Excerpt from Meliora, Vol. 4: A Quarterly Review of Social Science in Its Ethical, Economical, Political, and Ameliorative Aspects
Obtains from the deeply-dyed criminal voluntary obedience to the command Cease to do evil, learn to do well,' was ignored, and Captain Maconochie, when he sought to substitute moral for coercive discipline, was regarded as an amiable visionary, who vainly desired to coax by weak indulgence those who could effec tually befgoverned by the lash alone. Bit by bit, however, though too often without acknowledgment of their authorship, his plans have been adopted, until in 1856 a Committee Of the House Of Commons embodied in its resolutions most of the principles for whose accept ance by the Legislature he had struggled incessantly from the time he first enunciated them in 1837. His advocacy was still un recognized; but the genuine philanthropist cares little for the acknowledgment of his efforts if their end be attained; and had those resolutions embraced the substitution originally suggested by Archbishop Whately, of task for time sentences, which constitutes the keystone of Captain Maconochie's system, he would have felt amply repaid for twenty years of toil, disappointment, and peen niary loss, Whether his name had been associated with the ti'imph or not.
Born in 1787, and entering the navy at fifteen years of age, he saw much active service, and attained his captaincy before the downfall Of Napoleon put an end to the war. Thus he had had experience in the management of large bodies Of men, and had already tested the value Of the principle of mutual responsibility which afterwards became an important feature in his plan for the treatment of criminals, when in 1836, upon the invitation of his old friend Sir John Franklin, appointed Governor of Van Diemen's Land, Captain Maconochie accompanied him thither as' his se cretary and his thoughts would probably have occupied them selves with the subject Of convict management, even had they not been Specially turned in. That direction by a request from the Prison Discipline Society to correspond with them on the subject.
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