Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 15.djvu/474

 460 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY

ALTRUISM

That phase of altruism which, in exercise, holds benevolence to others in subordination to self-interest is dominantly present in our prison system. This altruistic sentiment exists in the protective purpose of the law which establishes it, pervades the administrative polity in all its details, and gains impulse with its sympathetic reward in individual reclamations achieved. But in its active agency the principle is a rational characteristic, not a mere sentimentalism. It is devoted to prompt enduring wel- fare rather than passing enjoyments. The paramount object always in view is a collective benefit sought and wrought through the well-being of individuals, and the individual welfare through a better adjustment to ordinary communal relations. In use and inculcation it is ego-altruism, for the personified state seeks her own advantage, and the prisoners pursue, whether voluntarily or compulsorily, their own advancement. The bene- fits are mutual — an increase of ultimate mutual abiding happi- ness. The principle of the New York law, as of the other laws patterned after it, notwithstanding their marring limitations, constitutes a radical change of spirit in criminal jurisprudence. A distinguished jurist has publicly declared that the change "is destined to change men's habits of thought concerning crime and the attitude of society toward criminals; to rewrite from end to end every penal code in Christendom; and to modify and ennoble the fundamental law of every state." It is a change from a plane, where feeling sways, to the loftier realm and reign of wisdom. It is, conceded that no human agency can operate quite free from emotional influence, but the emotions are always a dangerous element in law-making and governing. To this vitiating source is traced the undue severities of all time, and, also, the supersentimentality which now is, perhaps, the most serious menace of our prison system. The true is a restrained and rational altruism — a brooding beneficence, impartial, and ever striving to promote the interdependent collective and indi- vidual welfare subordinating, as needs be, transitory pleasure to the more permanent and the nobler good.