Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-gbm5v Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-27T08:41:34.322Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Foundations of Parole in California

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 July 2024

Sheldon L. Messinger ,
John E. Berecochea ,
David Rauma  and
Richard A. Berk
Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Core share and HTML view are not available for this content. However, as you have access to this content, a full PDF is available via the ‘Save PDF’ action button.

Parole was introduced in California, and used for over a decade, primarily to relieve governors of part of the burden of exercising clemency to reduce the excessive sentences of selected state prisoners. Later, when parole was additionally used to relieve prison crowding, processes were initiated that eventually led to the adoption of a rehabilitative justification for parole. We outline these events and their background and briefly consider their implications for the study of penal reforms.

Type
Research Article
Information
Law & Society Review , Volume 19 , Issue 1 , 1985 , pp. 69 - 106
Copyright
Copyright © 1985 by The Law and Society Association

Footnotes

*

This paper is based on research supported by grants from the National Institute of Justice and the Law and Social Sciences Program, National Science Foundation. We wish to thank: David L. Snyder and Joseph P. Samora, California State Archives, and Marie Vida Ryan and Dona Good, California Department of Corrections, for help in locating primary records; and Francis A. Allen, Thomas G. Blomberg, Stanley Cohen, Gilbert Geis, Richard O. Lempert, and Stanton Wheeler for editorial suggestions.

References

References*

Unpublished Materials.Google Scholar
The following manuscripts, registers, and other materials will be found at the California State Archives in Sacramento:.Google Scholar
Register of Prisoners Received at San Quentin State Prison, 1851-1914, and at Folsom State Prison, 1880-1914.Google Scholar
BMSQ and BMF: Minutes of the California State Board of Prison Directors, San Quentin Series, 1880-1914, and Folsom Series, 1880-1914.Google Scholar
Governors' Pardon Papers, 1880-1914.Google Scholar
Published Materials.Google Scholar
ALLEN, Francis A. (1981) The Decline of the Rehabilitative Ideal: Penal Policy and Social Purpose. New Haven: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
BEAN, Walton (1973) California: An Interpretive History, 2nd Ed. New York: McGraw-Hill.Google Scholar
BERECOCHEA, John E. (1982) “Origins and Early Development of Parole in California.” D. Crim. Dissertation, School of Criminology, University of California, Berkeley.Google Scholar
BERK, Richard A., RAUMA, David, MESSINGER, Sheldon L. and Thomas F., COOLEY (1981) “A Test of the Stability of Punishment Hypothesis: The Case of California, 1851-1970,” 46 American Sociological Review 805.Google Scholar
BERK, Richard A., MESSINGER, Sheldon L., RAUMA, David and John E., BERECOCHEA (1983) “Prisons as Self-Regulating Systems: A Comparison of Historical Patterns in California for Male and Female Offenders,” 17 Law & Society Review 547.Google Scholar
BOARD OF CHARITIES AND CORRECTIONS, CALIFORNIA STATE (1906, 1912) Biennial Report. Sacramento: Superintendent of State Printing.Google Scholar
BPD: BOARD OF PRISON DIRECTORS, CALIFORNIA STATE (1880, 1884, 1885) Annual Report. Sacramento: Superintendent of State Printing.Google Scholar
BPD: BOARD OF PRISON DIRECTORS, CALIFORNIA STATE (1893, 1909) Rules and Regulation for the Paroling of State Prisoners. Sacramento: Superintendent of State Printing.Google Scholar
BPD: BOARD OF PRISON DIRECTORS, CALIFORNIA STATE (1910, 1913, 1915, 1916, 1920) Biennial Report. Sacramento: Superintendent of State Printing.Google Scholar
BOOTH, Newton (1874) “Message from the Governor,” Journal of the Senate of the State of California. Sacramento: State Printer.Google Scholar
CAHN, Frances and Valeska, BARY (1936) Welfare Activities of Federal, State and Local Governments in California, 1850-1934. Berkeley: University of California Press.Google Scholar
CALIFORNIA STATE LEGISLATURE (1907) Final Calendar. Sacramento: State Printer.Google Scholar
DCSP: DIRECTORS OF THE CALIFORNIA STATE PRISON (1865) Report. Sacramento: State Printer.Google Scholar
DCSP: DIRECTORS OF THE CALIFORNIA STATE PRISON (1869-70) Report to the Legislature of California Recommending the Pardoning of Certain Convicts. Sacramento: State Printer.Google Scholar
DCSP: DIRECTORS OF THE CALIFORNIA STATE PRISON (1879) Biennial Report. Sacramento: State Printer.Google Scholar
DOWNEY, John G. (1861) “Message from the Governor,” Journal of the Senate of the State of California. Sacramento: State Printer.Google Scholar
FORD, Tirey L. (1912) “Purpose, Operation and Result of the Parole Law in California,” 5 The Lawyer and Banker and Bench and Bar Review 36.Google Scholar
GAGE, Henry T. (1901) First Biennial Message to the Legislature of the State of California. Sacramento: Superintendent of State Printing.Google Scholar
GILLETT, James N. (1909) First Biennial Message to the Legislature of the State of California. Sacramento: Superintendent of State Printing.Google Scholar
GILLETT, James N. (1911) Second Biennial Message to the Legislature of the State of California. Sacramento: Superintendent of State Printing.Google Scholar
HAIGHT, Henry H. (1872) “Message from the Governor,” Journal of the Senate of the State of California. Sacramento: State Printer.Google Scholar
IRWIN, William (1878) “Message from the Governor,” Journal of the Assembly of the State of California. Sacramento: Superintendent of State Printing.Google Scholar
JA: JOURNAL OF THE ASSEMBLY, CALIFORNIA STATE LEGISLATURE (1887, 1891, 1893, 1907, 1909). Sacramento: Superintendent of State Printing.Google Scholar
JS: JOURNAL OF THE SENATE, CALIFORNIA STATE LEGISLATURE (1883, 1887, 1891, 1893, 1909). Sacramento: Superintendent of State Printing.Google Scholar
LAMOTT, Kenneth C. (1961) Chronicles of San Quentin: The Biography of a Prison. New York: David McKay Co.Google Scholar
LOW, Frederick F. (1868) “Message from the Governor,” Journal of the Senate of the State of California. Sacramento: State Printer.Google Scholar
MARKHAM, Henry H. (1893) First Biennial Message to the Legislature of the State of California. Sacramento: Superintendent of State Printing.Google Scholar
MARKHAM, Henry H. (1895) Second Biennial Message to the Legislature of the State of California. Sacramento: Superintendent of State Printing.Google Scholar
McKELVEY, Blake (1977) American Prisons: A History of Good Intentions. Montclair, NJ: Patterson Smith.Google Scholar
MELENDY, H. Brett and Benjamin F., GILBERT (1965) The Governors of California: Peter H Burnett to Edmund G. Brown [Sr.]. Georgetown, CA: Talisman Press.Google Scholar
MESSINGER, Sheldon L. and Phillip E., JOHNSON (1978) “California's Determinate Sentencing Statute: History and Issues,” in Determinate Sentencing: Reform or Regression. Washington, DC: National Institute of Law Enforcement and Criminal Justice.Google Scholar
PACHECO, Romualdo (1876) “Message from the Governor,” Appendix to the Journal of the Senate and Assembly, Vol. 4. Sacramento: State Printing Office.Google Scholar
PARDEE, George C. (1907) Second Biennial Message to the Legislature of the State of California. Sacramento: Superintendent of State Printing.Google Scholar
PC: PENOLOGICAL COMMISSION, CALIFORNIA STATE (1887) Penology. Sacramento: Superintendent of State Printing.Google Scholar
PERKINS, George C. (1881) Annual Message to the Legislature of the State of California. Sacramento: Superintendent of State Printing.Google Scholar
PERKINS, George C. (1883) Biennial Message to the Legislature of the State of California. Sacramento: Superintendent of State Printing.Google Scholar
PRISON REFORM LEAGUE (1910) Crime and Criminals. Los Angeles: Prison Reform League Publishing Co.Google Scholar
ROTHMAN, David J. (1980) Conscience and Convenience: The Asylum and its Alternatives in Progressive America. Boston: Little, Brown and Co.Google Scholar
SPECIAL COMMISSION OF INQUIRY, CALIFORNIA STATE (1881) Report of the Special Commission of Inquiry into the General Administration of the State Prisons of California. Sacramento: Superintendent of State Printing.Google Scholar
STONEMAN, George (1885) First Biennial Message to the Legislature of the State of California. Sacramento: Superintendent of State Printing.Google Scholar
STONEMAN, George (1887) [Second] Biennial Message to the Legislature of the State of California. Sacramento: Superintendent of State Printing.Google Scholar
WATERMAN, Robert W. (1888) [First] Biennial Message to the Legislature of the State of California. Sacramento: Superintendent of State Printing.Google Scholar
WELLER, John B. (1859) “Message from the Governor,” Journal of the Senate of the State of California. Sacramento: State Printer.Google Scholar
WELLER, John B. (1860) “Message from the Governor,” Journal of the Senate of the State of California. Sacramento: State Printer.Google Scholar
WHYTE, Edward H. (1916) “The Parole System in California,” 7 Journal of the American Institute of Criminal Law and Criminology 1.Google Scholar
WILKINS, James H. (1918) Evolution of a State Prison. Sacramento, CA: State Library (compiled from articles appearing in the San Francisco Bulletin, 13 June through 10 July 1918).Google Scholar

Cases Cited

People v. Bowers, 13 Pacific Reporter 660 (1888).Google Scholar

Statutes Cited

1868 Cal. Stats., ch. 137.Google Scholar
1880 Cal. Stats., ch. 71.Google Scholar
1901 Cal. Stats., ch. 64.Google Scholar