Note 266 — Chapter XXVII · POOR-RELIEF, CORRECTION, AND OTHER WELFARE PROBLEMS

A good many people are beginning to wonder whether the reaction against the old-fashioned methods of dealing with offenders has not been carried too far. Persons charged with crime are now given a fair trial with liberal opportunities for appeal. When convicted they are frequently given indeterminate sentences and then, after a short term of confinement, are released on parole. In prison they are well housed, properly fed, given various privileges, provided with motion picture entertainments, and given other forms of recreation. The complaint is made that we have made the path of the transgressor altogether too easy and that the sort of punishment which is now meted out to offenders is inadequate to serve as a deterrent to crime. The increase in crime, particularly in the larger American cities, is by some attributed to this leniency of treatment.