It would be ridiculous to suppose that this Republic more than any other builds luxuriously-equipped and comfortable prison-houses, to act as an encouragement for the committing of crime. The object of punishment, we are told, is prevention of evil, and we all know that under no circumstances can it be made incentive to good. The punishments inflicted upon Salvadorean prisoners are based upon much about the same scale as in other countries; but the physical condition of the prisoners as a whole is infinitely better than that which is to be met with in any other Latin-American country, with the two exceptions of Peru and Mexico.[1] Of all three countries I may say with every justice that the present prison system is of a much more lenient and humane nature than that of any other country in either the old or new world. I state this deliberately and after having visited most of the prisons in Latin-American Republics, as well as many of those to be found in Europe and the United States.
[1] See "Mexico of the XXth Century," vol i., pp. 79, 83, 86, and vol. ii., pp. 101, 143, by the same Author.
It is the object of the Government of Salvador to make as much use of prisoners' services as is legitimate, and at the same time to find for them intelligent and useful occupations. While hard work is not always compulsory, and is not always an accompaniment of a sentence to imprisonment, every encouragement is offered to prisoners to engage themselves in some kind of work; and in many instances substantial payments are derived from some of the work thus undertaken, all such payments being carefully preserved for the use of the prisoners, and handed over to them at the time of their release. Thus, for instance, in the Penitenciaría Central, at San Salvador, which is the chief penal establishment in the Republic, many of the prisoners are engaged in making furniture for the public offices, as well as military and police uniforms, boots, etc., likewise for use in the army and the police force. I am not sure whether any payment is made to prisoners for this kind of contribution; but in other penal establishments which I visited I observed that the prisoners were making baskets, mats, toys, and other small articles, which were offered to visitors for a trifling sum, and in other cases were sent to the public market for sale.
