Living My Life - Emma Goldman [212]
The Jefferson City prison was a model in many respects. The cells were double the size of the pest holes of 1893, though they were not light enough, except on very sunny days, unless one was so fortunate as to have a cell directly facing a window. Most of them had neither light nor ventilation. Perhaps Southern people do not care for much fresh air; the precious element certainly seemed tabooed in my new boarding-house. Only in extremely hot weather were the corridor windows opened. Our life was very democratic in the sense that we all received the same treatment, were made to inhale the same vitiated air and bathe in the same tub. The great advantage, however, was that one was not compelled to share one’s cell with anyone else. This blessing could be appreciated by those only who had endured the ordeal of the continuous proximity of another human being.
The contract labour system had been officially abolished in the penitentiary, I was told. The State was now the employer, but the obligatory task the new boss imposed was not much lighter than the toil the private contractor had exacted. Two months were allowed to learn the trade, which consisted in sewing jackets, overalls, auto coats, and suspenders. The tasks varied from forty-five to a hundred and twenty-one jackets a day, or from nine to eighteen dozen suspenders. While the actual machine work on the different tasks was the same, some of them required double physical exertion. The full complement of work was demanded without regard to age or physical condition. Even illness, unless of a very serious nature, was not considered sufficient cause for relieving the worker. Unless one had previous experience in sewing, or a special aptitude for it, the achievement of the task was a source of constant trouble and worry. There was no consideration for human variations, no allowance for physical limitations, except for a few favourites of the officials, who were usually the most worthless.
The shop was dreaded by all the inmates, particularly on account of the foreman. He was a boy of twenty-one who had been in charge of the treadmill since he was sixteen. An ambitious young man, he was very clever in pressing the tasks out of the women. If insults failed, the threat of punishment brought results. The women were so terrorized by him that they rarely dared to speak up. If anyone did, she became his special target for persecution. He was not even averse to robbing them of a part of their work and then reporting them for impudence, thus increasing their punishment for being short of the task. Four unfavourable marks a month meant a drop in the grade, which in return brought a loss of “good time.”
The Missouri penitentiary was run on the merit system, of which Grade A was the highest. To attain that goal meant to have one’s sentence reduced almost by half, at least so far as the State prisoners were concerned. We Federals might work ourselves to death without benefiting by our efforts. The only reduction of time we were allowed was the usual two months off each year. The dread of failing to reach Class A whipped the non-Federals beyond their strength in an attempt to accomplish the task.
The foreman was of course but a cog in the prison machine, the centre of which was the State of Missouri. It was doing business with private firms, drawing its customers from every part of the United States, as I soon discovered by the labels we had to sew on the things we manufactured. Even poor old Abe had been turned into a sweater of convict labour: the Lincoln Jobbing House of Milwaukee had the picture of the Liberator on its label, bearing the legend: “True