R. N. BALDWIN WOULD ABOLISH ALL PRISONS

Asserting that "every member of society has within him potential criminality which reveals itself under certain condition", Mr. Roger. Nash Baldwin '05, government political prisoner during the war, advocated the total abolishment of prisons in this country at the Liberal Club dinner held last night in the Trophy Room of the Union. Mr. Sanford Bates and Mr. Thomas Orrin, respective penal Commissioners of Massachusetts and Boston, also spoke the later refuting Mr. Baldwin and advocating the reform rather that the abolishment of prisons.

"There is no such thing as a good prison no matter how much you reform it", said Mr. Baldwin. "The whole idea that you can benefit men and women by inflicting punishment upon them is wrong. We all have within us potential criminality; and the most law abiding members of society would commit crimes if they were placed under the same conditions as the majority of the so-called criminals of this country. Most of the 4,00,000 persons imprisoned in the United States are young men, arrested for petty crimes, the result of hunger or poverty".

Mr. O'Brien an answered Mr. Baldwin's remarks by assorting that a person who commits a crime is morally sick and should therefore be put in a moral hospital for recovery. He also emphasized the fact that penalties must be imposed to enforce the law.