I. A Sociological Study

The Arena (Jan. 1901) Vol. XXV: pp. 59-68

There is no problem in the United States that receives so much attention, and that offers so rich a field for investigation, as Criminal Sociology. This is the general term now applied to all studies relating to crime and its causes and prevention. It is only within the last decade that the United States has made such a systematic and scientific study as enables it to claim a criminal sociology of its own. This study now includes both the theoretical and practical branches, and each is important and indispensable. European investigators have devoted more attention to the theoretical work. The United States has emphasized the practical side, because its best investigators have been practical, experienced men, holding responsible positions in penal institutions, rather than theorists.

The United States has made noteworthy progress in practically demonstrating the precepts of criminal sociology. More than most countries, it has united effort in the form of organizations whose objects are discussion of problems and extension of progressive measures. Aside from the many State and interstate organizations, there exist such national organizations as the National Prison Association and Conference of Corrections and Charities. The United States is foremost in its adoption and extension of the reformatory system. There is scarcely a Northern institution that does not claim some reformatory influences. In many States systems of identification have been adopted. Private and municipal charities have combined to improve social conditions and lessen crime. This is a significant fact because they have so long stood aloof from each other. There exists a growing interest in social and economic causes of crime. There are now compulsory education and truant laws, free public schools, free kindergartens, college settlements, manual training and public night schools. There are social and industrial organizations that assist in raising the individual's standard of himself. The legal advancement is less marked, though it includes such measures as habitual criminal acts, parole laws, indeterminate sentence, juvenile courts, child labor laws, and many others. All these are within the domain of practical criminal sociology, for they constitute agencies for the prevention of crime. These represent a few of the progressive measures that characterize American criminal sociology.

Unfortunately, however, this does not apply to the whole United States. Only the North sustains theories worthy of the name criminal sociology, and only the North has adopted the reformatory idea. In any study of American criminality the South must be considered, for a large percentage of the criminal class is found in these States. The South is still in the age of revenge and punishment. Its system is neither systematic nor scientific. This is true for the following reasons: Its criminal class is largely negro. The problem of white criminality is a small one. While the penitentiaries contain negro women, there are rarely white women, and at most but two or three. The proportion of the white male criminals is larger. The South has been handicapped financially and industrially since the war, and is just turning its attention to this most abject and helpless element of its population. The institutions in the North are much older. Before the war, the South had but few penal institutions. The criminal, then as now, was the negro; and as a slave he was chastised or despatched by his master as the nature of his crime demanded. The few whites were confined in jails or county prisons. The previous condition of the negro as a slave makes the progress of the reformatory idea exceedingly slow, for it must grow with the conception of the negro as a man.

The current opinion in the South is that the negro is incapable of reform. In Alabama and Georgia county reformatories are being established, and New Orleans is struggling to obtain one. In those already existing, much labor and little instruction are the practise. Most of the advancement seen in Northern penal systems and laws is unknown. Many of the people are hostile to the reformatory idea, for the basis of the Southern system is financial. A successful prison administration is judged by the amount of net revenue to the State. There are no Southern organizations for the study of criminality, and no State bureaus of charity. In fact, one State often does not know the system of its neighbor. These conditions are fatal to the application of any scientific measures, and preclude the study of the causes of crime. So long as a State's criminals bring it a net revenue of from $30,000 to $150,000 a year, it is difficult to introduce methods leading to reform and to the decrease of crime.

In The Arena for March, 1900, I presented the most important conclusions of European investigators. These conclusions are only applicable to the country whence the facts underlying them were obtained. This rule has not been adhered to, and they have been adopted broadcast. The United States does not resemble these countries sufficiently to warrant their adoption. It must have its own facts because of its heterogeneous population, nature of soil, climate, government, and industrial and economic conditions. It presents problems that can be solved only by studies within its borders, not by the importation of facts and theories. These may be of suggestive value, but they do not furnish an accurate basis for philanthropy and legislation. The data must be its own. The European investigators assert that there is a criminal type; that criminals differ from normal individuals and constitute a class having common social, physical, and mental characteristics. The problem of the causes of crime resolves itself into one of heredity and environment. It is a very large and important part of these causes to determine the relative influence of these two, for upon it depends much of the nature of penal laws and reforms. Thus habitual-criminal acts recognize the physical basis of the crime; parole laws recognize the influence of environment. In reformatories, corporal punishment and emphasis upon labor attest a stronger belief in heredity than does a more humane system, with more moral and mental instruction. In philanthropy, the establishment of homes, as in New York and Chicago, where criminals can obtain work, is the result of the ascertained social fact that more than two-thirds of all criminals are unemployed when arrested.

As a result of these European investigations, the tendency has been to overestimate heredity and ignore environment. These theories are founded upon measurements of the criminal and normal classes in various European countries, chiefly Russia, Italy, and France. So far as the United States has adopted these theories, it has also adopted the facts. A chief defect of the European investigations is the small number of normal individuals measured, and the fact that they are not a representative normal class. They consist largely of the lower classes found in hospitals. A study in heredity and environment involves measurements for four classes: The criminal class, the normal class of the same grade from which criminals come, a representative normal class in the community, and the criminals of high grade. This last class represents but a small proportion of incarcerated criminals, and the problem of the United States is chiefly with the larger mass incarcerated and with the population furnishing this number. This leaves three essential classes. My investigation has included the measurement of 55 students, representing the normal class. This is a high average normal class, but it must be so selected as not to encroach upon the industrial and laboring classes that furnish the mass of criminals.

Last summer, in Northern institutions, 61 criminals were measured; and this spring, in the institutions of eight Southern States, 90 negro criminals were measured. This is the beginning of efforts to secure data for comparison of the criminal and normal classes. The measurement of the classes from which the criminals come is most essential, but is also most difficult, and has not yet been undertaken. Measurements of students are in progress during the university year— these to include measurements of the negro students at Tuskegee. This last will permit a comparison between negro and white students— and of the negro criminal and negro student. Results are given at this stage of the investigation, not to demonstrate theories and conclusions, but rather to show the nature of the investigation, its scope, and the tendencies it reveals; also to arouse interest and co-operation in an investigation that will make possible the adoption of humane and reformatory measures, more judicious philanthropy, and wiser legislation. Thus far the measurements have been of women, though social and penal institutions have been studied with reference to both sexes.

It is the facts relating to negro criminals and Southern institutions that I wish to present here, together with such comparisons as are possible with Northern white criminals and institutions. These Southern institutions include the States of Mississippi, Louisiana, Alabama, Georgia, Florida, South Carolina, North Carolina, and Virginia. The data fall under four distinct heads: (1) The negro in the South: socially, economically, politically, educationally, and morally—all with reference to criminality. This includes a study of the Southern white man's attitude, and the position of the negro woman and child. (2) State penal systems: general statement, excellencies and defects in the various State systems, laws, and courts, and county and municipal conditions. The facts for these two divisions apply equally to men and women. (3) Measurements and tests of women in the State penal institutions. The former include: weight, height, and strength of chest and hand grasps; 14 measurements of the face, ears, and head; length of fingers, thumbs, and hands; girths of various parts of the body, and foot imprints, besides nervous observations. The latter included tests of sight, hearing, touch, smell, taste, pain; of memory, association of ideas, precision, assortment, nerve tracing, fatigue tests, and respiration curves. (4) A study of the environment of each criminal, including data regarding the following facts: education of criminal and parents, religion, morality, reading, parents, home, associates, games, occupation, temptations, amusements, diseases, habits, family, superstitions, wishes, and civil condition and facts relating to it. The criminals are divided into two classes, according to the crime, being offenders against property and offenders against person. The former includes arson and all forms of theft; the latter infanticide, homicide, and assault. European investigators make each crime a division, but my results show only small differences for the two distinct classes, and do not warrant a finer analysis. The measurements in the third division are taken to ascertain (1) if the negro criminal differs structurally from the normal negro and the white criminal; and (2) if through psychological tests mental and moral defects can be ascertained.

Assertions have been made that the criminal is defective and degenerate. Thus far few tests have been made to prove this. Structural anomalies have no value to the practical penologist or to the State, unless they influence the cause of continuance of crime. Anomalies in functioning are more closely related to abnormality, and these may or may not depend upon structural defects. It is of no practical significance if an individual possesses asymmetries, high cheek-bones, or heavy jaw, unless they influence his response to social stimuli. These characteris­tics often exist in normal individuals and are not subject to comment, unless some prominent act identifies them. Psycho­ logical tests touch a more fundamental condition. If there are defects of sight, hearing, or touch; if there is limited reason, im­agination, mental capacity, memory, or if the normal sense is obtuse, there will be less successful functioning. Hence, tests that determine these are essential in supplementing the anthropometrical work. Most investigations have been confined to the latter and are correspondingly inadequate and misleading. Completing the data of both of these must be such a presenta­tion of social facts as will throw light upon the influences of heredity and environment. These social facts are ascertained by asking questions, and wherever possible they are verified by visits to the homes and haunts of the criminal and through statements of relatives and associates and officers. The negroes' answers are more trustworthy than those of the white criminal class, because they are less suspicious and believe they will benefit rather than lose by them. In some instances there were pathetic attempts to give the right details. These facts must necessarily be less accurate than the ones secured in the laboratory through accurate measurements.

First, then, the negro in the South. There is no denying the fact that negro criminality is out of proportion to the population, the proportion being greater than among the foreign whites. The census gives this fact without further analysis; but any one who will consider the agencies that produce crimes, and will then study the negroes' position, will see the inevitableness of this statement. Briefly, we may glance at these factors and the negroes' relation to them:

1. Climate—In the North, for the greater part of the year, it induces activity; in the South it is detrimental to continued labor, and it affects both negroes and whites. There are but few large cities in the South, and occupation has a more intimate relation to, and is more dependent upon, the climate. When the white finds labor difficult, he relies upon his inheritance or goes into business in the city. The poor white and negro must labor, starve, or steal, for he has not a plantation, nor credit or opportunities in the city. The Southern climate is less rigorous, and there is less forethought required—it is not an incentive to frugality and forethought, but rather encourages thriftlessness, thus providing an opening for vice and crime. Leffingwell has shown that in warm seasons of the year crimes of passion and licentiousness are more numerous. These form a very considerable number of the crimes of both negroes and whites in the South. Thus the climate predisposes to idleness, which is seen to furnish an opportunity for crime.
2. Soil—This yields greater returns for a small expenditure of energy than in most sections. In the North the labor must be unceasing to secure similar returns. The negro rarely labors a full week, even if he knows the necessity exists; for he feels assured of a livelihood. Every race for whom Nature provides lavishly, and in whom there have not been developed desires aside from those incident to self-preservation, will not exert itself. The necessity does not exist. It is the obstacles that have assisted the Anglo-Saxon race in its upward course. When this test comes, the race will rise or disappear. The negroes' near ancestry to races lavishly provided for, and the lack of these obstacles during slavery and now, have not tended to develop thrift and forethought. Certainly the indolence of the white Southerner is equally notable, and is disappearing only as he enters urban life and is drawn into the current of sharp competition. With the extension of city populations there is increasing criminality, but this is also assuming a more professional character and lacks the simplicity that characterizes so many negroes' crimes. Thus a soil yielding lavishly predisposes to crime through idleness.

3. Food—The food that the negro uses, whether by preference or necessity, is not of such a quality and is not so prepared as to give the greatest vitality. The death-rate of the negroes is often high because of the foods given during illness. In fevers and similar diseases this is important. The negro's daily food is ill-prepared, and his meals are irregular. Food in the North sustains an important place in the social and domestic life. Many cultural influences cluster about the meal hour. In the South there is none of the emphasis that makes it so important a factor in developing or cementing a closer family life. Later the effect of this loosely-woven domestic life will be seen in relation to immorality.
4. Labor—In the North, prison statistics show that where the criminal claims an occupation it is usually that of unskilled labor or of an artisan. Labor or idleness may not be a cause of crime, but they are closely associated with it. Each occupation has its common factors: First, a certain grade of intelligence is incident to certain occupations. The grade of intelligence of a gang of street-laborers in New York is about the same as in Chicago, though they may not have intermingled. Second, certain degrees of physical capability accompany the various occupations. It ranges all the way from mere endurance to skill. Third, associates are often selected through the occupation, and thus there are certain habits, recreations, and amusements with which each grade is familiar. The wages for the various kinds of labor must often determine the social, sanitary, and esthetic environment. Thus street-laborers have their own "hang-outs," and live in such sections as their wages permit. The habits and resorts of sailors are closely associated with their occupation. It may be argued that a man chooses his occupation according to his tastes and capabilities, and it is a result rather than a precedent. In a limited sense this is true, but among the classes from which the criminals come, and in this age of fierce competition, a man cannot more often choose his occupation than he can direct his training and education. Necessity may force him into work long before he is capable of choosing, or the parents' limited education and desires and lack of influence may keep him down in the scale. In all occupations in which the individual remains he in time develops the congeniality for it and shows the limited or undeveloped capacity characterizing it; for if he fails to keep the pace he drifts into a lower labor grade or into idleness, and if he exceeds the pace he grows out of it into new opportunities. These facts are especially true of the negro. But through his own experience and the desire of the whites his labor remains largely agricultural. Only a small per cent. are skilled laborers, and still fewer are in the professional class. The whites need him in the agricultural work and offer but little incentive for him to rise in this. When he drifts into the city it is often into idleness, unless he is a skilled laborer and can endure the competition.

With regard to women, the criminals come almost exclusively from the servant class. This is true in the North. Out of 1,451 women incarcerated at the Blackwell's Island Workhouse in one year, 1,298 claimed this occupation. There is practically no problem of criminality among Southern white women, and this is primarily true because there is no white servant class. The few white women in the workhouses who are intemperate or immoral come from the poor white class or drift in from Northern cities. It is secondarily true because women in the South have not entered professions and trades to the same extent as in the North; so they are not subjected to the temptations offered by industrial and professional life. Thus, labor in the South predisposes to crime because it favors both idleness and ignorance. It favors ignorance because education is difficult. The large plantations make attendance at school difficult, and the school year is more often three months than six. The far removal from centers of activity makes the use of libraries and all forms of general instruction impossible. The negro is more dependent upon his master, and upon traditions and customs, for his cultural influences—and these are meager enough. The agricultural class in the North can in no sense be compared with that in the South. The system in the North is one of small farms, in close proximity to educational influences, and the laborer has a personal and financial interest in the farm. The negro laborers compare more nearly with unskilled labor in the North—a fluctuating mass, having no stable roots or personal interest in work except the remuneration. It is a noteworthy fact that the occupations in the Northern cities that yield a large percentage of criminals also yield a number of negro criminals in Southern cities. The negro needs that training which will take him out of the class of unskilled labor and put him in a position to attain the interests and success of the small farmer in the North.