The Marquess of Normanby, in moving the consideration of the Commons' Amendment to the Prisons' Act Amendment Bill, said that it was the intention to relieve certain persons confined for misdemeanour from great severity of punishment. He did not agree that parties convicted of all political offences short of treason should be treated as felons, but at the same time be was not disposed to confine a relaxation of discipline to persons confined for one portion of the class of misdemeanours, but he would extend it, if circumstances required it, to all portions. The amendment made in the Commons did not meet the difficulty, for it limited the relaxation to the provisions of the Prisons' Act of last year, whereas the seventy arose under the General Gaol Act of 4 Geo. 4th; and he would, therefore, propose an alteration in the amendment so as to make it meet all cases of misdemeanour in which circumstances should exist which should render it desirable to mitigate in favour of particular prisoners the general prison regulations. But in moving this, he only did it as a temporary measure, because it would scarcely meet the real evil. At some future time he would propose that convicts confined for misdemeanours should be separated into two distinct classes, and that then the judge should state whether the prisoner should be confined in class one or class two; thus leaving in the hands of the judges the discretion as to the severity of punishment in each case. As to some cases, the previous habits of the individual made an enforcement of the strict ordinary prison discipline a great increase of the severity of punishment, and under the name of uniformity they were making the most unequal punishment. The Commons' amendment, too, confined the power to the visiting justices and the Secretary of State; he proposed to add the term "visitors" to make the temporary remedy apply to the 830 Penitentiary, because although nominally the Secretary of State had the power to remove a prisoner from one prison to another, yet in consequence of the want of provisions to pay the expenses of sustenance in any other county gaol, the power was practically limited to removal to the Penitentiary; but when the prisoner was so removed, he was subject to all the ordinary rules in force in that prison; and the consequence had been that an individual who had been removed from a prison in a district in which riots had broken out to the Penitentiary, had been subjected to a severity of punishment that was not contemplated in the original sentence. The amendment which he proposed was, that when it should appear to the visiting justices, to the visitors, or the Secretary of State, that there were good grounds for the relaxation of the ordinary prison discipline in the case of any prisoner confined as a convict for misdemeanour generally, the discipline should be by such visiting justices or visitors, with the consent of the Secretary of State, or by the Secretary of State, relaxed in favour of such prisoner.
The Marquess of Salisburysaid, that it seemed to have been the intention of the House of Commons to alter a bill framed, for one purpose, expressly to meet certain cases that had lately occurred, and, in fact, to alter entirely the law with regard to all seditious and public libels; and if the noble Marquess's alteration were intended to meet those particular cases, he was, in fact, agreeing to the amendment of the Commons. Now, this was not a fair way of meeting such a question, because if the noble Marquess thought that in these particular cases there ought to be a relaxation of punishment, he had the power of recommending the exercise of the clemency of the Crown; and it would be but fair, as the whole law was proposed to be altered, that the precise amendment should be printed for noble Lords to consider.
§ Lord LyndhurstWhy not print the original bill with the Commons' amendments and the proposed alteration of the noble Marquess?
The Marquess of Normanbywould not oppose the printing if it were pressed, and there was any objection to the principle of his alteration. He must, however, say one word upon the noble Marquess's remarks, that though he might wish to relax the severity of prison discipline, he might not wish to go to the extent of recommending an exercise of the clemency of the 831 Crown. The bill, as he proposed to alter it, would include the cases to which the noble Marquess had alluded, but it would not be confined to them. He wished the alteration to be printed that he might judge of the principle.
§ The Earl of Warwickremarked, in reference to some of the cases which had been alluded to, and which had come under his own observation, that it was impossible to say that people could be better treated according to their deserts than those individuals. They all knew that this matter was got up in another place, for the purpose of asking their Lordships to legislate permanently with the reports of these cases fresh on their minds, and he would certainly vote for the printing of the amendment.
Lord Ellenboroughsaid, that the effect of the noble Marquess's alteration, as he understood it, was to make the punishment in all cases of misdemeanour depend not on the sentence of the judge who had tried the prisoner, but on the view taken of the case by the Secretary of State. In some cases such a power in the Secretary of State might be necessary; but as the noble Marquess himself admitted that his present proposal was only temporary, he had better bring in such a bill as he considered perfectly right.
§ Lord Portmansaid, that all that was asked by the proposed alteration was, to give to the Secretary of State the same power of relaxing the prison discipline in particular cases which might demand it, as the surgeon of the prison now had on a consideration of the health of a particular prisoner. There were parties to whom simple imprisonment itself was a very great punishment, and under the present law, if a person were sentenced to imprisonment for a misdemeanour in inciting to a breach of the peace, he must be subject to every one portion of the ordinary prison discipline for misdemeanours, and he was sure that inciting to a breach of the peace, was not such a case as their Lordships would wish to see punished by such severity.
The Marquess of Salisburysaid, that if his objection to the proposed alteration was strong before, it was made ten times stronger by the remarks of the noble Baron, because it would appear, that it was the object of the alteration to allow the Secretary of State to alter when he thought fit the sentences of the Judges.
The Marquess of Normanbyobserved, 832 that he did not propose to give the power exclusively to the Secretary of State, but to the visiting magistrates, with his sanction, and with them it would practically, and except in extraordinary cases, rest. A great practical injustice took place at the present moment, in consequence of the inequality and discrepancy of the prison discipline in different gaols.
Lord EllenboroughThat was the fault of the Secretary of State. He might have disallowed the rules if they were not uniform.
§ Bill postponed—alteration to be printed.