In the limits of this paper I have been obliged to confine myself to remarks upon the indeterminate sentence itself, without going into the question of the proper organization of reformatory agencies to be applied to the convict, and without consideration of the means of testing the reformation of a man in any given case.  I will only add that the methods at Elmira have passed far beyond the experimental stage in this matter.

The necessary effect of the adoption of the indeterminate sentence for felonies is that every State prison and penitentiary must be a reformatory.  The convict goes into it for the term of a year at least (since the criminal law, according to ancient precedent, might require that, and because the discipline of the reformatory would require it as a practical rule), and he stays there until, in the judgment of competent authority, he is fit to be trusted at large.

If he is incapable of reform, he must stay there for his natural life.  He is a free agent.  He can decide to lead an honest life and have his liberty, or he can elect to work for the State all his life in criminal confinement.

When I say that every State prison is to be a reformatory, I except, of course, from its operation, those sentenced for life for murder, or other capital offenses, and those who have proved themselves incorrigible by repeated violations of their parole.

It is necessary now to consider the treatment in the reformatory.  Only a brief outline of it can be given here, with a general statement of the underlying principles.  The practical application of these principles can be studied in the Elmira Reformatory of New York, the only prison for felons where the proposed system is carried out with the needed disciplinary severity.  In studying Elmira, however, it must be borne in mind that the best effects cannot be obtained there, owing to the lack of the indeterminate sentence.  In this institution the convict can only be detained for the maximum term provided in the statute for his offense.  When that is reached, the prisoner is released, whether he is reformed or not.

The system of reform under the indeterminate sentence, which for convenience may be called the Elmira system, is scientific, and it must be administered entirely by trained men and by specialists; the same sort of training for the educational and industrial work as is required in a college or an industrial school, and the special fitness required for an alienist in an insane asylum.  The discipline of the establishment must be equal to that of a military school.

We have so far advanced in civilization that we no longer think of turning the insane, the sick, the feebleminded, over to the care of men without training chosen by the chance of politics.  They are put under specialists for treatment.  It is as necessary that convicts should be under the care of specialists, for they are the most difficult and interesting subjects for scientific treatment.  If not criminals by heredity, they are largely made so by environment; they are either physical degenerates or they are brutalized by vice.  They have lost the power of distinguishing right from wrong; they commonly lack will-power, and so are incapable of changing their habits without external influence.  In short, the ordinary criminal is unsound and diseased in mind and body.