Commonwealth ex rel. Johnson v. Halloway

• Decision Date: 21 April 1862
• Citation: 42 Pa. 446
• Parties: The Commonwealth <I>ex rel.</I> Johnson <I>versus</I> Halloway. Same <I>ex rel.</I> Langhammer <I>versus</I> Same.
• Court: Pennsylvania Supreme Court

Page 446

42 Pa. 446

The Commonwealth ex rel. Johnson versus Halloway.

Same ex rel. Langhammer versus Same.

Supreme Court of Pennsylvania.

April 21, 1862.

IN the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania.

The opinion of the court was delivered, April 21st 1862, by WOODWARD, J.

A penitentiary on the principle of solitary confinement of convicts, was first provided for in Pennsylvania by an Act of Assembly of 3d March 1818, which established it in Allegheny county. By an Act of 20th March 1821, a similar penitentiary was provided for Eastern Pennsylvania, to be located within the county of Philadelphia. In pursuance of these Acts of Assembly, the two noble structures known as the Eastern and Western Penitentiaries were erected. By an Act of Assembly of 23d April 1829, the penal code was revised, crimes defined, and punishments in the two new penitentiaries enjoined. The government of the penitentiaries was committed to boards of inspectors, "consisting of five taxable citizens of Pennsylvania," to be appointed by the judges of the Supreme Court, and they were to act under "rules and regulations for the better ordering and governing of said penitentiaries," which the Act of 1829 set forth in full. Among other details the discharge of convicts was prescribed. Some immaterial provisions have been supplied by subsequent legislation, but the Act of 1829 established a system of punitive justice that has never been essentially modified, and which, by reason of the excellence of the conception and the fidelity of administration, has commanded the attention of the civilized world.

But on 1st of May 1861 the legislature passed an act "relative to prison discipline," which, while it does not profess to repeal prior acts respecting penitentiary punishments, nor to disturb the well-matured system which we possess, will, nevertheless, impose new and difficult duties on the inspectors and superintendents of all our prisons, and greatly impair the efficiency of our system, if it do not derange all of its outlines. The inspectors of the Eastern Penitentiary, with the entire concurrence of their colleagues of the Western, have set forth their objections to the Act of 1861, in a printed report of a committee of their body. They complain of the act as of doubtful constitutionality, and of such ambiguity that they are unable to carry it satisfactorily into execution. They say they first knew of its passage from the lips of a convict under their care, and that, according to their information, it passed one branch of the legislature at the latest moment of the session, without a word of observation or criticism from a single member.

It is much to be regretted that the legislature of 1861 permitted its powers to be employed in disturbing an admirable system of penitentiary punishment, without consulting any of the officers to whom the system had been intrusted for administration, and whose experience had qualified them for advising wisely in respect to the proposed measure. The act was, however, passed in all the forms of law, and two prisoners now claim their discharge from further confinement by virtue of its provisions.

The first section requires the wardens or superintendents to keep a record of the name of each prisoner, and of every infraction of the printed and published rules, and of the punishments inflicted therefor, which record is to be laid before the inspectors for examination and approval. The second section provides for a graduated "deduction from the term of sentence" of every prisoner who shall have no infraction of rules recorded against him for any month of the first year of his imprisonment — one day for the first month, two additional days for the second month, and three additional days for each succeeding month of the first year's imprisonment — and to a similar deduction of four days...