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in numbers, which cannot be done at present, there can be no further reason for any discrepancy save a very small one; between it and other prisons. Supplies of all kinds cost but a trifle different at the Marquette prison than in the others. The only difference possible is in the freight, which water carriage reduces to the lowest possible amount. Neither do the officers and board claim they do cost more.

The following table will show the prices paid for nearly all kinds of supplies, for the three prisons during the month of January of this year, which is a fair example of the continuous conditions (For the Marquette prison there had to be taken the amount of the purchases for three months, January, February and March, as the different articles could not be had in one month's purchasing, the institution being small.):

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The above table shows in many of the articles, there is a difference in favor of Marquette:

Coal is the article which makes the worst average, in fact your committee think there must be some explainable cause for this, as all other articles except milk and butter show very little difference against Marquette, and the freight could not make the difference.

Your committee do not wish to be understood as claiming that the warden of this prison is not using every effort to conduct its affairs for the benefit of the State, and the welfare of the prison, although the results financially have not been satisfactory within the last two years, as was said the conditions were unfavorable, a large establishment, a corresponding large plant could not be run low per capita, when there is less than half the proper number of inmates.

The following table will show how that condition added materially as to the cost per inmate, per diem, or per annum:

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In Ionia this includes 5 foremen, at $2.50 per working day and superintendent of furniture factory at $1,000 per year, who are extra beyond the keepers and guards.

In this prison the wage scale is about 25 per cent lower than in Marquette and Jackson. Their pay being as follows:

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Marquette prison has a capacity for 330 inmates. By the foregoing it will be seen that under normal conditions the prison would have made a much more favorable showing. The proportion of officers would be almost the same, except that in Marquette there would have been two, more than an average, but we again repeat that while this is so, and the condition ought to be rectified, due attention to the farming possibilities of the location would result in a still more favorable financial condition, and render it unnecessary to seek other remunerative labor except for winter, which is admittedly a long season at Marquette.

Former mention in this report has been made of the manufacture of snow shoes, and your committee would reiterate, they think it an ideal industry for the prison, if it can be made to yield even a small revenue.

The tendency of all wardens and managers of State institutions to regard their separate institution as something not a part of the whole, and for which they must give a direct financial return, even at the sacrifice of advisable measures, is shown by a remark of the warden to this committee, when he stated that he could furnish employment for every convict he had upon the building improvements and farm of his prison, but that the labor would not show a money return.

STATE HOUSE OF CORRECTION AND REFORMATORY AT IONIA.

The State House of Correction and Reformatory is an institution much different, as its name implies, to the Jackson and Marquette prisons, while the reformatory principle should be and is a factor in the treatment of the inmates of all prisons, in the latter prisons the punitive feature is necessarily more prominent. In the Ionia prison as the primary purpose is to correct and reform the conditions proper for the other prisons would be out of place here. Your committee is of the opinion that no greater mistake was ever made in connection with a penal institution of this character than placing within its walls the large furniture plant of that prison, even if it has begun to pay, and soon as another method of furnishing employment to the inmates can be arranged for, the whole business should be sold. Such a consummation would be to the advantage of the State, and of the prison. In this prison, reasons which govern our opinions in regard to others must be dismissed. Profits from industries, when conflicting with the primary purpose should be done away with. Nor is this inconsistent with economy, nor would it render it necessary to keep prisoners in idleness, or prevent them by well directed industry, relieving the State from a large part if not the wohle of the burden of the maintenance, for it is clearly proven by the results of purely reformatory measures in foreign countries, that an enormous saving has been established. Let us take the results of 15 years, from 1893 backward, of the reformatory changes in England alone. In the face of an ever increasing and poverty stricken population the number of inmates of penal institutions has been reduced from 21,000 to 12,000. Think of this reduction of 9 in 21 and consider that the expense of trial and conviction of a criminal is in many cases as great as the gross cost of his entire imprisonment, and you will gain some idea of the important value of reformatory measures. As before said, it is not contemplated that no attention should be given to remunerative labor, but it should be of a very different character from that at present, the principal industry in Ionia. Which is essentially of a machine attending nature, requiring a very small amount of skill. Not 25 per cent of the prisoners employed in the furniture making factory in that prison is or can be permanently benefited by their experience in the shops, or can be made better fitted for their future battle in life.

The inmates of this prison are or ought to be young or un hardened criminals, in whom the possibility of better things exist. Their terms of imprisonment are, or should be, short and in a few years at most, many in a few months, are returned to society, either divested of their uncleanliness and reformed or sent out unimproved to swell the army of recidivists, and become again and again a penal inmate. With the State rests to a great extent the responsibility of their future. It has undertaken to correct and reform and no grasping desire for profit, no mean spirit of economy should be allowed to interfere with the proper end.

Your committee would wish to state that there seems to be a strange idea in the minds of some of our circuit judges as to the fitness of convicts for this institution. During one of their visits there was sent to and received in the prison at Ionia convict over seventy years of age, committed, if you please, for ten years to a reformatory, and no doubt had we had time to look into this matter we might have found more of such miscommittals.

The new interpretation of the law regarding the transfer of prisoners will enable many of these mistakes to be rectified, and enable the proper officials to keep the prisons at a more equal ratio. Notably in balancing the prisoners of Jackson and Marquette. by the assistance of the methods. which your committee are recommending.

With the changes above mentioned, and the daily increasing knowledge of those in charge of prisons, your committee are confident in their hope for a decrease rather than an increase of the number of convicts, and that for an indefinite time there will be no addition required in the capacity of our penal institutions. Such changes are and will be in the line of true. economy. As was said in the Elmira report. "Society must be estimated, not by the height to which it soars. but by the depth to which it descends to bring its lowest members from their degraded position and uplift them be it but one step higher is a work of greater merit than to raise to the clouds those who tower above, or to save money by letting them alone.' And this should be the great aim in Ionia reformatory.

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The conduct of the affairs of this prison in the past seems to have been founded upon a similar chaos to that from which the world is said to have been evolved. Its business to have been the purchase of lumber and tools of any kind, at any price, and the manufacture by their means of furniture, to be disposed of at any price. Its bookkeeping was of an ingenious nature, which allowed a statement of any kind that would suit the occasion at any time, and a general condition existed, the most remarkable of the kind in the world, for a public institution. Consequently while we do not claim there was actual dishonesty in the books at the time the present warden took possession, the condition or the appearance of everything at least was very unsatisfactory.

They are glad to be able to say that the changes established in this institution are of a praiseworthy nature, and that Mr. Fuller is gradually working out of the slough in which its affairs rested when he took charge.

As has been said it would be preferable to see the industries of that prison change from the present to much more diversified and educational nature. But as this vast investment in machinery is established there and cannot be done away with in a moment, it is indeed fortunate that the warden and board see and are acting on the necessity of change in its policy. It is an improvement that he should be giving his attention to improving the quality of the goods he turns out of his factory. He is, gradually of course, increasing the cost of his articles, by putting more labor into the construction, not by using more material or more expensive kinds of mateial. This is in the right direction, labor being the commodity the State has for sale. (The more of it sold unaccompanied by expensive material the better the object of the State is met.) For the same reason the manufacture of sideboards, chiffoniers and book cases are to be recommended, and cane top counter stools and foot stools, besides being in the line of economy in using up waste, will be a considerable source of revenue. This will be borne out by examining part of the inventory, which is as follows:

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In every case the larger profit or pay for labor agrees with the amount of finish on the goods. The larger amount of money invested in proportion to the earnings on each article, the great risks to be run in collection show beyond doubt that this is not a business which should ever have been placed in a State prison.

In connection with this prison there is a large amount of land which could be used to better purpose than it now is, the most of it being situated on the flats by the river, it becomes subject to overflow, which renders it unfit at present to raise anything but hay, the least profitable crop that could be raised for such an institution. But your committee are impressed that this land could be much improved, and fitted for almost any agricultural purpose. A competent engineer could erect here with prison labor a system of levees, which would prevent its submersion, turn aside the flow of water and enable it to be kept comparatively dry, by the assistance of windmill or other power. River flats reclaimed in this way are the most porfitable farming land in this State.

It is understood one of the employes at present engaged in the prison is possessed with sufficient engineering knowledge to accomplish this work, which in the opinion of your committee should be undertaken.

The opinion of the committee that another industry which is partly established in this prison might be made to contribute considerable revenue, and also be of an educational character, is based upon the existence of a greenhouse in the prison yard for the use of the prison grounds. This might be extended until a considerable business in plants and seeds could be done all over the United States, and even in other countries, and with the printing plant established at Jackson, their advertising needs could be met within the State property, and the assistance that could be

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