But the
statistics of criminality will never be constant to one rule from
year to year. There will be a dynamical but not a statical
regularity.
Thus the element of fixity in criminal sociology consists in
asserting, not the fatality or predestination of human actions,
including crimes, but only their necessary dependence upon their
natural causes, and therewith the possibility of modifying effects
by modifying the activity of these causes. And, indeed, even
Quetelet himself recognised this when he said, ``If we change the
social order we shall see an immediate change in the facts which
have been so constantly reproduced. Statisticians will then have
to consider whether the changes have been useful or injurious.
These studies therefore show how important is the mission of
the legislator, and how responsible he is in his own sphere for
all the phenomena of the social order.''
The second consequence of the law of criminal saturation, one of
great theoretical importance, is that the penalties hitherto
regarded, save for a few platonic declarations, as the best
remedies for crime, are less effectual than they are supposed to
be. For crimes and offences increase and diminish by a
combination of other causes, which are far from being identical
with the punishments lightly written out by legislators and
awarded by judges.
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