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June 15, 2003, 11:38 PM
Forbes magazine
May 26, 2003
page 48
"On my mind" guest columnist article
by Theodore Dalrymple, a pseudonym for a doctor who works in a British inner-city hospital and in a prison, contributes to the Spectator in London and to the Manhattan Institute's City Journal.
Prisons Are Good
The inmate population in the U.S. has surpassed 2 million for the first time. Hear! Hear!
There is no finer investment, said Winston Churchill, than putting milk into babies. The second-best investment is putting criminals into prison. It may not bring much in the way of happiness, but it certainly prevents a lot of misery.
To judge by the statistics, America is investing very sensibly in prisons. As one might expect, the New York Times has expressed unease that the prison population of the U.S. recently exceeded 2 million for the first time, but from the other side of the Atlantic this appears to be a sign of good health and self-confidence rather than of malaise, weakness and injustice. Unlike Europe, America still has the strength of mind and character to deal with antisocial wrongdoing in a serious and consistent fashion. By contrast we in Europe have all but surrendered to the worst elements in our societies.
The surrender has been most complete in Britain, which is now the most crime-ridden country in the Western world (though France and Holland are not far behind). With the single--admittedly important--exception of murder, Britons are now far more likely to be victims of crime than are Americans: Our robbery and burglary rates are much higher than America's, and crime in Britain is far less concentrated in urban ghettos than it is in the U.S. No Briton ever returns home nowadays without wondering whether he has been burgled.
The change from good order to lawlessness in Britain has been startling both in its extent and its swiftness. Robberies in England and Wales rose, from an already very high level, by 27% between 2001 and 2002. Moreover, on average, the seriousness of the crimes reported has increased greatly.
True, our rate of imprisonment is now higher than it has ever been before, at 135 per 100,000 population. (The U.S. figure is 686 per 100,000.) The fact that we have more prisoners than ever before, at a time of unprecedented levels of crime, is taken by commentators to prove that imprisonment does not work. But even these tenderhearted souls could not possibly believe that if all our prisoners were released without the possibility of ever being reimprisoned, the crime rate would not rise.
From 1931 to 1991 the number of prisoners in England and Wales rose from 11,000 to 46,000. But the number of crimes recorded per prisoner rose much more steeply, from 15 to 115, demonstrating that the odds of a malefactor's being sent to prison lengthened considerably.
Those who deny the efficacy of prison are rather coy about the alternatives. And only their willful lack of familiarity with the quotidian acts of evil perpetrated in the society that surrounds them permits them to retain what they believe to be their generously merciful and understanding attitude. When I describe to them the cases that I see and hear about daily in my medical practice and ask them what they think the appropriate punishment would be, they always reply "life imprisonment." They offer this answer without realizing that it implies that our prisons would be vastly more populous than they are, so frequently committed are the kinds of crimes I have described.
Like all sensible people, they are appalled to hear that three youths who robbed a shop, one of them attempting to strangle the shop assistant while the others filled their pockets, received only a warning (that is to say, a polite request not to do it again) from the police; or that a man who stalked a woman, issuing threats by telephone to kill her and who eventually attacked her in the street, kicking, biting and threatening to do worse next time, likewise received only a meaningless warning.
According to a recent British government survey, 26% of female crime victims were subsequently threatened with further violence if they either went to the police or gave testimony.
America has much to learn from what has happened in Britain and elsewhere in Europe. It need have no shame about its high rate of imprisonment.
May 26, 2003
page 48
"On my mind" guest columnist article
by Theodore Dalrymple, a pseudonym for a doctor who works in a British inner-city hospital and in a prison, contributes to the Spectator in London and to the Manhattan Institute's City Journal.
Prisons Are Good
The inmate population in the U.S. has surpassed 2 million for the first time. Hear! Hear!
There is no finer investment, said Winston Churchill, than putting milk into babies. The second-best investment is putting criminals into prison. It may not bring much in the way of happiness, but it certainly prevents a lot of misery.
To judge by the statistics, America is investing very sensibly in prisons. As one might expect, the New York Times has expressed unease that the prison population of the U.S. recently exceeded 2 million for the first time, but from the other side of the Atlantic this appears to be a sign of good health and self-confidence rather than of malaise, weakness and injustice. Unlike Europe, America still has the strength of mind and character to deal with antisocial wrongdoing in a serious and consistent fashion. By contrast we in Europe have all but surrendered to the worst elements in our societies.
The surrender has been most complete in Britain, which is now the most crime-ridden country in the Western world (though France and Holland are not far behind). With the single--admittedly important--exception of murder, Britons are now far more likely to be victims of crime than are Americans: Our robbery and burglary rates are much higher than America's, and crime in Britain is far less concentrated in urban ghettos than it is in the U.S. No Briton ever returns home nowadays without wondering whether he has been burgled.
The change from good order to lawlessness in Britain has been startling both in its extent and its swiftness. Robberies in England and Wales rose, from an already very high level, by 27% between 2001 and 2002. Moreover, on average, the seriousness of the crimes reported has increased greatly.
True, our rate of imprisonment is now higher than it has ever been before, at 135 per 100,000 population. (The U.S. figure is 686 per 100,000.) The fact that we have more prisoners than ever before, at a time of unprecedented levels of crime, is taken by commentators to prove that imprisonment does not work. But even these tenderhearted souls could not possibly believe that if all our prisoners were released without the possibility of ever being reimprisoned, the crime rate would not rise.
From 1931 to 1991 the number of prisoners in England and Wales rose from 11,000 to 46,000. But the number of crimes recorded per prisoner rose much more steeply, from 15 to 115, demonstrating that the odds of a malefactor's being sent to prison lengthened considerably.
Those who deny the efficacy of prison are rather coy about the alternatives. And only their willful lack of familiarity with the quotidian acts of evil perpetrated in the society that surrounds them permits them to retain what they believe to be their generously merciful and understanding attitude. When I describe to them the cases that I see and hear about daily in my medical practice and ask them what they think the appropriate punishment would be, they always reply "life imprisonment." They offer this answer without realizing that it implies that our prisons would be vastly more populous than they are, so frequently committed are the kinds of crimes I have described.
Like all sensible people, they are appalled to hear that three youths who robbed a shop, one of them attempting to strangle the shop assistant while the others filled their pockets, received only a warning (that is to say, a polite request not to do it again) from the police; or that a man who stalked a woman, issuing threats by telephone to kill her and who eventually attacked her in the street, kicking, biting and threatening to do worse next time, likewise received only a meaningless warning.
According to a recent British government survey, 26% of female crime victims were subsequently threatened with further violence if they either went to the police or gave testimony.
America has much to learn from what has happened in Britain and elsewhere in Europe. It need have no shame about its high rate of imprisonment.