hubert howe bancroft - Central Pacific Railroad Photographic History ...

INHUMANE INJUSTICE. 219
for 1879, with the governor's name at the head, was
the following paragraph which should have some
meaning: "I would use the pardoning power ten
times where it is now used once; would not use it
absolutely but conditionally. The governor may impose
any condition he pleases; he may confine one
man to the limits of a particular town ; another to a
county or a farm, or he may send him out of the
state or the United States, or he may pardon him
upon condition that he pay a sum of money for the
support of the prison, or that he furnish beef for the
prison for a certain time. There are at least 100
prisoners here who ought, in my judgment, to be
pardoned; and there are at least 200 serving excessive,
unheard of, inhuman sentences." Then,
again, there are at least 200 prisoners here, under
short sentences, who should either have been sent for
life, or long terms." The legislature was requested
to devise some plan for the equalization of sentences,
which was certainly only proper, to prevent the state
of things here represented ; but making the governor
a pardon-broker, with unlimited powers, would have
been strange legislation.
In the next chapter I shall have particular reference
to courts of appeal, their constitution, history,
and decisions.
• The governor may have found some cases like this one: a Mr Levy, in
1855, was sentenced to a year in state prison, and a forfeit of £30,000, for
smuggling cigars. S. F. Alia, Nov. 6, 1855. This, while murderers went
free! The report of the assembly com. on prisons for 1881, gives a list of 26
prisoners convicted of robbery, whose sentences vary all the way from one
year to life, five being in for their natural lives.