Chapter VII (2)

I. Crimes against Persons and Property, tried at the Assizes. II. General Criminality (Crimes and Misdemeanors). III. Offenses against the Common Law, tried by the Correctional Tribunals. IV. Price of a Sack of Flour in the Markets of Paris. V. Number of Failures.]

[PLATE II.

I. Thefts with Aggravating Circumstances, tried by the Assizes, and Simple Thefts, tried by the Correctional Tribunals. II. Theft, Fraud, Embezzlement, tried by the Correctional Tribunals. III. Number of Failures and the Price of Flour Combined.]

The curves are almost constantly parallel; the deviations are caused by political events and by the industrial revival. [250]

Vagrancy and mendicity take the same course as failures; they increase, however, from 1848 to 1852 in consequence of the political troubles of those years. From 1878 on, failures, and vagrancy and mendicity increase and are parallel. In the periods of industrial revival (1854–59 and 1874–76) vagrancy and mendicity decline sharply. In examining the curve of recidivism it must be remembered that since 1884 many recidivists have been transported.

[PLATE III.

I. Vagrancy and Mendicity. II. Failures. III. Recidivists sentenced by the Assizes or the Correctional Tribunals.]

Here we see a result contrary to that on the preceding charts: If the failures increase the rapes generally decrease, and vice versa. According to this plate the consumption of alcohol has no relation to crimes against morals.

[PLATE IV.

I. Rape. II. Consumption of Alcohol. III. Failures.]

At the end of his study the author comes to the following conclusion: “The effect of bankruptcy upon criminality and politics is undeniable; it furnishes one of the most striking proofs of the correctness of the historical theory of Karl Marx, that the phenomena of literature and art, of morality and religion, of philosophy and politics, in human society, lead back to the phenomena of economic development.” [251]

VI.

H. DENIS.

Professor Denis begins his report to the 3d Congress of Criminal Anthropology, entitled “La criminalité et la crise économique”, by calling attention to the effect that the crisis of 1846–47 had upon criminality. The crops of wheat, rye, and especially potatoes had been bad, and the price of these articles of food had accordingly risen. The breaking up of household labor and the introduction of machines brought about a revolution in the linen industry at the same time. So the figures for crime indicate an enormous increase during these years, and at the close of the period a continuous decrease.

=======+===========================
| Numbers of Delinquents
Years. | to the 10,000 Inhabitants.
-------+---------------------------
1845 | 28.8
1846 | 47.9
1847 | 65.3
1848 | 42.4
1849 | 25.-
1850 | 19.8
1851 | 19.8
1852 | 19.2
1853 | 19.7
=======+===========================

Then the author treats of the effect produced upon criminality by the crises of 1874 and the years following. The price of grain no longer giving, in consequence of importation, an exact picture of the economic conditions, he adds to the chart which he uses, the “nombres indicateurs” (of 28 of the more important articles of commerce). The curve of these numbers shows a fluctuating rise during the period from 1850 to 1865, and a fluctuating decline during the period following the years 1874–75. During the first period, in which the economic conditions were favorable (the years 1870 to 1873 being characterized by an economic development that was even feverish), criminality remained fairly stationary. Only during the years 1856–57 and 1861–62 was there an increase, and this is probably to be ascribed to the high price of grain. The economic depression that commenced after 1874 was severely felt, and crime continually increased without the low price of grain being able to prevent it.

Professor Denis closes his report with the following words: “The solution of the problem of criminality must be in part sought in economic conditions; and the more regular and constant the social movement of wealth, the more we approach a normal equilibrium of collective functions, the more we instil justice into our economic institutions, the more shall we be able to gain the mastery over criminality.

“An Italian criminologist, Ferri, studying the evolution of criminality in France in relation to the income of the most numerous class, has shown that with a general rise in wages we see a decrease in certain kinds of crime. The general increase of prosperity is a sure pledge of a decrease in criminality. But there is another, and that is a decrease in those more or less marked oscillations, in the economic world, whose periodic return is certainly one of the gravest aspects of the modern state.

“In the second place, the economic causes that affect the tendency to crime reveal an immense solidarity, which continues to extend itself into space, as heredity plunges its roots into time. The great fluctuations in prices are common to the whole world, and the individual whom these perturbations drive to crime by a series of shocks, comes into conflict with a great number of other individuals, without being conscious of this infinite solidarity. But science must endeavor to collect the evidence of it. Finally these great economic influences tend, on the one hand, to reduce the field of the individual responsibility, and on the other, to give a precise character to the responsibility of society in this connection. It is responsible, in fact, within the limits within which it might have restrained the economic fluctuations and corrected their effects, but has not done so. Here the terrible saying of Quetelet is still true: society herself has put the weapon into the hand of the criminal.” [252]

VII.

H. LUX. [253]

In the chapter, “Die degenerirenden Einwirkungen des Kapitalismus”, this author treats of the question of criminality and its relation with present economic conditions.

“The property-holders, those who enjoy the benefits of all the political and social institutions, alone have the right to exist. Those without possessions do not have this right, despite the fiction of the Prussian code with regard to the matter. The simple instinct of self-preservation causes them to engage in a continual attack upon a legal system that protects only the stronger. It is this attack which those who are in possession of power, those who have drawn up the laws for the purpose of protecting their power, characterize as a breach of the law, as crime.... This is the simplest relationship between the form of society and crime. Naturally, complications come in.... The stronger those without property, the outlawed, themselves become through some chance, the more do they modify the law that was set up by those who were formerly stronger, the more do complications arise in the primitively simple right of property, the right to the protection of social institutions, and the law of marriage, and the greater and more complicated becomes the circle of crimes.” [254]

After having next spoken briefly of free will, and having shown that it is incorrect to connect criminality with a single social phenomenon alone, since the social mechanism is too complicated, the author begins to treat of the crimes against property. In the first place he gives the following tables:

Germany. [255]

========+========================================================++========================= | Prices. || +----------------------------------+---------------------++ To 10,000 Inhabitants | In Marks per 1,000 Kilogr. | In Pf. per Kilogr. || Over 10 Years Old. Years. +-----------+----------+-----------+----------+----------++----------------+-------- | Of Bread. | Of Peas. | Of | Of Beef. | Of Pork. || Crimes Against | Theft. | | | Potatoes. | | || Property. | --------+-----------+----------+-----------+----------+----------++----------------+-------- 1881 | 198 | 251 | 43.5 | 114 | 128 || -- | -- 1882 | 171 | 236 | 56.5 | 116 | 128 || 52.9 | 32.6 1883 | 155 | 241 | 45.5 | 120 | 128 || 51.0 | 31.6 1884 | 145 | 229 | 47.0 | 120 | 120 || 50.7 | 30.1 1885 | 147 | 212 | 38.0 | 119 | 120 || 48.6 | 27.9 1886 | 130 | 209 | 39.5 | 117 | 119 || 48.1 | 27.2 1887 | 135 | 198 | 41.5 | 113 | 115 || 47.1 | 26.0 1888 | 144 | 219 | 59.0 | 112 | 114 || 45.9 | 25.4 1889 | 162 | 209 | 42.0 | 117 | 128 || 49.3 | 28.1 ========+===========+==========+===========+==========+==========++================+========

Hungary.

============================+======+=======+=======+======+======+======+======+====== | 1881 | 1882 | 1883 | 1884 | 1885 | 1886 | 1887 | 1888 ----------------------------+------+-------+-------+------+------+------+------+------ Convicted of theft | 19. | 26.7 | 25.7 | 23.4 | 32.2 | 22.0 | 21.7 | 22.3 Crop of maize per hectare | 16.1 | 20.0 | 16.8 | 17.2 | 20.5 | 15.5 | 14.2 | 18.0 ,, ,, potatoes per hectare| 81.8 | 110.7 | 109.9 | 80.1 | 92.0 | 77.2 | 79.0 | 85.4 ============================+======+=======+=======+======+======+======+======+======

Finally, Dr. Lux cites some statistics from Kolb’s “Handbuch der vergleichenden Statistik”, which show the close connection between crimes against property and economic conditions.

Political crimes. “In the case of crimes against the State, public order, and religion, the dependence upon the form of society is immediately apparent. The ‘classes’, i.e. the property-owners as a whole, see in the institutions that they have set up, the strongest support of the capitalistic system, which must be maintained at any cost. The property-owners have the power to uphold their unique position by laws directed against those who would break down that power. And if the laws are no longer sufficient, their place is taken by judicial interpretations in the interests of the classes. This is only the logical consequence of the whole spirit and aim of legislation. The greater become the rights founded upon property, the more do those without property feel themselves to be deprived of their rights,—in the fullest sense of the word—in jeopardy as to their existence, their full life; the more energetic is the reaction against the laws, which are felt as despotism; and the more serious is the attack upon those laws,—a characteristic phenomenon of all periods of transition as to the form of society.” [256]

The question which presents itself now is this: how far are these factors connected with existing economic conditions? But before entering upon this the author calls attention to the environment in which the children of the proletariat live, and especially of the lower proletariat, an environment in which misery and vice contend for the preëminence. There it is nearly out of the question to learn ethical conceptions. Whence it comes also that in our days criminality among the young has greatly increased. However, alcoholism must also be named as one of the most important causes of psychical perturbations.

It is not only the non-possessors, but also the possessors who are driven to commit crimes as a consequence of existing economic conditions. “But not only for those without property, for the proletariat, does capitalism furnish the psychically prerequisite conditions for crime ... but for the property-holders themselves. Entirely aside from business practices and tricks of the trade, which stand upon the hairline between right and wrong, apart from the frauds, forgeries, etc. that are evoked by too tempting opportunity, there are more general effects of the capitalistic system. The hurried chase for gain, the accelerating of commerce by railroad, steamship, telegraph, and telephone, the multiplication of commercial crises, which earlier came at intervals, but now are a permanent accompaniment of the social life, bring about a nervousness running through all circles of society, that is continually increasing, and is the forerunner of more serious psychoses. The terrible increase of cases of insanity (in Prussia, to the 10,000 of the population, in 1871, 5.94 cases; in 1875, 7.28; in 1880, 9.87), appears to be thus directly caused by capitalistic society.” [257]

However, there act in man as counter-determinants, combating the factors called criminogenous, the ethical factors (“ethische Hemmungsvorstellungen”), which are determined by education, character, the fear of punishment, etc. Those who do not wish to investigate the deepest causes of criminality, are of the opinion that the best way to combat crime is by increasing the penalties. The persons who speak thus forget that the so-called ethical factors have no longer any effect when the conditions have reached a certain degree of seriousness.

Crimes against persons. It is the industrial workers who form the greatest contingent of criminals against persons. “The continually changing conditions of earning a living, the desire for drink, the slight influence of the family, the being crowded together with persons of defective education and little training ... these all necessarily breed crimes of violence; entirely aside from the habitual rowdyism of the bully [“Zuhälter”], which is to be regarded as the consequence of prostitution. [258]

Besides the external conditions named above, the person of the criminal is also to be noticed. We may consider it as proved that in some cases of crime one of the causes is a mental perturbation (for example, that caused by drunkenness). These perturbations play a great part in sexual crimes (perverted instincts). What characterizes most of these mental anomalies is that they blunt the social instincts. But there is another cause of psychic degeneracy. “It is a universally valid psycho-physical law that man, ‘the more he depends upon an agreeable stimulation for the satisfaction of his senses, demands ever stronger stimuli, even to secure the same degree of pleasure.’ Pleasures, especially sensual pleasures, must always become more intense, more titillating, in order to afford satisfaction, but the more their intensity increases, the more do the nerves become irritated and exhausted, and the more quickly is the ground prepared for mental diseases either in the individual himself or in his descendants.—It must be emphasized, however, that such an increase in the stimulus is only possible to the rich, and accordingly it is with reference to them chiefly that these sources of mental disturbances are to be taken into consideration.” [259]

After having called attention to the great amount of recidivism among female delinquents, to the great increase of crime in our own day, and to the great percentage of young people among the criminals, the author closes with the following words: “Crime belongs in a society founded upon capitalism just as necessarily as do prostitution, the destruction of countless human lives through economic exploitation, etc.”

VIII.

P. HIRSCH.

After having shown in the first chapter of his work, “Verbrechen und Prostitution”, [260] the relation between criminality and prostitution, and the increase of the two at the same time, the author gives, in his second chapter, a short exposition of the doctrine of criminal anthropology, and in the third chapter he takes up the doctrine of the social environment.

Here he treats first of the encouragement of prostitution and crime by the marriage restrictions. Marriages increase or decrease as economic conditions grow better or worse. So, for example, in Prussia there were, from 1866 to 1870, 1605 marriages to 100,000 of the population; this number rose to 1896 in the period of prosperity between the years 1870 and 1875, only to fall, in 1888, to 1624. In bad times the number of illegitimate births makes a consequent increase. It is very comprehensible that natural children furnish a greater number of criminals than legitimate children, since they have more difficulty in enduring the combat of life than the others.

Then he sets forth as a cause of crime the influence of domestic relations. When the parents belong already to the class of criminals, it is almost inevitable that their children should fall into the hands of justice while still young. And the present system of production brings it about that the education of the children of the proletariat is almost nil, since it obliges the father, and very often the mother also, to work away from home during a great part of the day and often of the night. The situation is still more unfavorable for the children who have lost their parents when they were still quite young. Starke says that about 57% of the legitimate children among the juvenile prisoners in Plötzensee were orphans or had been abandoned by their parents.

The third part has to do with the housing conditions of the proletariat. “A lodging fit for a human being is the first requirement for the bodily and mental welfare of the family; it is the prerequisite for a well-regulated family life, and for the rearing of the children to be moral men and women. The improprieties resulting from the exigencies of insufficient lodgings are innumerable, and this condition is an inexhaustible source of crime, prostitution, and vice of every kind.” All the data prove that the proletariat, who, of all classes, pay the highest rent, are the most miserably housed. In Berlin, for example, the poorest classes have been shown to spend on an average a quarter of their income for rent. In Hamburg the part of the income that had to go for rent among the class whose income was from 600 to 1200 marks, in 1868 was 18.77%, in 1874 20.90%, in 1882 23.51%, and in 1892 24.71%, while the percentage remained the same or decreased for all other classes. In order to make up the resulting deficit, resort is often had to night-lodgings. “The disadvantages of subletting are obvious. ‘Children of both sexes have to sleep with their parents, and often with strangers, in the same room, often even in the same bed; the advantages of domesticity are lost; the tavern offers more pleasant entertainment than being crowded together with wife and children in one room that must be shared with strangers, and in which the opportunity for quarreling and fighting, in consequence of the narrow quarters, is constant. It is the bad housing conditions that are the cause of the increasing alcoholism, of the break-up of the family life, and of the lack of education for the youth.’ (Braun).” [261]

The chapter that concerns us next treats of the subsidiary businesses engaged in by school children. It goes without saying that in the cases where the wages of the father of the family must be increased by the labor of the mother, the children also must be put to work at an age at which they ought to have their leisure time for play. For though child-labor in factories is a little limited by legislation, it is still commonly practiced in household industry. Further most of the children of the proletariat must, in their free hours, do all kinds of work harmful to their physique and their morals. “It is plain to be seen how greatly the school-children are injured by engaging in additional work. Entirely aside from the harm they suffer in the matter of health, and from the fact that the tired children cannot give sufficient attention to the words of the teacher and that for many of them their instruction is as good as lost, is the great fact that their morals are in the highest degree endangered. Under the pressure of necessity, these children learn to grasp every advantage, whether allowable or not, and—not through their own fault, but through that of society—are precociously familiar with vice.” [262] “Any one who examines these conditions will not be surprised that according to the statement of Superintendent Schönberger, out of 100 juvenile prisoners in the Plötzensee prison near Berlin, 70 had been employed during school days as breakfast-carriers, newsboys, messengers, bowling-alley-boys, etc., early in the morning, from half past four on, and in some cases still earlier, until school time, and in the afternoon either the whole time, or from four till half past seven or half past eight at night.” [263]

Next, Hirsch examines the influence of economic crises. He quotes, among other things, the following from the researches of J. S(chmidt). During the economic depression from 1875 to 1878 the number of punishments inflicted by the “Ordnungspolizei” in the country of Baden rose from 16,218 to 22,264, and that of the penalties inflicted by the “Sittenpolizei” (having surveillance of prostitution) from 1995 to 4485. There were increases, therefore, of 40% and 125%. In the period of prosperity from 1882 to 1885 these figures fell from 22,765 to 18,856 (16%), and from 4106 to 4007 (3%). During the critical years from 1889 to 1892 the number of recidivists convicted of theft rose 18%, and the number of other thieves convicted 6%. In the period from 1875 to 1878 (years of crisis) the number of offenses against property rose 17.4%, and decreased 13% in the years 1882 to 1885 (a period of prosperity).

In conclusion the author points out the fact that there are also criminals who are predisposed to crime by their physical constitution (mental disorders), and treats of “the repression of crime and prostitution.” [264]