Queen Victorias Effect on Britain

Queen Victorias Effect on Britain Did Queen Victoria leave her subjects in a better condition in 1901 than when she found them in 1837? The Victorian era was principally a time of change, of transience: the translocation of a people, challenged morally, socially and in their religious beliefs, as never before. Standing majestically above all this was the image of stability which Queen Victoria symbolised. The shift from the rural life of the eighteenth century and the Romantic Movement in the Arts which accompanied it was displaced and the population in the industrial towns and cities swelled to the point of overflowing, producing slums and sweatshops rather than the wealth and security that had been sought, with ‘the Age of the Novel’ involved with social issues as well as establishing a new literary genre. In 1837, when Victoria came to the throne, these changes had already begun and by the time her reign ended, in 1901, more was ahead particularly if one considers the ‘long nineteenth century’ which encompasses the pre-war years up to 1914. How far her people were in a ‘better condi tion’ by the end of Victoria’s reign will be the subject of this essay, looking at the idea via the different media of change evidenced in religion, literature, politics and related social issues as well as the Imperialism which the establishment of the British monarch as the first Empress of India established. In many ways, it is true to say that Victoria presided over a Renaissance which had not been seen since her antecedent, Elizabeth, had been on the throne. The coincidence that a female monarch should have been in place at both times of regeneration does not, however, imply a connective: conditions were very different during Elizabeth’s reign, particularly in the area of social mobility and religious imperatives. The Victorian era saw the greatest challenges to both of these that had ever been seen. The movement of the peasantry to the towns saw an enormous shift in both the physical location of the population and its imperatives. Much was lost, in terms of tradition and permanence when the move to the cities occurred because most of those who did relocate in the hope of increasing their meagre incomes had never been farther than the next village before they moved and this had been the case for generations. Indeed, as early as the mid-nineteenth century novelists were using the idea of the rural idyll to exemplify an ideal existence now lost[1]. This is evident in novels such as George Eliot’s Adam Bede (1859) which was set some fifty years before it was written: As he reached the foot of the slope, an elderly horseman, with his portmanteau strapped behind him, stopped his horse when Adam had passed him, and turned round to have another long look at the stalwart workman in paper cap, leather breeches, and dark-blue worsted stockings.[2] The mounted, unidentified and detached observer (a connective with the contemporary reader) takes a ‘long look at the ‘stalwart workman’ in an elegiac emblem of the author’s intent within the novel to show a time now lost and the changes that were about to take place. Adam as a type of workman has been displaced and is no longer to be found and which represents a longing for a return to old times and old days associated with the countryside which can be traced to the present day and certainly becomes a primary informative, present in works such as Flora Thompson’s enduringly popular Larkrise to Candleford (1945) and further evidenced even in the work of such ‘scientific’ novelists as H.G. Wells in his novel, The History of Mr Polly, and the character of Leonard Bast as well as the evocative, mystical rural setting in E.M. Forster’s Howard’s End, both written in 1910. The novel also introduces the character of a female preacher, a ‘Dissenter’, in other words a Methodist, and by combining the two, Eliot shows that despite the loss of the life portrayed in her novel, there were positive challenges which changes such as the growing desire for the emancipation of women, at the forefront of which was J.S. Mill[3], and the need to find new ways of expressing religious sensibility. The ultimate challenge to religion, of course, was presented by the theories of evolution which were being formulated in the 1860s. Although Charles Darwin is credited with having discovered this, the work of such as Herbert Spencer, who actually coined the term ‘survival of the fittest’ in his Principles of Biology (1864) which Darwin incorporated into a later edition of his own work, were also significant. Within his seminal The Origin of Species, first published in 1859, Darwin introduced to the wider public the then profoundly disturbing notion that man was not created entire and complete as the Bible relates but evolved and thus dispossessed an entire generation who had previously felt secure in the knowledge of God as their Creator (though Darwin uses this term himself many times within the work and does not deny the idea of a Creator directly[4]). It is a mistake, however, to assume that Darwin’s ideas had much immediate effect on the population at large. R ather, its immediate aftermath may be discerned in the literature of the time, George Eliot, a close friend of Spencer, amongst these. Moreover, his published theories were simply an affirmation for many of a growing generic scepticism, such as Thomas Hardy shows: On the last day of the year [1901] he makes the following reflection: ‘After reading various philosophic systems, and being struck with their contradictions and futilities, I have come to this: Let every man make a philosophy for himself out of his own experience. He will not be able to escape using terms and phraseology from earlier philosophers, but let him avoid adopting their theories if he values his own mental life. Let him remember the fate of Coleridge, and save years of labour by working out his own views as given him by his surroundings.’[5] However, just as the move from the towns to the cities subsequently produced a sense of loss, the disconnection with the certainty of divine creation also saw the longing for a mystical element to life once ‘the divine’ had, in a sense, been removed from it: seeking ‘an oasis of mystery in the dreary desert of knowledge’[6]. The disconnection resulted in the burgeoning of interest in Spiritualism which was witnessed at the end of the century, with personages as eminent and respected as Rudyard Kipling not only interested and involved with this but also writing about it in stories such as the mysterious ‘They’[7] and imagination came to be seen as connected to the divine and dislocated by Darwin’s discoveries, Forster wrote in 1910: ‘They collect facts and facts and empires of facts. But which of them will re-kindle the light within?’[8] However, the connection of facts with the denial of imagination had been discussed much earlier by the man who is above anyone the voice of the nineteenth century, Charles Dickens. In his novel of 1854, Hard Times, he demonstrates the denial of the importance of ‘fancy’ in Utilitarian educational methods and the pre-eminence of ‘facts’[9]. This he extends to the teaching methods used to train the teachers themselves: He and some one hundred and forty other schoolmasters had been lately turned at the same time, in the same factory, on the same principles, like so many pianoforte legs. He had been put through an immense variety of paces, and had answered volumes of head-breaking questions. [†¦] He had worked his stony way into Her Majestys most Honourable Privy Councils Schedule B, and had taken the bloom off the higher branches of mathematics and physical science, French, German, Latin and Greek. [†¦] Ah, rather overdone, MChoakumchild. If he had only learnt a little less, how infinitely better he might have taught much more![10] Dickens the radical is less appreciated now than in his own time, as in subsequent centuries he has come to be seen simply as a master-story teller, which of course he was. However, this is to deny the way that Dickens, as evidenced in this satirical swipe at the Utilitarian movement, used his immense popularity in the cause of social reform. Indeed, in the early years of Victoria’s reign, he published his second and third novels, Oliver Twist (1837-9) and Nicholas Nickleby (1838-9). The first of these was concerned with the effects of the infamous ‘Poor Law’ and the 1834 amendment. It was widely believed that the abuse of this injured rather than helped the poor and Dickens’ novel was intended to bring that to the notice of those who had the power to do something about it, as well as reaching the newly literate lower echelons and letting them know they had someone who would speak for them, that their story, as Dickens remarked in his Preface to the 1867 ed ition, from thieves to prostitutes, was a ‘TRUTH’ that ‘needed to be told’[11]. As his friend and first biographer remarked: His qualities could be appreciated as well as felt in an almost equal degree by all classes of his various readers.[12] Thus, as the novelist is known to have said, by making people care about one child, he might make them care about the many and this emanated from his own sufferings as a child alone in London when his father was imprisoned for debt in the infamous Marshalsea (which was to provide the setting for his later novel, Little Dorrit, 1857, though the six hundred year old prison closed in 1842) whence he was accompanied by his wife and younger children[13]. Dickens never spoke of the experience, save through his fiction, nor did he ever forget it. In Nicholas Nickleby and the creation of Dotheboys Hall, Dickens continued to exercise his creative power to bring to the attention of his readers the appalling social evil of the Yorkshire schools, whose abuses he remembered hearing of as a child and then investigated (whilst wearing a disguise) as part of his research for the novel. As the author said in his fragment of autobiography, ‘we should be devilish careful what we do to children’[14]. Dickens had a long memory and an acute social awareness and both are evident in Nickleby, as is the sheer exhilaration and appetite for life which had proved so popular in his first novel Pickwick Papers (1836-7). Moreover, Dickens was a successful reformer, commenting in his preface to the 1848 edition: This story was begun, within a few months after the publication of the completed Pickwick Papers. There were, then, a good many cheap Yorkshire schools in existence. There are very few now.[15] The fact is stated simply but the achievement was immense. The obverse of these schools, of course, was seen in Arnold’s pioneering work in reforming the public schools, as evidenced in Thomas Hughes’, Tom Brown’s Schooldays (1857). The issue of social and educational reform was one with which many novelists were concerned at this time, engaging with both the needs and desires of the weakest in society. Engels had identified this as ‘the social war, the war of each against all’[16] and he applied this as a generic to the multiplicity of industrial towns and cities: What is true of London, is true of Manchester, Birmingham, Leeds, is true of all great towns. Everywhere barbarous indifference, hard egotism on one hand, and nameless misery on the other, everywhere social warfare, every mans house in a state of siege, everywhere reciprocal plundering under the protection of the law, and all so shameless, so openly avowed that one shrinks before the consequences of our social state as they manifest themselves here undisguised, and can only wonder that the whole crazy fabric still hangs together.[17] Engels’ work was published between September 1844 and March 1845 and had an immediate effect on not just those who were, if one may term it so, ‘declared radicals’, like himself, but also those like the deeply ‘respectable’ and widely respected writer Elizabeth Gaskell, whose first novel, Mary Barton, written in 1848, partly to assuage the pain of losing her child, deals largely with the poverty experienced by the poor in Manchester. Gaskell, encouraged by both her husband, the Ereverend William Gaskell, and Dickens, researched the conditions of the city in which she and William were then living. What she found horrified her and the reality of expression present within the novel can be seen in her powerful descriptions of the slum dwellings she had seen: Our friends were not dainty, but even they picked their way, till they got to some steps leading down to a small area, where a person standing would have his head about one foot below the level of the street, and might at the same time, without the least motion of his body, touch the window of the cellar and the damp muddy wall right opposite. You went down one step even from the foul area into the cellar in which a family of human beings lived. It was very dark inside. The window-panes many of them were broken and stuffed with rags, which was reason enough for the dusky light that pervaded the place even at mid-day. After the account I have given of the state of the street, no one can be surprised that on going into the cellar inhabited by Davenport, the smell was so foetid as almost to knock the two men down.[18] The importance of setting such descriptions in the context of fiction might be thought possibly to lessen its reality in the eyes of contemporary readers but nothing could be farther from the truth, as though few would be drawn to the admirable tracts of Engels, many were attracted to the vivid stories of such as Dickens and Gaskell. Indeed, Gaskell was careful always to ensure that her work did not offend those in power to the extent that she will qualify a passage on the uncaring attitude of the rich as perceived by the poor by adding placatory comments such as: I know that this is not really the case; and I know what is the truth in such matters: but what I wish to impress is what the workman feels and thinks.[19] The implied separation in comprehension may appear patronising by today’s standards but it must be remembered that Gaskell was truly attempting to do as she proclaimed, ‘impress’ the thoughts and feelings of ‘the workman’ on those in power in the hope it would aid reform. If she had been too directly challenging, they would simply not have read her works which would have defeated the object. Gaskell faced similar opposition in her second novel, Ruth, published in 1853, when she addressed the topic of an unmarried mother sympathetically, much too sympathetically for the liking of many, who felt she was undermining the perceived moral and religious mores of the time. The novel was thought to be based upon the true story of a girl called Pasley: In 1850 she took up the cause of a girl called Pasley whom she had come across in the New Bayley prison. In a long letter to Dickens, at that time involved in his emigration project for fallen women, she gives details of the case. Pasleys career exemplifies the dangers facing even a girl of respectable parentage who was neglected. The daughter of an Irish clergyman who had died when she was two, she had been neglected by an indifferent mother, and then placed in an orphanage, before becoming a dressmakers apprentice. Following a series of misfortunes for which she had not herself been responsible she had been seduced by her own doctor. The consequence had been first the Penitentiary and then a career of petty crime; finally, by an appalling stroke of coincidence, the poor girl had been confronted when in prison by her very seducer, now acting as prison surgeon.[20] Certainly, there are many similarities between the case of Pasley and that of Ruth and Gaskell’s clear intent is to show how difficult was the plight of girls in Ruth’s and Pasley’s situation. Gaskell successfully persuaded Dickens to intervene for Pasley and she emigrated but clearly the case was not forgotten by her as emblematic of the vulnerability of young girls in nineteenth century society. Indeed, she had already addressed the idea that prostitution was the usual fate of such girls in Mary Barton and the ‘petty crime’ to which she refers might certainly be euphemistically describing prostitution. Attitudes towards prostitution were far from sympathetic and much of the reforming work done at the time concerned not only changing conditions for prostitutes but also in improving the notorious double-standard which operated towards it, both then and now. The Contagious Diseases Acts of 1864, 1866, and 1869 to some extent reflect this. The Act was established to protect soldiers but had the coincidental effect of advancing the cause of women’s liberation: [†¦] legislation intended to protect members of the British armed forces from sexually transmitted diseases ended up galvanizing a major Victorian feminist movement in which working- and middle-class women worked together for a common cause.[21] Thus, it can be seen that Gaskell’s pre-emptive strike truly reflected the feelings of many that Victorian laws operated for the protection of men rather than women and that even though there were exceptions, such as Mill and Dickens, the latter of whom set up Urania Cottage as a refuge for ‘fallen women’, the vast majority of the population preferred simply to ignore the suffering and anguish of girls on the streets. Somewhat ironically, compassion towards prostitutes was stirred by the infamous ‘Whitechapel Murders’ of 1888-91, perpetrated by the still unidentified ‘Jack the Ripper’. Even for the so called ‘respectable’ working classes, indeed, in general conditions were appallingly bad, especially in the factories and sweatshops[22] which abounded both in London and elsewhere in the country: ‘The nineteenth century saw the Englishman turn town dweller and by 1900 three-quarters of the nation lived in towns’[23]. Bearing this in mind, it seems inevitable that conditions in these towns would be at best difficult and at worst unbearable (the infamous employment of children as, for example, chimney-sweeps, being evident in the work of such as the reformer Charles Kingsley who wrote The Water Babies in 1863 to expose this abuse). Thus, approaching the end of Victoria’s reign, the population was generally in a state of crisis. However, there was a discernable exception to this, in part, in the beginning of what we would now take to be an upwardly mobile meritocracy. Consisting largely of those persons concerned with ‘white-collar work’, the clerk for example, this section of society knew a growth and freedom such as never before. Possibly the best example of this is to be found in George and Weedon Grossmith’s The Diary of a Nobody, first published in Punch as a series of articles during 1888-9, in the form of a diary of the fictional Mr. Pooter. The highly amusing work is also an invaluable record of a new type of man emerging in Victorian society: My clear wife Carrie and I have just been a week in our new house, â€Å"The Laurels,† Brickfield Terrace, Holloway—a nice six-roomed residence, not counting basement, with a front breakfast-parlour. We have a little front garden; and there is a flight of ten steps up to the front door, which, by-the-by, we keep locked with the chain up. Cummings, Gowing, and our other intimate friends always come to the little side entrance, which saves the servant the trouble of going up to the front door, thereby taking her from her work. We have a nice little back garden which runs down to the railway. We were rather afraid of the noise of the trains at first, but the landlord said we should not notice them after a bit, and took  £2 off the rent. He was certainly right; and beyond the cracking of the garden wall at the bottom, we have suffered no inconvenience.[24] The Pooters encapsulate the image of a new class, living in their own home, employing a servant, having a garden and yet still retaining their parsimonious connective with their humbler origins; in many ways, the Pooters are the future. In conclusion, it may be remarked that the Victorian era saw the greatest period of change that had ever been seen. Industrial development saw riches and poverty in unequal measure; improvements were made in nursing and social concerns but the population mostly remained in poverty and both ill-nourished and inadequately cared for in terms of health; the trains united the country but the rural population was fragmented and the urban largely in dire circumstances; schooling was expanded and literacy improved but the standard of education was at best questionable; the Empire flourished but its members across the seas were mostly downtrodden, subjugated and rebellious: in short, to quote Dickens’ famous opening to A Tale of Two Cities (1859), ‘it was the best of times and the worst of times’. It is extremely difficult to assess, in the final analysis, whether the end of Victoria’s reign saw her people in a better or worse condition than when her reign began but certainly, the single most important development seen was the opportunity for change. In this sense if no other, the population was better off at the end of the long nineteenth century than at the beginning of it. However, the war that was about to devastate Europe brought apocalyptic changes which could never have been envisaged and certainly Tennyson’s famous reference in ‘The Charge of the Light Brigade’ (1854) to the fact that ‘Some one had blunderd’ would take on a profoundly disturbing resonance from which the world over which Victoria presided would never recover. Truly, 1914 brought more than just the end of an era it brought the end of Victorian mores and the expectations of the population would alter radically, with revolution, such as occurred in Russia in 1917, a perpetual possibility, especially with the growth of the unions and the Socialist Party, which wiped out the Liberals. Victoria’s reign was not just one age but many and as such, like most eras, was both good and bad. Bibliography Ackroyd, Peter. Dickens. London: Guild Publishing, 1990. Beer, Gillian. Darwin’s Plots. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000. Davis, Philip. The Victorians. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002. Cobbet, William. Rural Rides. New York: Cosimo Classics, 2004. Darwin, Charles. The Origin of Species. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996. Dickens, C. Oliver Twist. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999 Dickens, Charles. Hard Times. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1989. Eliot, George. Adam Bede. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998. Eliot, George. The Lifted Veil. London: Virago Press, 1985, Englels, F. The Condition of the Working class in England (1844) http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1845/condition-working-class/index.htm> Forster, E.M. Howards End. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1987. Forster, J. The Life of Charles Dickens in Two Volumes. London: J.M. Dent, 1980. Hardy, F.E. The Life of Thomas Hardy. London: Macmillan, 1962. Hughes, Thomas. Tom Browns School Days. New York: Harper Brothers,1911. Gaskell, Elizabeth. Mary Barton. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1993. Gaskell, Elizabeth. Ruth. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998. Grossmith, G M. The Diary of a Nobody. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998. Kipling, Rudyard. Kim. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1918. Kipling, Rudyard. Traffics and Dicoveries. New York: Charles Scribner Sons. Langland, Elizabeth. Nobodys Angels: Middle-Class Women and Domestic Ideology in Victorian Culture. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1995. Lawrence, D.H. The Rainbow. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997. Lightman, Bernard, ed. Victorian Science in context. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1997. Maltus, Thomas. Essay on the Principle of Population (1798), 29.11.08. http://www.marxists.org/reference/subject/economics/malthus/index.htm> Mathias, P. The first Industrial Nation. London: Routledge, 2001. Mayhew, Henry. The Unknown Mayhew. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1971. Mill, J.S. The Subjection of Women. New York: Prometheus, 1986. Roberts, F. David. The Social Conscience of the Early Victorians. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2002. Smiles, Samuel, Self Help. 29.11.08 http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/etext97/selfh10h.htm> Smiles, Samuel. Industrial Biography: Iron-Workers and Tool-Makers. Boston: Ticknor and Fields,1864. Sturt, George. Change in the Village. London: Caliban Books, 1984. Thompson, Flora. Lark Rise to Candleford. London: Penguin, 2008. The Victorian Web. accessed 30.11.08. http://www.victorianweb.org/gender/contagious.html> Worthen, John. D H Lawrence. The Early Years 1885-1912. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991. 1 Footnotes [1] For more on the idea of changes and loss of traditions see: Sturt, George. Change in the Village. London: Caliban Books, 1984. (First published in 1912.) [2] Eliot, George. Adam Bede. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998, p. 12. [3] See: Mill, J.S. The Subjection of Women. New York: Prometheus, 1986. [4] Darwin, Charles. The Origin of Species. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996. [5] Hardy, F.E. The Life of Thomas Hardy. London: Macmillan, 1962, p. 310. [6] Eliot, George. The Lifted Veil. 1878. London: Virago Press, 1985, p. 26. [7] Kipling, Rudyard. Traffics and Dicoveries. New York: Charles Scribners Sons, 1904, p. 337. [8] Forster, E.M. Howards End. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1987, p. 43. [9] Dickens, C. Hard Times. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1989, pp. 8-9. [10] Dickens, C. Hard Times. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1989, p. 10. [11] Dickens, C. Oliver Twist. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999, Preface, p. xx. [12] Forster, J. The Life of Charles Dickens in Two Volumes. London: J.M. Dent, 1980, vol. I, p. 83. [13] Forster, J. The Life of Charles Dickens in Two Volumes. London: J.M. Dent, 1980. [14] Forster, J. The Life of Charles Dickens in Two Volumes. London: J.M. Dent, 1980. [15] Dickens, C. Nicholas Nickleby. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1990, Preface to the 1848 Edition, Lii. [16] Englels, F. The Condition of the Working class in England (1844): 29.11.08. http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1845/condition-working-class/index.htm> [17] Englels, F. The Condition of the Working class in England (1844): 29.11.08. http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1845/condition-working-class/index.htm> [18] Gaskell, Elizabeth. Mary Barton. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1993, pp. 79-80. [19] Gaskell, Elizabeth. Mary Barton. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1993, p. 49. [20] See Alan Shelston’s introduction to: Gaskell, Elizabeth. Ruth. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998, pp. vii-viii. [21] See: ‘The Contagious Diseases Act’, accessed 30.11.08. http://www.victorianweb.org/gender/contagious.html> [22] See: Mayhew, Henry. The Unknown Mayhew. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1971. [23] Mathias, P. The First Industrial Nation. London: Routledge, 2001, p. 226. [24] Grossmith, G M. The Diary of a Nobody. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998, p. 3.

Juvenile Life Imprisonment

Kirsten Shew A Juvenile’s Right to Change Making mistakes is part of human nature and the progression of self-identity. People do it all of the time, and among people even children make mistakes. Sometimes, the degree of the mistake is minor and other times it is disturbingly extensive. Either way, a punishment is almost mandatory and in the case of an extensive punishment life imprisonment is only too often considered and acted upon.Shutting a child away in prison should be out of the question for three main reasons: they have a chance at rehabilitation, such an immense degree of punishment is unconstitutional and juveniles are in no way the same as adults. As a teen, you are most vulnerable to the shaping of beliefs, identity and viewpoints. Currently, there are over 2,500 individuals serving life without parole due to a crime they committed when they were as young as 13. When you send a child to prison for life, they arrive there just as that – a child.They are vulne rable and they are frightened. Change, for them, seems like the best decision in the world at that moment and later in their future it could be the best choice they had made. Teen offenders who commit mass crimes such as homicide or battery are often sentenced to an adult prison instead of a juvenile rehabilitation center. In an adult prison, a juvenile learns the ways of these older peers who have the extreme power to influence them and teach them the ways of a true criminal.In a juvenile rehabilitation center, they are surrounded by other teens that had committed crimes relatable to theirs and are influenced by other’s desires to change and become a real member of society. In an article by Steven Silverman, he talks about case of Zachary Watson and Emmanuel Miller who had both committed what was to believe a hate crime and had both asked to be sent to juvenile court. Miller’s wish had been granted and Watson’s had been refuted.In adult prison, Watson was stabb ed and repeatedly harassed while Miller, in juvenile prison, received his GED, played on the football team and obtained amazing observations from his teachers. In another case, there was a boy, Scott Fillipi, who shot his mother and after he was released from prison he joined the army and became a member of the Presidential Honor Guard. Also, Charles Dutton killed a person at the age of 17 and is now an award winning actor-producer. Based on where hey spend their sentence, in a rehabilitation center or an adult prison, it will determine how well the individual will progress. In Missouri they constructed a juvenile system where, after leaving, only 8 percent of juveniles ended up back in prison. Rehabilitation offers children another chance to right their wrongs and become a real member of society. The eighth amendment of the U. S constitution states, â€Å"Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted. In 1999, Kuntre ll Jackson robbed a video store with his friends and soon found out his friend had murdered the store clerk with a shotgun. He was 14 years old and was sentenced to life without parole even though he was not the shooter; the shooter received life with the possibility of parole. Rodrigo Caballero was a diagnosed schizophrenic and gang member who had shot three rival gang members and was condemned to 110 years in prison. To send a child away from society, their friends, and their family and shut them away for the rest of their life is callous and unnecessary.Putting them into an adult prison is like offering the prisoners fresh meat; the juvenile would likely be handed over to sexual predators and no child, no matter the crime committed, should have to go through something so horrendous. They are more likely to get beat, raped or commit suicide in adult prison than through the juvenile justice system. If it were a 53 year old man who had viciously murdered another human being, to lock him away for the rest of his life is adequate. Since a 53 year old man is far beyond the ripeness of growing mentally, he is unlikely to ever come back from that mental state that left him to take a life.There was a study held by The Human Rights Watch and The American Civil Liberties Union that showed that many of the young prisoners admitted to struggling with hallucinations, anxiety and depression while in the adult prisons. The more humane act of punishment would be to send them to a juvenile justice system where they would be offered counseling and mental health services. One crime does not define who the child is and their beliefs and desires. They do not deserve to have their positive mental health forced from them when it should be preserved by the people who are supposed to protect them, not put them in harm’s way.The correction officials have a duty to protect us and the responsibility to save the future generations from everlasting scarring when they are put in th e hands of the adult justice system and still have so much to offer the world. If someone has the capability to be rehabilitated, then why would another person take that chance away from them? When people think of adults, they often imagine somebody who is mature and sophisticated and someone who has seen the world for what it is.But, when people think of adolescents they think of someone who is ripe in their education, immature, prone to influence and just mentally different than an adult. Just because an adolescent commits an atrocious crime does not infer that they are any more grown up than any other child their age. Young children are more likely to break rules and act on impulses than adults; they have a lower sense of responsibility and are completely vulnerable to peer pressure. When they decide to commit a crime, when their yearning to break the law exceeds its limits, they are usually unaware of the consequences that will be brought on by their crime.Being sent into an adu lt prison is no doubt hard for adults, but for a child it’s almost unbearable, which is why they commonly resort to ending their life. A study by the University of California shows that â€Å"teens often lack the social and emotional maturity to control impulses† and â€Å"emotional maturity isn’t attained till after 22. † Kids who commit crimes are more frequently being tried as adults and being sent into adult prisons where they will be faced with rape, assault, peer pressure and negative influences.Being that children are more prone to influences than adults, because they are so unaware of the consequences of certain actions, they would be more susceptible to take on the ways of adult offenders and their chance at righting their wrongs in an adult prison is slim to none. Teen offenders would be forced to spend the majority of their life in a prison cell when they still have room in their souls to grow and prove their morality. Allowing a convicted crim inal back into society is no doubt risky and for some people it is an immense idea to be open to.There is always a chance that the juvenile would relapse in a way and go back to their life of crime. Or, maybe they would spread their past experiences on to other vulnerable children and open their minds to the idea that violence is the way to solve problems. Then again, there is always the chance that they might not. How would anybody ever know what kind of change a person is capable of if they’re not offered the chance to prove themselves? If an adult had come from an adult prison that they had been in since they were a teen, the likeliness of them returning to their previous way of life is extremely likely.If they’re not offered counseling or mental health services when they are younger and more prone to influence, then they would know no other way of life than that of the one in adult prison. A person who commits a crime should no doubt be held responsible and serve t ime, no matter what their age or excuse is. A child is so inclined to change, that they should serve time in a place that allows them to change. Maybe, they wouldn’t change at all being placed in a juvenile rehabilitation center, but because everyone is different every child deserves a second chance at life to prove themselves worthy of being a part of society.A changed person, who had once been part of the dark side of reality, could prove a role model to other children who had made mistakes. Raphael Johnson started a community policing program and received his bachelor’s and master’s degree with honors after being released from prison for shooting and killing a classmate when he was 17. He even ran for public office. Charles Dutton became an award winning actor-producer after quitting school when he was 12 years old and committed manslaughter.This is not saying that committing an exorbitant crime is okay because the convict will back to normal again when theyà ¢â‚¬â„¢re released; it is saying that people are capable of amazing feats and have the ability to turn their life around. They just need the chance to prove so. Juveniles do not deserve to spend their whole life in prison. No matter what they did. Because of their ability to accomplish significant change and their ability to be influenced more than adults, they still have a chance at rehabilitation, it will always be unconstitutionally wrong and they are not the same as adults just because they committed a crime.To lock a child away for the rest of their life is immoral and cruel, but to send them away to a rehabilitation center where they can still be punished by forcing them to face what they have done and yet still receive counseling to deal with their problems and set them straight is a much more sensible approach. If more juvenile delinquents were to be dealt with in juvenile court, instead of adult court, society would have gained another person who now knows the consequences of certain actions and would be looked to as a role model for change. Do not neglect them of a punishment, but allow them an opportunity at a transformation.

Police Brutality - 1399 Words

Composition 1 Argumentative Research Essay Final Draft. Police Brutality Police work is dangerous. Sometimes police put in situations that excessive force is needed. But, because some officers use these extreme measures in situations when it is not, police brutality occurs. I believe Police brutality needs to be addressed, because it affects every one of us within our society. How can we trust the Police officers who sworn to â€Å"serve the public† when they use such excessive force that results in homicide? For those people who feel racism is not a factor in causing the use of excessive force, here is a startling fact. In Tampa Bay, Florida, five men died while in the custody of the Tampa Bay police Department (C.C. 27). The†¦show more content†¦During a disturbing 911 call before her death, Delafield told the dispatcher she believed she was in danger and that her sister was trying to harm her. Officers say when they arrived, Delafield was in her wheelchair, threatening police and family members with two knives and a hammer. One officer Tasered Delafield nine times for a total of 160 seconds and another officer Tasered the woman once for less than 5 seconds. Delafield s death was ruled a homicide. The family of slain teen, Fong Lee, have filed a lawsuit against the Minneapolis police and the officer who killed him. The family has compiled a review of police reports, witness statements and other evidence that support the theory that Fong Lee was unarmed when he was shot by police eight times in 2006 and the gun found near his body was planted there by police. The gun that the officers claim to have found near Fong Lee s body had been recovered by police from a burglary and was kept as evidence. The family also alleges in court documents that Minneapolis police may have tried to deliberately alter history by writing new reports indicating the gun recovered near Fong Lee s body was not the same gun that had been recovered after the burglary. The evidence suggests that Minnesota police planted the gun to cover themselves after killing Fong Lee in the street. Police reports indicate that no fingerprints or DNA was found on the weapon. After a May 13, 2009Show MoreRelatedThe Causes Of Police Brutality810 Words   |  4 Pages Police brutality remains to be one of the most abused human rights in the US.Police have actet out in ways that have made people wonder â€Å"Are officers of the law really doing there job?† Over takats African Americans have gotten discriminated .But for over 50 years those who are to protect us are not.One of the reasons that The media contributes to police brutality is by leaving some stories untold or even change it which then leaves an false impression for the readers . The Media only reportsRead MoreA Report On Police Brutality1367 Words   |  6 PagesStudent Name Instructor Date Course Police Brutality There is various forms of human rights violation currently in the United States, however; Police abuse remains the most serious of them all. Police brutality is, therefore, the use of excessive force or even unnecessary force by the police while they are dealing with civilians. 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The controversies that surround the topic of police brutality relate to different definitions and expectations over what is meant by excessive force. Indeed, police officers are expressly authorized to use necessary, reasonable force to perform their duties. As Jerome Skolnick, an influential police scholar in the United States, underscores: â€Å"as long as members of society do not comply with the law and resist the police, forceRead MorePolice Brutality And The Police851 Words   |  4 Pagesthe police, your opinion may vary. Let me ask you a question about our police force. But keep this in mind, in October 2015 alone, there was 81 deaths by the police. With that being said, who’s to protect us from whose protecting the block? I don t care who you are, you have to be able to realize nowadays that the police brutality is getting out of hand, that the power surge is growing and growing. Look around, there s an increase of civilians death via cops, an increase of reports of police wrongdoingRead MorePolice Brutality2853 Words   |  12 PagesPolice Protality: Introduction Police brutality has been and continues to be of major concern in society. First of all, police brutality is a term used to describe the excessive use of physical force, assault, verbal attacks or slurs, and threats by any law enforcement officer. Efforts to police communities, throughout history, have been tainted by brutality ans abuse of power to some degree. The term police brutality is commonly used very loosely to any and all forms of policeRead MorePolice Brutality1263 Words   |  6 Pagesï » ¿Police Brutality Did you know that Police brutality is the intentional use of excessive force, usually physical, but potentially also in the form of verbal attacks and psychological intimidation, by a police officer? Despite major improvements in police practices (since 1981) reports of alleged police misconduct and abuse continue to spread through the nation. Police Brutality still goes on around the world today with improvements of enforcing police brutality in police departments. There haveRead MorePolice Brutality1865 Words   |  8 Pagesï » ¿Police Brutality is Prevalent Background Information Over the recent years, police have been one of the organizations to be associated with the largest cases of misconduct. Police brutality can be termed as the process of misuse and abuse of authority by the police. The rising cases of police brutality are causing more harm to the public, compared to the actions perpetrated by real criminals. Although police claim that it’s sometimes necessary to curb crime, the process is illegal and police officersRead MorePolice Brutality Over The Years1458 Words   |  6 PagesIt feels as if nothing has changed about police brutality over the years. The usual cycle is that juries acquit the police, cops get their jobs back, and brutality happens again. One of the most broadcasted cases of police brutality, was the beating of Rodney King. On the night of March 2, 1991, a bystander named George Holiday, videotaped the moment when five officers used excess force on an African American man named Rodney King, beating him with batons as he strugg led on the ground. Also, it wasRead MorePolice Misconduct and Police Brutality985 Words   |  4 Pages We hear about police misconduct case and wonder, Why don’t they do anything to stop this? Many say that we should keep the police officers’ perspective in mind. Others say that these actions are due to racism or post 9/11 paranoia. Whatever the excuse may be for these cases, there should be no need for violence anywhere. Police brutality videos go viral and reveal to the world that it actually happens and that it may happen to you too. This pervades people with fear and anger because their

U.s. Soldiers During The Vietnam War - 1472 Words

U.S. Soldiers in the Vietnam War To this day, many Vietnam veterans suffer and feel forgotten, unappreciated, and even discriminated against. Combat experiences or physical disabilities have ruined some of their lives. For more, returning to normal life had not been easy. Imagine if you had just graduated out of high school and were sent to a guerrilla warfare far away from your home. During the war, you were exposed to a lot of stress, confusion, anxiety, pain, and hatred. Then you were sent back home with no readjustment to the lifestyle in the states, no deprogramming of what you learned from the military, and no welcome home parades. You are portrayed to the public as a crazed psychopathic killer with no morals or control over your aggression. You find that there s nobody you can talk to or who can understand what you ve been through, not even your family. As you re-emerge into civilization, you struggle to establish a personal identity or a place in society because you lack the proper education and job skills. In addition, there are no supportive groups to help you find your way, which makes you feel even more isolated, unappreciated, and exploited for serving your country (Thompson 279). This situation is like what many Vietnam veterans had felt upon returning home from war. Upon their return to the states, veterans displayed severe psychiatric symptoms. The symptoms varied from difficulty sleeping to vivid flashbacks, and are now recognized as PostShow MoreRelatedPolitical And Social Upheavals Caused By War1533 Words   |  7 Pagescaused by war. Some may have even experienced it first-hand. Throughout history war has had negative psychological implications on those effected. However, there is no greater negative impact of war than the psychological and emotional turmoil that it causes individual soldiers. 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The Vietnam War was, in myRead MoreThe Vietnam War And The United States872 Words   |  4 PagesThe Vietnam War was unlike any other war in which the United States has participated. The Vietnam War has many unique attributes, beginning with the unclear reason as to why the U.S. became involved in a war that presented no threat to U.S. citizens or national security. Three unique attributes of the Vietnam War that are very interesting are the U.S. combat strategy, the Vietnamese guerrilla warfare, and the MIA issue. The first interesting attribute is the combat strategy used by the American soldiersRead MoreThe Battle Of Dien Bien Phu1519 Words   |  7 Pages Vietnam Timeline 04/24/2016 Sarah Dustagheer Period 4 Battle of Dien Bien Phu (1954) The Battle of Bien Dien Phu was the first crucial engagement in the first Indochina War. It took place in March 13, 1954 - May 7, 1954. This battle was a symbolic turning point in Indochina. 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People were able to watch the war from their armchair and many American people were disgraced by the images of children dying and innocent people being shot dead in villages. A perfect example of this, is the My Lai massacre which took place in 1968. The images appalled people all over the world, especially American peopleRead MoreVietnam War Turning Point Essay1425 Words   |  6 PagesHome The Vietnam War was a long and bloody war between a communist government against South Vietnam along with its ally, the U.S. After long years of fighting and many deaths, the war ended on April 30, 1975 after President Nixon and the communist government negotiated secretly about a compromise. The paris peace accord solved a long-lasting issue, that was the vietnam war. The Paris Peace Accords was a major turning point in the Vietnam War because it ended the Vietnam War, brought peace to theRead MoreThe War Of The Vietnam War Essay1158 Words   |  5 Pagesâ€Å"The war in vietnam is but a symptom of a far deeper malady within the American spirit.† Martin Luther King, Jr. once said. The Vietnam War was considered one of America’s greatest defeats of all time. Not only did the US failed to stop the spread of communism, but they also embarrassed this country as a whole with the outcome of this war. The overall outcome from this war will be remembered for years to come. I n this essay, I will be talking about how the United States would have won the Vietnam