Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER I. THE ECONOMIC STATUS OF PENAL SERVITUDE. The status of the convict—penal servitude. Justice today can conceive of no state without penal servitude. Economic history—the economic value of the labor of the wayward individual has directly affected the methods of his punishment—galley—mine. In the time of economic distress the hangman was the most convenient agent. Economic demand for colonists for America—cheaper to secure the type of labor from Africa. Idle convicts in England—productive work—sale to private contractors. Australia, a new field. Industrial revolution—children in mills—pressure for workmen—impoverished state sells convicts to build institutions. The earliest prisons in the United States were privately owned. Development of the function of the government. Organized labor the strongest force. Labor's program of constructive reform—New York State Constitutional Amendment in 1894—spreading over the country—prisoner worked efficiently—return to the state—support wife and children. New devices of business—choice of the disposition of the wage and the choice as to the type of labor. Slave system given up—-free system of labor adopted. "Will you buy me, Sah ?" asked a boy convict in an Alabama convict camp, when approached by the writer. "Won't you buy me out, Sah?" he reiterated to the rejoinder, "I'm not buying niggers." "It'll only cost you $20, Sah, an' I'll work fer you as long as you say. I'se fined $1.00, Sah, and got $75 costs. I'se worked off all but $20. Do buy me out, Sah, please do."1 The wail was raised by a small boy of fourteen years, with black skin, in a particular camp, yet the appeal is the appeal of many thousands who from want, disease or evil environment have passed for a time out of our world into the hell on earth which we, in our wis...