Page:Siberia and the Exile System Vol 2.djvu/473



EVILS AND PROJECTED REFORMS

HAVE regarded and discussed the exile system in this work rather from the point of view of the criminal than from the point of view of the non-criminal Siberian resident; but my survey of the subject would be very incomplete if I should wholly fail to notice the evil influence exerted by the Russian system of deportation upon the moral and economic life of the colony to which the criminals are banished. Opposition to the exile system in Russia rests chiefly upon facts that are not known, or at least are not duly taken into account, by writers on the subject in other countries. With us Siberian exile is condemned because it is thought to be a cruel and unusual punishment. In Russia it is opposed because it has a demoralizing effect upon the Siberian population. In the one case it is regarded from the point of view of the criminal, and in the other from the point of view of society. As the inhabitants of Siberia, and especially of the West-Siberian provinces, become more and more wealthy, prosperous, and civilized, they object more and more strenuously to the colonization of criminals in their towns and villages. "We admit," they say, "that it is essential for the protection of society in European Russia that the criminal should be removed from there, and very desirable that, if possible, he should be reformed; but we do not want him removed to our villages and reformed entirely at our expense. What have we done that we should have eight or ten thousand thieves, forgers, drunkards, counterfeiters, and vagrants turned loose at our very thresholds every year?" Then