Seeking Liberty through Imprisonment: The Paradox of Prison Reform in the Early Republic

Abstract

Shortly before their discharge from the penitentiary in Auburn, New York, in 1830, convicts offered brief yet revealing sketches of their lives before imprisonment. Most of them came from impoverished, unstable homes; led hard scrabble, itinerant lives; and drank to excess. W.B., for example, had been rover and intemperate. Convicted of attempted rape against ten-year-old girl, W.B. denied the charge but admitted that he was well soaked with rum when the crime allegedly occurred. L.S., also convicted of attempted rape, admitted that he had been a very wild boy, in loose company great deal, tending billiard tables, [and] nine-pin alleys. He described his education as poor and conceded that he got and usually spent the Sabbath playing sports. Convicted of grand larceny, J.G. noted that both his parents died when he was very young. Left on his own, he soon fell into low vicious company, and became addicted to stealing and excessive drinking. Female convicts at Auburn offered similar portraits of unstable, troubled lives. Doll, young black woman who served threeyear sentence for stealing clothes, recalled that she never knew her father and that her mother put her out to service at young age. Soon, Doll recalled, she went among loose women and became prostitute. She sometimes got drunk and could not read at all.1 Criminals who offered such testimony posed special challenge for lawabiding antebellum Americans. The Revolution eroded the public's commitment to patriarchal authority and created republic dedicated to individual liberty. Yet public safety required that Americans in the early republic devise effective ways to punish and deter criminals. So how to reconcile Americans' love of liberty with their defense of public order and the disciplining of criminals?