In the early ages,which also is known as the Age of Enlightenment, there were four Enlightenment Reformers,that brought changes to the corrections system. The four Enlightenment Reformers were William Penn, Cesare Beccaria , John Howard, and John Bentham. William Penn also known as the founder of Pennsylvania was also know for the Great Laws and the Quaker reform. The Great Laws reform was a reform that stated the Harsh and cruel punishment was wrong and ineffective and that he believed that Hard labor was a better of of deterring criminal acts verses giving the death penalty. The Quaker reform was based upon that criminals should have human treatment and that they are capable of changing and that they as well have rights. His biggest contribution …show more content…
to the correctional system was the Great Laws and which is still being used in correctional facilities around the world.His reforms and ideas were promoted due to his position in the Quaker community as the religious leader. Cesare Beccaria was known for his writing and particularly a piece called Crimes and Punishment which condemned the death penalty. He was also known for being the creator of Classical Criminology ,which says that punishment should be meaningful, deter people in general from committing a crime. He Helped Established the use of speedy trials, liberty as a punishment, the greatest good for the greatest number, which are still being used till this day. His reforms were promoted by his activism actions and from his writings. John Howard was an appointed sheriff who looked at the correctional system as unsanitary, unsafe and having a lack of justice towards the Offenders, which helped him bring attention to his State of Prisons treatise for British Parliament. His ideas and reforms were mostly promoted through his writings, and position as sheriff. Jeremy Bentham was known for believing that punishment should be proportional to the crimes committed. Hedonistic Calculus, was the creation that Jeremy made that was based upon obtaining pleasurable experiences while lessening painful and unpleasant experiences. His contributions were his Reform Hedonistic Calculus which is used to help deter future criminal tendencies. Even though we have taken on some of the contributions of the four Enlightenment reformers , we have also kept some of the ways that brought about their reasons to change the system.
The corrections system has a major problem with corruption. As a correctional officer, or policeman/woman, it is a duty that is meant to protect and serve, but lately from incidents that have taken place in the world it seems that they are taking advantage of their duties,an over use of their position. Treating inmates like animals, having them living in unsanitary conditions,and etc. A way to remedy these problems would be to take a harsher disciplinary action against the offending. Taking better care of our jails,and making them livable. Making correctional officers and police officers wear body cameras so they can be monitored, and held responsible for their wrongdoings. If the Four Enlightenment reformers were still alive today, i could guarantee that they would be very displeased with the correctional system, why because things from their time to now has not changed significantly. If they were still living they would try to imply better treatment opportunities in the jailing system for transition from jail to society,better deterring strategies for inmates and the general population. They would imply a better system that treated inmate with a better sense of humanity, and would have possibly been able to have ridden the death penalty for
good.
One of the biggest issues with jails and prisons is how crowded they are. In jails and prisons, they are way too over populated in the number of inmates that they can hold. Drugs are the main cause of jails and prisons being way overcrowded. I do not agree with how overcrowded the jails and prisons are. Morgan showed the result of overcrowded jails and prisons. Jails and prisons are way to over populated so therefor, inmates have to sleep on floors or find a spot to rest, because there are not enough beds to hold the number of inmates that are committed into the prisons and jails anymore. I also disagree with how their running their disciplinary strategies because if they did a better job, then two of three prisoners would not be back to jail shortly after leaving. What they do on the inside should help to where more inmates will not be back after being released from jail or
The enlightenment period was full of social and intellectual growth. This time period changed the way people thought of the world and exposed the world to different cultures. It brought the world into several revolutions that will later contribute to great change for the modern world. Travel was significant during the enlightenment due to the enlightenment ideas that knowledge and information was gained through experience. In order for the people to get a better understanding of the world and gain information about other cultures, they had to travel to these people. During this era and time period of the enlightenment, travel was significant in order to get a quality and endless education. Denis Diderot shows the significance that travel did
Unlike previous centuries, the eighteenth century was the dawn of a new age in Western Europe where intellectuals thrived, science was honored, and curiosity was encouraged; and the framework of how civil society was changed as a whole. From the dawn of the Enlightenment Western European culture was changing due to the revolutionary new ideas that were changing. With the social change going on, political change was as ever evident as time went on. With these changes rooted in social change went out, the effects of the Enlightenment can be seen over 18th century Western Europe and beyond.
In 1682, William Penn arrived in Philadelphia and succeeded in expanding The Great Law. The Great Law emphasized hard labor in a house of correction as punishment for most crimes. In the 1800s, two reformation systems were introduced. These systems are known as the New York System and the Pennsylvania System. The New York System, also known as the Auburn System was a more cost effective labor and the state negotiated contracts with the manufactures. The New York System evolved into the Congregate System. The system believed in hard labor in shops in the day and solitary confinement at night. The rule of silence and strict discipline were used. The New York System believed to have reformation through good work habits and discipline. The only prison to use this system was the Auburn Prison in 1816. If the prisoners were to learn the advantages and satisfaction of hard work and thrift, the New York System believed there could be no better way than to be compelled to work together in harmony, if such a system also offered the potential for inmates to grow and harvest their own vegetables, raise and butcher their own meat, make their own clothes, and manufacture other items for use or sale by the state, such a benefit to the budget could not be
There are many different ways in which the Enlightenment affected the Declaration of Independence and the U.S Constitution. One way was the by the idea of a Social Contract; an agreement by which human beings are said to have abandoned the "state of nature" in order to form the society in which they now live. HOBBES, LOCKE, and J.J. ROUSSEAU each developed differing versions of the social contract, but all agreed that certain freedoms had been surrendered for society's protection and that the government has definite responsibilities to its citizens. Locke believed that governments were formed to protect the natural rights of men, and that overthrowing a government that did not protect these rights was not only a right, but also an obligation. His thoughts influenced many revolutionary pamphlets and documents, including the Virginia Constitution of 1776, and the Declaration of Independence. The Bill of Rights was created as a listing of the rights granted to citizens, the Bill of Rights serves to protect the people from a too powerful government. These civil rights granted to U.S. Citizens are included in the first 10 amendments to the U.S. Constitution. Additionally, Locke’s ideas about checks and balances and the division of church and state were later embodied in the U.S. Constitution as well. The Constitution replaced a more weakly organized system of government as outlined under the Articles of Confederation.
The church’s robust grip on religious expression shattered as medieval society transitioned into a period known as the Reformation. Characterized by the rejection of common ideology, the Reformation sparked religious curiosity. Reformers such as John Calvin and Martin Luther offered interpretations of the Bible in direct opposition to the Catholic Church’s teachings, forcing Europeans to examine and formulate their own beliefs. This style of thinking was foreign to European society because up to this point in history Europeans were passive absorbers of Catholic Church ideology. Hence, it was natural that an era considered the Age of Enlightenment followed the period of rejection and questioning known as the Reformation. The Age of Enlightenment did not merely confine itself to religious expression, but spread throughout natural and social science. Thus, the Age of Enlightenment marked the beginning of academic and religious philosophy and allowed great minds to think free from restriction and condemnation of established institution. As the perception of natural
Prison Reform in The United States of America “It is said that no one truly knows a nation until one has been inside its jails. A nation should not be judged by how it treats its highest citizens, but its lowest ones” (Nelson Mandela, 1994). The United States of America has more people behind bars than any other country on the planet. The prisons are at over double capacity. It cost a lot of money to house prisoners each year.
The Pennsylvania prison system, also known as the separate system, was influenced by isolation, silence, and strict discipline. The goal of this model was reformation. Prisoners under this system were kept in solitary confinement, and their cells were tiny. They were not allowed to come in contact with other inmates, and their visitors were limited. The prisoners even had their own exercise yards to promote further solitary confinement. Over time, the Pennsylvania prison system added in prison labor. This model was best for preventing violence in jail and letting the prisoners use isolation to reflect on their criminal behavior. On the other hand, this became very costly, and the isolation did not have many positive effects on the minds of the
The Enlightenment is a unique time in European history characterized by revolutions in science, philosophy, society, and politics. These revolutions put Europe in a transition from the medieval world-view to the modern western world. The traditional hierarchical political and social orders from the French monarchy and Catholic Church were destroyed and replaced by a political and social order from the Enlightenment ideals of freedom and equality(Bristow, 1). Many historians, such as Henry Steele Commager, Peter Gay, have studied the Enlightenment over the years and created their own views and opinions.
becomes an unpardonable issue. When taking Locke 's statements into account, it becomes clear that the Declaration 's goals were influenced by this Enlightenment philosopher, who stressed liberty and following natural law. However, Locke was not the only Enlightenment philosopher to influence the Declaration of Independence.
Incarcerated under the Pennsylvania system of corrections, were housed in solitary confinement, separated from each other, and most human contact. This was intended to make the inmates focus on the wrongs that they had committed, which caused them to be incarcerated (Mays & Winfree, 2009). This philosophy was based on the reforms which were occurring during the Enlightenment period. The thinkers of this time felt that by confining an inmate in a solitary manner, with no meaningful human contact, was a more humane way of punishing offenders than was corporal punishment (Cloud, Drucker, Browne, & Parsons, 2015). It was after visits to the Eastern State Penitentiary, that some of the enlightened thinkers of the time, such as Charles Dickens, began to see that this solitary confinement was in fact, more inhumane, than other forms of incarceration (Cloud, Drucker, et al, 2015). Once it became apparent that the silent prisons of the Pennsylvania system were more inhumane, more reforms in the field of corrections came about, such as the Auburn system used in New
"Today's system, where imprisonment is a common penalty for most crimes, is a historical newcomer." Many crimes during 1718 and 1776 were punishable by death. This was usually done by hanging, sometimes by stoning, breaking on the rack and burning at the stake. Towards the end of the 1700's people realized that cruel punishment did little to reduce crime and their society was changing the population grew and people started to move around more frequently. There had to be a search for new punishments. "New punishments were to rely heavily on new ideas imported from Europe in the writing of such social thinkers of the Enlightenment as the baron de Montesquieu, Voltaire, Thomas Pain and Cesare Beccaria". These thinkers came to believe that criminals could be rehabilitated."
Throughout history into today, there have been many problems with our prison system. Prisons are overcrowded, underfunded, rape rates are off the charts, and we as Americans have no idea how to fix it. We need to have shorter sentences and try to rehabilitate prisoners back to where they can function in society. Many prisoners barely have a high school education and do not receive further education in jail. Guards need to pay more attention to the well being of the inmates and start to notice signs of abuse and address them. These are just a few of the many problems in our prison systems that need to be addressed.
In today's society, we are facing many changes. Our own family, neighbors, and countrymen are afraid of many dangers which influence their lives. Although many people have fear which resonates in their consciousness and unconsciousness, the United States has a comparatively low crime rate. Despite this low crime rate, America incarcerates it's citizens five times the rate of Canada and seven times that of most European democracies.(Slambrouck, Paul. 24) Our society needs to be changed. We cannot blame the individuals involved in wrongdoing but we can blame our society who raised these criminals. Of course someone who kills another human being needs to be put away in some form; but we need to make changes. We need to help as many maladjusted people as we can. There are some steps which really seem to work. There are many prison inmates who come from broken homes and have low self-esteem. What needs to be done to help these insecure people, who are at war with themselves and society, is to rehabilitate them. The problem is the prison officials do not try to teach the prisoners how to learn from their mistakes.(McGovern, Celeste. 42) What actually happens is that criminals tend to be better thefts, and have the ability to out smart the police. Our politicians need to stress how important vocational, educational, drug-treatment, and religious programs are, in order to improve the attitude and demeanor of these convicted felons. This is the only way to keep ex-con's from jail.(DeLuca, H.R. 38) Another problem with America's prison system is overcrowding. There is a huge amount of young conscienceless offenders who are entering today's prisons. Imagine trying to compact eight gallons of water in a five gallon con...
The first issue that I would like to address is the overcrowding issues in prisons. In my opinion, overcrowding issues are the biggest issues in our correctional system that concerns every citizen. Running a prison required money, resources and manpower, with overcrowding issues, the government would have no choice but to increase the number of correctional facilities, privatized prisons and increasing manpower. According to (Levitt, 1996), “The incarceration rate in the United States has more than tripled in the last two decades. At year-end 1994 the United States prison population exceeded one million. Annual government outlays on prisons are roughly $40 billion per year. The rate of imprisonment in the United States is three to four times greater than most European countries.” (p.1). Overcrowding issues are not only affect prisons but the society as a whole as well. The reason is simply because prison population directly refl...