Helfman, Harold M.

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Antecedents of Thomas Mott Osborne\u27s Mutual Welfare League in Michigan

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Journal of Criminal Law and CriminologyVolume 40 | Issue 5 Article 51950Antecedents of Thomas Mott Osborne's MutualWelfare League in MichiganHarold M. HelfmanFollow this and additional works at: https://scholarlycommons.law.northwestern.edu/jclcPart of the Criminal Law Commons, Criminology Commons, and the Criminology and CriminalJustice CommonsThis Article is brought to you for free and open access by Northwestern University School of Law Scholarly Commons. It has been accepted forinclusion in Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology by an authorized editor of Northwestern University School of Law Scholarly Commons.Recommended CitationHarold M. Helfman, Antecedents of Thomas Mott Osborne's Mutual Welfare League in Michigan, 40 J. Crim. L. & Criminology 597(1949-1950)ANTECEDENTS OF THOMAS MOTT OSBORNE'S"MUTUAL WELFARE LEAGUE" IN MICHIGANHarold M. HelfmanThe author is a member of the Department of History in the Ohio State Univer-sity. The present article sets forth the claim that nineteenth century developmentsin the penal administration of the Detroit House of Correction and the MichiganState Prison are the true origins of the concept of inmate self-government that waspopularized by Thomas Mott Osborne's "Mutual Welfare League." '-EmToPenal historians usually give Thomas Mott Osborne creditfor first introducing the "new penology" of culture and educa-tion as a preparation of criminals for citizenship. The "MutualWelfare League" at New York's Auburn Prison in 1914, andthe system of convict self-government which he later developedat Sing Sing have been represented as the first systematic andcomprehensive American attempts to provide an effectiveprocedure of social education for prison inmates.' The NewYork program envisaged a convict democracy expressed throughself-governing representative bodies and inmate-imposed rulesof discipline. Warden Osborne, in a series of lectures which-he delivered in 1916 at Yale University and published in collec-tive form as Society a#c Prison, traced the genesis of hisprogressive idea of inmate rule to the George Junior Republicat Freeville, New York, of whose board of trustees he waspresident for more than fifteen years.2 Nowhere within hislectures did Warden Osborne make mention of two Michigan ex-periments of more than a quarter of a century previous, fromwhich consciously. or unconsciously he must have borrowed.Some time within the 1860's, Zebulon R. Brockway, the"miracle-worker" of the Detroit House of Correction, initiateda plan for self-government among the inmates of that institu-tion. The annual reports of the officers and inspectors of theHouse of Correction make no mention of this pioneer attemptat reformative prison management, although Brockway dis-cussed the subject later in his published memoirs.3 No doubtBrockway felt that the civic opinion of the day would brandas sugar-coating and coddling any deviation from the orthodox"watch dog" supervision of incarcerated felons and so madeno public utterances at the time on the worthwhileness of hisexperiments.The Brockway plan, formulated from the famous experiment1 Harry E. Barnes, The Evolution of Penology in Pennsyivania (Indianaolisi,1927), p. 365.2 (New Haven, 1916), p. 139.a Zebulon R. Brockway, Fifty Years of Prison Service: An Autobiography (NewYork, 1912), pp. 96-97.HAROLD M. HRLFMAv[at Norfolk Island of the English reform Warden, AlexanderMaconochie, called for the assignment of intelligent long-termprisoners to custodial and monitorial duties usually performedby civilian officers. This promotion of inmates to semi-officialrelations and duties differed from the orthodox use of "trusties"in local jails since the new duties were less servile and theinstitutional social status of the prisoners thus engaged wasmore elevated. Warden Brockway had so much confidence inhis experiment of engaging prisoners in supervisory capacitiesthat by threatening to turn over the complete mechanical andeducational supervision of the House of Correction to theprisoners themselves, he broke a strike of civilian administra-tors in the late 1860's and forced the officers to relent and toreturn to their duties. Brockway's resignation in 1871, pre-cipitated by a quarrel with Mayor Hugh Moffatt, aborted thispractice of inmate rule at the Detroit House of Correction. Nofurther recognition of the procedure can be found in the officialor unofficial records of the Detroit institution for the nextquarter of a century, during which time reforms were sacrificedin the endeavor to produce an annual municipal profit.Brockway's aim of prisoner self-government was carriedover and elaborated by the experiments introduced in the late1880's by Warden Hiram F. Hatch of the Michigan State Prisonat Jackson. Michigan's "reform warden" premised his programwith the belief that discipline had for its object "the adaptationof character to circumstances, the training to self-command. "4His six-year tenure of office at the Jackson prison from 1885-1891 witnessed the transformation of a philosophy of blindindiscriminate punishment to a credo that the amenable delin-quent must be fitted for a successful rehabilitation in society.Hatch's brightest achievement was the formation in 1888 of anorganization for social betterment among the 457 inmates ofthe State Prison. A constitution was drawn up by an unsuper-vised committee of their own number, in which the men namedtheir organization, "The Mutual Aid League of the M. S. P.1,a title somewhat similar to Osborne's "]Mutual Welfare League"4xperiment of some twenty-five years later. The lofty aims ofthe society were stipulated in its constitution:The objects of this league shall be: by social intercourse to improveourselves, and to aid in the moral, intellectual, physical and financialadvancement of our fellowmen. To inculcate a higher appreciationof the value and sacred obligations of American citizenship, andthe necessity of unconditional loyalty to the Federal and State4 Biennial Report of the Inspectors and Ofcers of the Michigan State 1'rison forthe Year Closing June 80, 1890 (Lansing, 1890), p. 80.[Vol. 40MUTUAL WELFABE LEAGUEgovernment, as exemplified by a strict maintenance of the laws bythem promulgated. To resist and oppose corruption and dishonestyin all forms and places and to promote honesty and efficiency inthe discharge of all labor, tasks and duties assigned. To respect andaid by personal discipline, in the maintenance of all rules and regula-tions necessary to the discipline and good order of the prison.5Warden Hatch presided over monthly convocations of thesociety alone without guards. Agreeable to their by-laws, heappointed nine members as an executive board to meet withhim weekly, a number and procedure similar to that adoptedin the Osborne experiment. Suggestions and opinions madeby the representative body of the inmates enabled authoritiesto keep in constant touch with the sentiments of the prisonyard. The membership of "The Mutual Aid League" was ex-pected to assist in starting and keeping the new men right;and in this way many of the convicts interested themselvesactively in assisting the administration to preserve good orderand in maintaining the beginnings of correctional and reforma-tory work in the Michigan State Prison.6Considerable contemporary criticism was directed at Hatch's.progressive method of prison management. That the Jacksondiscipline was new and radical was in itself sufficient reasonfor ridicule. But belittlers of the self-government programclaimed that participating inmates were "pampered and coddledto the destruction of good discipline and all deterrent effect.''7One prison officer, drawing from his long experience with the"criminal type," even prophesied that Hatch's "reckless pro-ceeding" of holding meetings without guards patrolling theaisles could only result in "the utter demoralization of theprison, if not a destructive outbreak." 8 Warden Hatch answeredthese slurs on his administrative techniques by pointing to anunblemished record in the maintenance of prison discipline andby logically noting that if "the principles which underlie them[his ideas] are true, they will survive and will be strengthenedby opposition. If they are defective and wrong, they will failas they ought."9This innovation could have made the Michigan State Prisona leader in national penal correction and inmate reformation,but, unfortunately, it was dropped with the resignation ofHiram F. Hatch on February 3, 1891. So thoroughly did theJackson institution eradicate traces of "The Mutual Aid5 Ibid., p. 40.6 bid., pp. 40-41.7.Ibid., p. 30.8 H. H. Hart "The Reformation of Criminals," as quoted, ibid.9 bid.1950]HAROLD M. HELFMAAvLeague" experiment that a report written in 1899 by OrlandoM. Barnes, a member of the board of inspectors of the StatePrison, and intended to be a compendium of penal activitiesat the penitentiary,10 made no mention of Hatch's attemptat inmate rule. In fact, the pendulum of prison administrationin Michigan swung decidedly to the opposite extreme duringthe decade of the 'nineties, as witnessed by Mr. Barnes' demandfor a penal discipline whereby inmates might appreciate theimportance of obeying laws by realizing that suffering followedas a natural consequence of rules infractions. 1So completely had Hatch's correctional program faded fromthe memories of men that when Thomas Mott Osborne formu-lated his "Mutual Welfare League" some two decades later,all prison administrators hailed this "new" system of inmateself-government as something profoundly radical and untriedin institutional management. That Warden Osborne's effortwas to be the most sustained and publicized program of prisondemocracy hitherto attempted in the "new penology" cannotbe denied by the present author. What must be challenged isthe allegation that the "Mutual Welfare League" was America'spioneer effort in the direction of penal self-government. Thesimilarity in objectives, names, techniques, and organizationalstructure between the Brockway-Hatch plans in Michigan andthe Osborne program in New York indicates to the historianmore than a mere coincidence.10 Prison System of Michigan: An Account of the Penal and Penitentary Systemand Institutions of the State of Michigan with a Consideration of Improvements(Lansing, 1899).11 Ibid., p. 31L[VoL 40

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Antecedents of Thomas Mott Osborne\u27s Mutual Welfare League in Michigan

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