Prisons Before the American Revolution, the Penal

Prisons

Before the American Revolution, the penal system in the colonies was brutal and harsh. Capital punishment was normative, and crimes were defined rather arbitrarily. As Edge (2009) points out, the colonial American mentality deemed "every crime a sin and every sin a crime," (p. 7). Not going to church on Sundays was sometimes viewed as a punishable offense (Edge 2009). After the Declaration of Independence was signed and the Constitution of the United States was ratified, the penal code in the former colonies improved rapidly and dramatically. Concepts of individual rights permeated the discourse on the penal system, reducing the number of crimes that were punishable by death. Likewise, the practice of public hanging and similar forms of humiliation were banned in the United States. According to the Howard League for Prison Reform (n.d.), Jeremey Bentham was a premier representative of prison reform during the 18th century. "Jeremy Bentham, and other penal reformers of the time, believed that the prisoner should suffer a severe regime, but that it should not be detrimental to the prisoner's health," (Howard League for Prison Reform n.d.). As a result, sanitary conditions in prisons would improve even as the prison system became highly regimented and institutionalized. The "panopticon"-style prison model that prevails was also initiated as a result of Bentham's philosophy. In 1799, the Penitentiary Act was passed, specifying that cells would hold one inmate at a time instead of placing convicted felons together in dormitory-style housing.

Edge (2009) points out that Benjamin Rush also had a major impact on the American prison system. In 1787, Rush noted "All public punishments tend to make bad men worse, and to increase crimes," (cited by Edge 2009, p. 16). Rush suggested private incarceration, as well as "labor and penitence" (Edge 2009, p. 16). In 1790, the first formal penitentiary in the United States was built: the Walnut Street Jail in Philadelphia. The Walnut Street Jail was essentially a state prison "designed to reform convicted felons…rehabilitate prisoners, or restore them to crime-free lives" (Edge 2009, p. 17). Thus was born the modern American penal system.

Also embedded in early models of state and federal penitentiaries included the notion that different types of prisons could be built for different types of crime; and that inmates would be housed according to the severity of their offenses. The Walnut Street Jail in Philadelphia became a model for prison reform and throughout the nineteenth century, similar institutions were built. Manual labor was, and remains, a major part of the state and federal prison system in the United States. The Auburn Prison, completed in 1821, operated with a system "based on silence, separation, and hard labor" (Edge 2009, p. 19). The Edge code included "rigorous discipline and corporal punishment for those who broke the rules," (Edge 2009, p. 19).

The population of the United States increased tremendously by the end of the nineteenth century due to a number of factors including Westward expansion and burgeoning immigration. Increasing population gave rise to the need for a greater number of correctional facilities. By the early twentieth century, the federal government created the Federal Bureau of Prisons.

The creation of the Federal Bureau of Prisons highlights the balance of powers between the state and federal governments with regards to the criminal justice system. County, state, and federal governments operate prisons concurrently. The Federal Bureau of Prisons, which was created in 1930, defines that institution's role as administrator of all federal prisons. "Pursuant to Pub. L. No. 71-218, 46 Stat. 325 (1930), the Bureau of Prisons was established within the Department of Justice and charged with the "management and regulation of all Federal penal and correctional institutions." This responsibility covered the administration of the 11 Federal prisons in operation at the time," (Federal Bureau of Prisons n.d.). Of course, there are far more than eleven federal institutions in 2011 and far more inmates housed in them. According to Cole & Smith (2006), approximately 161,000 inmates are incarcerated in federal prisons that are operated by the Federal Bureau of Prisons.

Federal prisons differ from state prisons on several levels. For one, the 1984 Sentencing Reform Act "established determinate sentencing, abolished parole, and reduced good time," (Federal Bureau of Prisons n.d.). Mandatory minimum sentencing laws have also made federal prisons significantly stricter with regards to sentencing rules and their relative inflexibility vs. state prisons.

Both state and federal penitentiaries house mainly convicted felons; those convicted of misdemeanor crimes usually spend time in county or city jails to fulfill their sentencing. State prisons are, by definition, run and paid for by state departments of corrections. Most of America's two million inmates are housed in state prisons, not federal ones. Federal prisons are generally reserved for felons convicted of federal-level crimes including racketeering, terrorism, immigration offenses bank robberies, tax evasion, treason, kidnapping across state lines, and "basically anything the FBI & CIA is involved in solving or prosecuting," (Cole & Smith 2006, p. 430). A relatively large number -- about thirty percent -- of inmates in federal prisons are not American citizens (Cole & Smith 2006, p. 430).

The Federal Bureau of Prisons manages federal prisons but responsibilities are also shared with its parent institution, the Department of Justice. The Department of Justice also manages the Administrative Office of the United States Courts, which covers probation and parole supervision," (Cole & Smith 2006, 430). At the state level, prisons are managed and staffed by a number of different administrative bodies. State prison administration is different in each state, as are the nature and type of institution. Different institutions or organizations than the correctional facilities themselves govern the parole boards in some states.