CRIME AND ITS CAUSES




CHAPTER I.

THE STATISTICS OF CRIME.


It is only within the present century, and in some countries it is
only within the present generation, that the possibility has arisen of
conducting the study of criminal problems on anything approaching an
exact and scientific basis. Before the introduction of a system of
criminal statistics--a step taken by most peoples within the memory of
men still living--it was impossible for civilised communities to
ascertain with absolute accuracy whether crime was increasing or
decreasing, or what transformation it was passing through in
consequence of the social, political, and economic changes constantly
taking place in all highly organised societies. It was also equally
impossible to appreciate the effect of punishment for good or evil on
the criminal population. Justice had little or no data to go upon;
prisoners were sentenced in batches to the gallows, to transportation,
to the hulks, or to the county gaol, but no inquiry was made as to the
result of these punishments on the criminal classes or on the progress
of crime. It was deemed sufficient to catch and punish the offender;
the more offences seemed to increase--there was no sure method of
knowing whether they did increase or not--the more severe the
punishment became. Justice worked in the dark, and was surrounded by
the terrors of darkness. What followed is easy to imagine; the