that a
factory for the developement of the
germs could do no more satisfactory
work than is done at Sing Sing. The
' prison was. built in 1S24, just seventy
five years ago on made land between
the New York Central railroad tracks
andthelludson river; and the main
floor is only rive feet above the water
level. Its stone walls are two feet
thick and the windows are narrow
slits, penitentiary style. Light
travels in straight lines and a narrow
slit between walls two feet thick will
admit a direct ray of sunlight only
for a few minutes eacli day when the
sun and the earth sustain certain ex
act relations. Not once in seventy
five years has a ray of sunlight
touched the damp cells which gen
erally hold two men, except in the
case of a prisoner condemned to
death, who is granted the solitude,
and the space of a whole cell. The
.cells are three feet three inches wide
by six feet and nine inches deep and a
trifle more than six feet high. Each
cell contains about 145 cubic feet of
airspace. The amount of air neces
sary to each individual is variously
estimated, but in England no individ
ual cell contains less than 8i0 cubic
feet of air and the school book phys
iology assigns one thousand to two
.thousand feet to each individual.
The old Nebraska penitentiary
cells were four feet wide by
seven feet deep and seven feet high,
allowing 196 cubic feet to a man, but
most of the cells were occupied by two
men. Therefore eacli man gets only 98
feet of the two thousand feet of air he
is entitled to as a human being. His
share might be decreased somewhat
on account of his crime against soci
ety but to starve his lungs with only
one twentieth of ins proper share of
atmosphere is a crime which society
is committing against 287 prisoners
now confined in the Nebraska peni
tentiary. That they are starving for
air their pallid, clammy faces prove.
Doubtless all of the prisoners deserve
to be restrained, but tiie idea that the
prisoner is a maD who can be tortured
has been relinquished, and is only
practiced by mobs, thoroughly brutal
gaolers or boards that build prisons.
The ventilation at the Nebraska peni
tentiary was so bad that it makes a
visitor, unaccustomed to its vileness,
faint. The sewage and drainage of
the building is bad and the principle
element of foulness is not the fumes
of cooking. Cells into which the sun
shine can not penetrate, and out ol
the way of direct draughts of air get
foul and fouler. Sunshine and fresh
air are a cure for tuberculosis, and by
the same token, the dead, damp air
of the Nebraska prison propagates the
germs of tuberculosis.
What is the use of pronouncing
a building all right, when it is all
wrong? The Nebraska state peniten
tiary is in an unhealthy location. It
is built on an old fashioned unsani
tary plan. Little provision is made for
the comfort of the prisoners. The
warden's and officers' rooms are large
light and airy, but the cell moms are
gloomy and pervaded by an indescrib
able but very offensive odor. We
have no right to keep even criminals
in an unhealthy place.
All prisons of the old-fashioned
Sing Sing type were demolished long
ago in Great Britain. A prisoner has
just the same right to good and suilic
ient air as he has to good and sufficient
food. It is quite as inhuman to
starve lungs as it is to starve stom
achsor to dole out to the. prisoners
poisonous food.
The New Cells.
Just at this time when the old cell
house at the penitentiary has burned
down, it is very fortunate that the
Governor of Nebraska is a man who
has made a study of the relations of
the state, or of society to criminals.
The new cell-room will contain steel
cells with smooth surfaces that do not
soak up moisture and tilth like stone
walls and mortar. Built with a tall
stack or chimney, in the cell-room, the
heavy, foul air will be drawn up and
with the new plumbing which will be
introduced into every cell the new
room will not be such a disgrace to
the state. Why, the dungeons or the
middle ages, where men rotted in
darkness and foul air were not very
much worse than the cells provided
by Nebraska for convicts.
In spite of the youthfulness of Ne
braska as a state, in spite of the alti
tude and the nervous tension that in
creases the activity of our minds and
bodies, Nebraskans are a conservative
unemotional people. Nil admirari is
their motto. Two years ago when a bat
talion of soldiers, parsed through Ne
braska, on its way from the Cuban
to the Pilipineside of the Spanish
American war, the crowds at the
stations watched the trains pull in
and out, with characteristic Nebraska
phlegm. There was noshouting.no
wild unrestrained tossing of hats into
the air, no demonstrations such as the
troops had been greeted by in the
trans-Mississippi states. The men
and officers asked the reason of the
silence, and were told that "It is our
way." Perhaps the resentment which
regards the distinction gained by an
other as a personal reflection on our
own obscurity has something to do
with the apathy with which measures
of reform, and the occasional presence
of men and women who have signal
ized themselves, are received. At
any rate frequent reports of the dis
graceful condition of the penitentiary
has failed to arouse any interest.
And unless the cell house had burned
down it would doubtless have been
very difficult to secure an appropri
ation from the legislature to make
the wards of the state more comfort
able. The convicts have reason to be
thankful therefore for the lire which
destroyed stone cells soaked with the
accumulated smells and disease germs
of years.
" Thoroughly Obnoxious."
A very competent forewoman of a
'ong established publishing house in
this city once discharged a printer
without alleging any cause of com
plaint. The president of the local
printers union wrote a letter to the
forewoman informing her that it was
the custom of the union to request In
such cases an explanation from the
employer. The man's character was
familiar to the union and it was only
as a matter of form that she was re
quested to explain his dismissal.
After considering her trials with the
printer the forewoman wrote the
union that she dismissed be
cause he was "thoroughly obnoxious."
Without specifying the daily annoy
ances caused by a spiteful, unreliable
employe, the forewoman summed up
the effect of the man's presence in
the composing room, his constant
complaints and petty tyranny exer
cised over his associates by the
quoted phrase. The president and
every member of the union who knew
the man understood exactly what she
meant.
Many a man and woman lose their
jobs because they make themselves
"thoroughly obnoxious." Overween
ing self-esteem and a constant desire
to attain a salary and an eminence
which they do not earn and arc not
fitted for, a temperament which be
littles the work and merits of others,
and an absolute absence of the sense
of propriety, are the characteristics
of a character thus described. Men
receiving a mucli higher salary than
the printer lose their jobs because
they can not resist the temptation to
render themselves "thoroughly obnox
ious" to the company or individual
that employs them. In investigating
the specific caus.es why such an indi
vidual was let out, a committee of in
vestigation frequently blames an em
ployer because a committee from the
outside has not sustained an em
ployer's relations with the ousted,
has no personal acquaintance with
the employe in question and docs not
realize the force of the description
"thoroughly obnoxious" as applied to
the dismissed.
The Cloture Rule.
Senator Flatt is as much of a nuis
ance, and the same sort, of a nuisance
in the United States senate as Croker
is in New York. One is a republican
and the other a. democrat, but they
stand for the same thing, plunder.
Senator Piatt was very much ann6yed
when Senator Carter defeated the
rivers and harbors bill by talking
until the close of the session. As
everybody knows this appropriation
of $50,000,000 included apportion
ments for the improvement of obscure
and un navigable rivers and creeks
along with monies for rivers and
harbors that repay developement.
Senator Carter called it "vicious leg
islation" and announced his intention
to talk the bill to death before the
close of the session. The majority
had decided to vote for the bill. Ex
perience of minorities, of their fre
quent righteous cause, of their habits
of independence and of reliance upon
their own conscience and of their in
difference to their own conspicuous
isolation, for righteousness' sake in
clines a student of politics, to respect,
the minority which so frequently
governs the majority. The minority
in the Nebraska legislature, wbiclt
opposes the election of Mr. Thompson
is right. The minority in the United:
State senate, headed by Carter wuich
opposed the will of Piatt and the
rivers and harbors bill was right.
The historical prestige of the minor
ity will doubtless prevent the minor
ity in the senate from voting ,for
cloture and thus yielding the salutary
negative power of the minority.
Betting on Salvation.
The Reverend Itichard A.Morley.
pastor of the Sheffield Avenue church
of Cbicago,,has agreed to pay Duke M.
Farson, revivalist, one thousand dol
lars if in the course of two-weeks he
"converts'" fifteen souls. There are
all kinds of people but to rise in meet
ing and request prayers inducted
thereto by aman who has put up one:
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