SIR ALEXANDER CAMPBELL, K.C.M.G.,

Lieutenant-Governor of the Province of Ontario.

May it please your Honour:

The undersigned, appointed by Commission under the Great Seal of the Province, bearing date the Third day of July, A.D. 1890, " to collect information regarding Prisons, Houses of Correction, Reformatories and the like, with a view of ascertaining any practical improvements which may be made in the methods of dealing with the criminal classes in the Province, so far as the subject is within the jurisdiction of the Provincial Legislature and Government, beg leave herewith to submit their report.

The Commission further direct that "The investigation of the subject shall include the following particulars:

(1) "The causes of crime in the Province.

(2) Any improved means which may be adopted in the Province for providing and conducting Industrial Schools.

(3) "Any improved means which may be adopted in the Province for rescuing destitute children from a criminal career.

(4) "Any improvement in the management of the County Gaols of the Province and with respect to the classification of prisoners therein. (5) "The most fitting practical employment of prisoners in the Province. (6) The question of indeterminate sentences for offenders against Provincial laws, and

(7) "Any improved way of dealing with tramps and habitual drunkards in the Province."

The powers necessary for the proper discharge of the duties thus imposed upon the Commissioners were given by the same instrument, and they were required

"Forthwith after the conclusion of such enquiry to make full report to the Lieutenant-Governor touching the matters concerning which the said enquiry is to be made together with a report of all or any of the evidence taken by the Commissioners respecting the same."

The Commissioners having met to take into consideration the best means of discharging satisfactorily the important duties imposed upon them, the Chairman stated that, having regard to the fact that the conduct of the enquiry not only involved the expenditure of money in the visitation of institutions, but necessitated the preparation of statistics by certain officials, he had submitted to the Honourable the Attorney-General an outline of the system on which the Commissioners proposed to proceed. The expenditures for the purpose as well as the system proposed received the approval of the Attorney-General.

This authority having been obtained and such statistical information as was immediately necessary, notice was given through the press that the Commission would hold sessions in the cities of Toronto, Hamilton, Kingston, Ottawa and London and all persons interested in the matters into which inquiry was to be made were invited to attend at the time and places named and state their views. Sheriff's, gaolers and other officials were notified to be present at sessions held in their districts and give evidence.

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It was arranged that having visited Ottawa the Commissioners should proceed to the State of Massachusetts and afterwards to the State of New York to observe the working of the penal and reformatory systems which obtain in those States, and to gather all the information which they deemed useful for the purposes of their enquiry; and that having visited London they should proceed to the States of Michigan and Ohio, and visit the best and most successful of the penal and reformatory institutions of those States, and ascertain as far as possible the special merits of their respective systems.

It was further arranged that they should obtain the evidence of a number of eminent specialists who have devoted much of their lives to the study of prison management as a science.

It was decided that copies of the reports of the best known institutions in the United States should be procured; also such information respecting the management of the principal penal establishments in Great Britain and Ireland, and in other European countries as could be obtained, and copies of the "transactions" or reports of proceedings of the several congresses held in Europe and in the United States of late years to consider the subject of prison reform.

It was considered that when the Commissioners had thus by personal observation and from the evidence of witnesses of experience ascertained the general working and results of the Prison and Reformatory system of Ontario, and had obtained such information respecting the most advanced systems of the United States and those which obtain in Great Britain and Ireland and other countries of Europe as would enable them to institute a proper comparison of all those systems and their results, they would be in a position to consider intelligently the subjects upon which they were required to report.

In order that the evidence might be taken in a systematic way, it was decided that the Chairman should prepare a series of questions to be put to such witnesses as might appear before the Commission.

The following questions were subsequently submitted and approved of as a basis of enquiry to be enlarged as circumstances required, and they are now incorporated iu the report in order that the nature and scope of the enquiry may be shown to some extent.

QUESTIONS TO BE PUT TO GAOLERS.

(1) When were you appointed gaoler?

(2) What was your occupation before you were appointed?

(3) How many separate and distinct corridors are there in your gaol ?

(4) How many airing and exercise yards?

(5) How many cells in your gaol?

(6) How many cells in each corridor respectively?

(7) Are certain corridors used exclusively for the confinement of certain classes of prisoners?

(8) Have you a separate yard for each class of prisoners? If not, for what classes respectively?

(9) What was the lowest number of prisoners in your gaol at any one time in 1889 ?

(10) What was the highest number in the same year

(11) What was the daily average?

(12) What number had you under confinement on September 30th, 1889 ? (13) Of that number how many were males? how many females?

(14) How many under sixteen years-inales and females?

(15) How many were awaiting trial-males and females?

(16) How many were under sentence-males and females?

(17) How many were lunatics-males and females?

(18) How many were detained for other causes-males and females ?

(19) Were each of these classes in a separate and distinct corridor?

(20) Did they mix together in the yards?

(21) From your experience and observation are you of the belief that the spread of vice and crime is due largely, or only to a limited extent, to the defective classification and corrupting influences of our common gaols?

(22) Is it possible under existing conditions to make a perfect or only a partial separation and classification of the prisoners in your gaol? e. g.

(23) Are youths of both sexes under the age of sixteen kept entirely separate

from the adults? If not, what are the exceptions?

(24) Can you make a complete separation of those awaiting trial from those undergoing sentence and of the civil prisoners from the criminal whether sentenced or not?

(25) How many vagrants and tramps passed through your gaol in 1889 ? (26) How many lunatics were committed, and of such how many were afflicted with mild unsoundness of mind or harmless imbecility although committed as lunatics?

(27) Since the establishment of the Central Prison and the Mercer Reformatory and the transfer of prisoners to those institutions have you been able to make a better classification of the prisoners?

(28) What have been the results of such improved classification?

QUESTIONS TO SHERIFFS, GAOL SURGEONS AND GAOLERS.

(29) Would the establishment of a poor house or of a poor house and work house combined, in each county, or group of counties and the removal thereto

of homeless persons, imbeciles, tramps, paupers and habitual drunkards and the removal of all sentenced prisoners to Industrial or Central Prisons and Reformatories enable you to make a very marked improvement in the classification of the remaining prisoners as well as the in discipline of your gaol?

(30) If the sentenced prisoners were removed to central prisons or to reformatories and the harmless insane, tramps and vagrants to poor houses or work houses, could your common gaol with partial reconstruction, be carried on strictly on the cellular or separate system in respect of the remaining prisoners charged with offences and awaiting trial?

(31) From your observation of, and experience with the criminal classes would the adoption of such a system as is described in the following resolutions passed by the Prisoners' Aid Association render a proper classification of prisoners in your gaol less difficult, viz.:

Clause 1. County gaols should be maintained only as places of detention for persons charged with offences and awaiting trial, and should not be used for prisoners after trial and conviction.

Clause 2. County gaols should be conducted strictly on the separate or cellular system.

Clause 3. Persons convicted of crime should not be detained in county gaols, but should be dealt with according to the age and natural proclivities of the criminal.

SECULAR AND RELIGIOUS INSTRUCTION.

(32) What religious instruction is imparted to prisoners in your gaol, and by whom is it imparted?

(33) What secular instruction if any is given?

(34) Have you a library for the use of the prisoners? If so, how many volumes does it contain?

(35) What is the result of such instruction?

OCCUPATION AND EMPLOYMENT.

(36) Are the sentenced prisoners employed in any kind of labour or work in your gaol?

(a) What work is done by the men?

(b) What by the women?

(37) How many men were transferred from your gaol to the Central Prison in 1889 ?

(38) How many women were transferred to the Mercer Reformatory?

(39) Of the sentenced prisoners who were not transferred to those institutions what proportion were in your opinion physically fit for industrial employment or hard work?

DRUNKARDS IN COMMON GAOLS.

(40) How many persons were committed to your gaol during the year 1889 for drunkenness or for drunkenness and disorderly conduct?

(41) What proportion of this class were sentenced to gaol three or more times?

(42) What proportion of those committed were habitual or confirmed drunkards?