hold of disease, and seeking to find
its cause and to remove that cause, we content ourselves with
prosecuting and punishing and visiting with misery and shame, not only
the boys and girls, the men and women, who are the victims of life, but
the large number of fathers, mothers, brothers, sisters, sons and
daughters, whose lives are ruined by a catastrophe with which at least
they had nothing to do. If a doctor were called in to treat a case of
typhoid fever, he would probably find out where the patient got his milk
supply and his drinking water and would have the well cleaned out to
stop the spread of typhoid fever through infection. A lawyer called to
treat the same kind of a case, legally speaking, would give the patient
thirty days in jail, thinking that this treatment would effect a cure.
If at the end of ten days the patient were cured, he would nevertheless
be kept in prison until his time was out. If at the end of thirty days
the disease was more infectious than ever, the patient would be
discharged and sent upon his way to spread contagion in his path.

The transgression of organized society in the treatment of crime would
not be so great if students and scientists had not long since found the
cause of crime. It would be hard to name a single man among all the men
of Europe and America who have given their time and thought to the
solution of this problem, who has not come to the conclusion that crime
has a natural origin, and that the criminal for the most part is the
victim of heredity and environment. These students have pointed the way
for the treatment of the disease, and yet organized government that
spends its millions on prosecutions, reformatories, jails,
penitentiaries and the like, has scarcely raised its hand or spent a
dollar to remove the cause of a disease that brings misery and despair
to millions and threatens the destruction of all social organization! To
the teaching of the student and the recommendations of the humane the
mob answers back: "Give us more victims, bigger jails, stronger prisons,
more scaffolds!"

Not only has the constant multiplication of penal laws helped without
avail to fill jails, but the failure to repeal laws that are outgrown
does its part. As already stated, there are many anti-social and
annoying things that can be done without violating the law. This, no
doubt, is responsible for some of the general statutes like that aimed
at the confidence game that catches a vic