Carrol wrote:
> Who said something like "One can measure a society by how it treats its
> outcasts"? And what is the accurate quote?
"The degree of a civilization in a society can be judged by entering its prisons." Dostoevsky, _House of the Dead_
> P.S. Does anyone else on this list subscribe to Prison Legal News? It is
> a truly great journal.
No, but I'll take a look at it on your recommendation. The first place I ran into this quote was in fact on another prison support group publication, The Fortune News, the newsletter of the Fortune Society, a group of mainly ex-inmates helping others with the transition. They've had it at the top of every issue for at least 30 years.
Speaking of degrees of civilization, it struck me when I re-read _Crime and Punishment_ a few years back that even Tsarist Russia had eschewed the death penalty by the 19th century as barbarian.
Michael
__________________________________________________________________________ Michael Pollak................New York City..............mpollak at panix.com