Not To Punish But To Reform: Annotated Bibliography

The article "Not to Punish But to Reform': Juvenile Delinquency and Children's Protection Act in Alberta” was written by Dr. Rebecca Coulter. This article was originally published in Studies in Childhood History: A Canadian Perspective in 1982. I accessed this article from the textbook Social Welfare Policy in Canada: Historical Readings by Raymond Blake and Jeff Keshen.

Dr. Coulter is a retired professor at the University of Western in London, Ontario. She received her Ph.D. from the University of Alberta. To date, Dr. Coulter has had many publications and her work is focused on her theoretical and activist interests in class, gender, political consciousness, agency and progressive social change (University of Western). She has worked

on many projects and has supervised many thesis’ that are similar to this article. With that being said, Dr. Coulter’s previous research is relevant to this article because it focuses on the social change that occurred between 1909-1929 that pertained to juvenile delinquency and The Children’s Protection Act. Her article covers the gender differences and as well as class differences that greatly impacted juvenile delinquency. She also highlights the changes that developed within the agencies during 1909-1929 that focused on the reform rather than punishment.

Dr.

Coulters thesis statement in, ‘Not to Punish But to Reform': Juvenile Delinquency and Children's Protection Act in Alberta is, “It is not clear whether Police Magistrate Primrose’s intervention on Albert’s behalf resulted in a suspended sentence but this anonymous youth’s life, revealed in some fragmentary correspondence, serves to illustrate the conflicting views of childhood and juvenile delinquency prevalent in the early part of this century”. (Coulter, R. 1995, pg. 138 as found in Blake and

Keshen).

I strongly believe this is a topic worthy of study as it has greatly made an impact on current legislation and policies. Moreover, the topic of study was an original contribution to the child welfare state. Thus, the development of Children’s Aid Societies and the development of juvenile courts has set the ground work for the processes that are prominently used for our youth today. This article highlights the development of the definition of neglect and the grounds officials have to execute when protecting children (Coulter, R. 1995 as found in Blake and Keshen). Moreover, the act was extended in 1916 to include a child up to the age of 18, rather than 16 in 1909 (Coulter, R.,1995). As it stands today, you are considered a child until the age of 18. Thus, this topic of study positively influenced past and present situations for youth, by studying the past we are able to learn for the future.

In this article, Dr. Coulter is describing how policies have changed, yet proving that that the system was flawed and intervention was needed. Thus, Dr. Coulter begins her article using an example of a boy named Albert, who moved to Canada from England with twenty-five dollars in his pocket. Ultimately, Albert was arrested for vagrancy and sentenced to four months of hard labour at the Fort Saskatchewan Gaol. Fortunately for Albert, and arguably all youth today, a police officer who was part of the child saving movement wrote to the Attorney General to bring the case to light and ensure that it was heard that Albert’s sentence was too harsh considering the circumstances of his age (Coulter, R. 1995 as found in Blake and Keshen). To further explain, the child savers were a group of people that came together in the early 18th century to combat the issue of juvenile delinquents. Moreover, this descriptive example serves to illustrate how conflicting views of childhood and juvenile delinquency prevailed in the early part of the 19th century. Therefore, Dr. Coulter continues to describe the social reform that has took place between 1909 to 1929 which included the Industrial Schools Act of 1908 that made provisions for the treatment of juvenile delinquents to the increase of child welfare laws and policies. The latter became the Act for the Protection of Neglected and Dependent children, more commonly known as the Children’s Protection Act (Coulter, R. 1995 p. 138 as found in Blake and Keshen). Ultimately, Dr. Coulter proposed the function of her article was to establish the history of social reform in regard to the shift from punishment to reform, the importance of the social change and engage the reader to analyze how it prevails in today’s society. Dr. Coulter takes a proactive approach by observing social change from multiple standpoints from immigrants to the poor and she considers the reasons for delinquent behaviour.

Dr. Coulter was able to make her case and produce a convincing article that clearly established how juvenile delinquency has been addressed during the period of 1909-1929. Dr. Coulter’s purpose was to illustrate the conflicting views of childhood and juvenile delinquency prevalent in the early part of this century. She illustrates that there was a shift from minimal interventions to legislations and acts to benefit juvenile delinquents. Moreover, Dr. Coulter speaks of R.B Chadwick who was appointed the superintended of the Industrial Schools Act. R.B Chadwick was suggested to be the best individual to make decisions and recommendations regarding how to deal with delinquent and neglected youth.

After much investigation, R.B Chadwick developed child welfare laws that would come to be the first piece of welfare legislation in the province. Moreover, Dr. Coulter establishes that R.B Chadwick gave a definition to the word neglect in the terms of child welfare, changed the age of an adult to 18, from 16 and included the development of an administrative framework. This resulted in every town with a population over 10,000 would have a shelter where children could be temporarily housed. Dr. Coulter further explains that by 1912, there were full functioning juvenile courts with better conditions for youth. As with the implementation of any new legislation, officials argue that there was still an issue of punishment versus reform (Coulter, R. 1995 as found in Blake and Keshen).

Thus, Dr. Coulter explains that the group of child-savers would argue that delinquency was a direct cause of family and mischief was due to the parent’s wrongdoings. Additionally, she explains the conflicting views of delinquency in the fact that, “child savers and police assumed immigrant children were more inclined to be delinquent and therefore may have spent more time looking for delinquents in immigrant neighborhoods (Coulter, R. 1995 p.147 as found in Blake and Keshen). Thus, this exemplifies that although there were new legislations being brought forth from 1909-1929, the individuals working with the youth were still conflicted in their views. She establishes that the fear of delinquency became present in communities and adults became more involved, “fears about the loose and immoral behaviour of the young grew (Coulter, R. 1995 p. 148 as found in Blake and Keshen). Controversially, communities were coming together to provide recreational activities to youth in hopes it would “keep” them out of trouble, because they believed the streets led to delinquency. Yet, juvenile delinquency continued.

In Dr.

Coulter’s article, the human condition establishes that children are vastly different from adults. Thus, children are automatically viewed as delinquent until they prove themselves wrong. There is a complex relationship between children and adults, especially between 1909 and 1929 with the development of child welfare legislation. People felt inclined to help the youth, yet the approach was largely inconsistent. This displays the biases that people were inclined to use, with disregard for their actions. Consequently, this was a time where there were minimal resources surrounding this topic, as it was relatively new. The human condition encompasses key events and situations that allow us to create our own beliefs and

values.

In the past, but also is significant in today’s society, immigrants were treated poorly simply because of their status. In this article, Dr. Coulter illustrates that immigrants were observed as more delinquent yet, the least cared from a social welfare standpoint. Dr. Coulter exemplifies this when she says, “there may have been a tendency, exacerbated by prejudice, to deal more firmly with immigrant children than other children” (Coulter, R. 1995 p. 147 as found in Blake and Keshen). Similarly, there was a stigma that surrounded individuals with money and insinuated that they were not delinquent like their “poor” counterparts. Finally, Dr. Coulter articulates that after researching statistics and annual reports, “most cases of delinquency seem to be have related to theft for boys and sexual offences for girls” (Coulter, R. 1995 p. 147 as found in Blake and Keshen). Controversially, it is believed these instances were reported most because the police were searching for these things from specific gender.

These biased assumptions that were occurring between 1909 and 1929 are still occurring today. Generally speaking, these key events and situations have shaped who we are as humans. It can be seen in the way our present-day law enforcement continues to target immigrants and minority races. However, while there are now policies that ire inclusive of all individuals, people’s viewpoints have not completely shifted. As Dr. Coulter stated, crimes have resulted in adolescents trying to meet the necessities of life; this remains true to date. Thus, “it is clear that the fundamental philosophy of child life and child care enunciated early in this century by child savers and has left an indelible mark on current thoughts and practices (Coulter, R. 1995 p. 149 as found in Blake and Keshen).

Overall, Dr. Coulter used examples and foot notes that provided further research into this topic. I strongly believe that she used valid points and argument to describe how the conflicting views of childhood and juvenile delinquency prevailed in the times period. While government officials and agencies were coming together to help, the communality members were building biases and were becoming quick to pass judgment and encourage negative stigmas.

Dr. Coulter’s article, "Not to Punish But to Reform': Juvenile Delinquency and Children's Protection Act in Alberta”, uses statistics and real-life examples that were supported by footnotes that further explained her thoughts and she further provided a reference. The facts about the legislations can all be verified from government sources. Also, the examples used were found in government achieves that date back to the time period Dr. Coulter was writing about, specifically regarding Albert Bb, R.B Chadwick and Stephan Humphries. Moreover, she included ample direct dialogue in the article which further proved her points and allowed the reader to gain a deeper understanding of the context.