Professional thieves, who are
habitual offenders, ought, with few exceptions, to be sentenced to
imprisonment for life, or for a term equivalent to the probable
remainder of their life.'' The draft Russian code, in 1883,
provides that, ``If it is found that the accused is guilty of
several offences, and that he has committed them through habitual
criminality, or as a profession, the court, when deciding upon the
punishment in relation to the different crimes, may increase it,''
&c. And the Italian penal code, though with much timidity, has
decreed a special increase of punishment for prisoners ``who have
relapsed several times.''
Quite recently, Senator Berenger introduced a measure in France
``on the progressive increase of punishment in cases of relapse,''
which became law on March 26, 1891, under the title of ``the
modification and increase of punishments.''
It is therefore very probable that even the classical criminalists
will end by accepting the indefinite seclusion of hardened
criminals, as they have already come to accept criminal lunatic
asylums, though both ideas are opposed to the classical theories.
This is so true that at the Prison Congress at St.
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