Penalties

Although various religions teach that there is some kind of life after this one, a life in which there is more justice than prevails on Earth, we still like to feel that, even here, people tend to get what they deserve. In our legal codes, this is usually spelled out much less precisely in terms of rewards than of penalties.

Every society has some kind of penal code. In ours, depending on the offense, there are two kinds of punishment: fines or incarceration. The fine can vary in amount, and in the time allowed for payment. But there is a sort of combination of the two in what I find a rather strange system called “Bail,” which involves putting up money as a guarantee that, even at the risk of imprisonment, you will appear in court when stipulated. This of course tends to favor those accused who have the most money. But the strangest part is that, at least in this country, there are “Bail Bond” companies who are allowed to make a living by putting up bail for people being charged, and, of course, being paid for this service. 

In some resulting true stories, the situation can get very complicated if the person facing charges fails to appear in court as scheduled, leaving the bail bond company to forfeit the money they have put up. Very exciting movie plots have been based on the hunt by people employed by the bail bond company to track down and bring back the absconder – thereby relieving the company of its obligation.

But the usual alternative to being fined is going to jail. And there are many variables of imprisonment, including length of sentence and style of accommodation. The worst treatment is accorded to repeat offenders with long criminal records, especially with a pattern of violence. Of course, many of these cases deserve to be treated as matters of mental health. But in our society sufficient funds are often not available for such an enlightened approach. Law-abiding people in general are not willing to pay for such methods, even if in the long run they are cost-effective. It is considered enough for bad people to be put away, and the rest of us protected from them.

The concept of crime and punishment goes back into surprisingly ancient times. In fact, one of the earliest written records we have – which is known as the Code of Hammurabi – spells out various offenses, together with the penalties, which could in some cases be very severe, including loss of limbs. But apparently, they didn’t have prisons, and in fact the idea of imprisonment as a form of punishment is relatively recent. And much more recent is “Penology” as a field of study. There also seems to be a close connection between jail and literature. Much of John Bunyan’s Seventeenth Century classic The Pilgrim’s Progress was written during the lengthy time he spent in prison for his religious views as a “Non-Conformist.”

Another form of punishment, one which prevailed in Britain for many years, was called “Transportation,” in which the offender was exiled to some distant place. America, and then (after the Revolution) Australia were favorite destinations. Russia occupied such a huge landmass that internal exile was quite feasible – a fact which has given the very name of Siberia an ominous resonance.

Then there’s a sort of “internal exile,” in which the offender, without being physically harmed, is cut off from the surrounding community. In England, especially among young people at certain schools, this was called being “sent to Coventry.” Anyone suffering this fate would find that their schoolfellows would no longer speak to them.

Most people know what is meant by the imposition of a boycott. What isn’t so widely known is how the word originated. The 1880s were a turbulent time in Ireland, where most of the land was owned by absentee landlords. Charles Cunningham Boycott was an Estate Manager, who lived on the estate he managed. It was his duty to collect the tenants’ rents – and to evict those who would not, or could not, pay. To fight the landowners, a “Land League” was organized. It was decided to ostracize Boycott. Suddenly, even the shops he patronized would have nothing to do with him. He was forced to bring in armed guards to protect himself while performing evictions. But his ultimate penalty was to live to see his name become a not very pleasant word, not only in English but in various languages around the world.