#colonial prisons

“One hundred inmates are employed in Department G. They run a steam laundry. It cares for the laundry of the prison and takes in civilian washing on a commercial basis. Fancy the derision visited upon an inmate who comes back to his mountain home and who in reply to the question of his neighbors as to what kind of work he did while in prison replies that he did the washing! What a blush of shame will mantle his swarthy face as the first astonished breath-holding is followed by a loud cry in unison, “What?” “Women’s work!”

It will require a lot of explaining, perhaps considered as the Philippine equivalent of our defense reaction known as a lie, to disabuse his hearers of the picture summoned up in the minds of his neighbors by his word, "washing," the picture of him standing knee deep in a river among the women, sloshing the clothes up and down in the water and beating them upon a convenient stone. We are assured, however, by the prison authorities that the growth of sanitary laundries and cleaning establishments makes this trade a not undesirable one for ex-convicts. A Westerner wonders why this is not a part of Department H.

The last organized department is H, for the one hundred sixty women in Bilibid. Most of them are sentenced for theft, adultery, and prostitution. They are taught domestic economy, weaving, embroidery, lace-making, and crocheting. This is perhaps the least promising department from the standpoint of industrial training. However, their lace and embroidery command good prices. Women prisoners here, as in the United States, are poorly handled. In addition to the organized departments just described, a number of other trades are taught, incidentally to small numbers, in the maintenance of the prison, such as shoe-making, cooking, baking, nursing, twine and rope making for prison use, gardening, poultry-raising, hair-cutting, clerical work, typing, stenography, and orchestral music. I fear, however, that the word "training" applied to such work of prison maintenance here, as in America, is an accommodation of language. Yet it must be said of Bilibid, what cannot be said of many prisons in the United States, every prisoner is kept busy, from the unruly fellow, who in stripes and chains pulls monotonously back and forth the giant fan over the workers to keep them cool, or those others whom I saw industriously mauling a tough knot of Philippine hard wood - my back and arms ached for them from memories of my own boyhood exertions over dried elm knots – to the artistic woodcarver and rattan weaver, or the 450,000 peso bank embezzler who kept the prison accounts.

The inmates are graded into four grades. Entering the prison, a man is placed in the second grade.  Those in this grade are clothed in blue denim and are allowed certain privileges. Those in the third grade have been demoted from the second grade for misconduct or lack of industry. These are clothed in stripes. They are denied most of the privileges enjoyed by those in the second grade. The first grade is made up of those who have been promoted from the second grade for good conduct over a certain period of time. These enjoy greater privileges and receive a larger wage. The fourth class is made up of trusties. These have still more extended privileges and receive larger pay. All these features are familiar to us in the United States.

Wisely the administration of the prisons of the Philippines has taken measures to keep alive the economic motive. The policy of the administration is to promote a prisoner from grade to grade as rapidly as possible and from one position to another. Ordinarily a prisoner may reach the grade of skilled laborer within a period of six months and then be entitled to receive a certain amount of compensation; until he reaches this grade he earns no wages. A convict who has served a tenth of his term without any bad conduct is made a trusty. A trusty has special privileges denied to others, such as sleeping in special dormitories, eating at a table covered with a tablecloth, served by waiters. He works in some responsible position and receives compensation for his work. There have been instances of convicts who left Bilibid with money enough to carry them through for a considerable period until they could get a job.

The law passed by the Philippine legislature, regulating the compensation of prisoners, is as follows:

Insular prisoners who are or become skilled and semi-skilled workmen may receive compensation for their work from the profits accruing to the credit of the industrial division 6f the Bureau of Prisons by the sale of articles manufactured by the prisoners or from payments made for work performed by them: Provided, that such compensation does not exceed the difference between the gross cost of the prisoner's maintenance and the amount that his services are reasonably worth with the additional proviso, that all prisoners who are in the  same conduct and workmanship classifications, regardless of nature of work, shall receive like compensation.

Half of these earnings are withheld from the prisoners and deposited to their credit and paid to them upon discharge; the other half, on the request of the prisoner, is used for the support of the dependent members of his family or for such personal uses as may be approved by the director of prisons.

A very interesting feature of Bilibid Prison is the school. Every prisoner under thirty years of age gets two periods of schooling a day up to the fourth grade. These classes are taught by prisoners, but the whole school is under a civilian superintendent. Only the elementary subjects and such practical subjects as mechanical drawing, stenography , electricity , telegraphy , and accounting are taught. Since most of the prisoners are quite uneducated, the classes are large. These classes are held in one large building without partitions. When we visited the school the noise seemed very disturbing. I was told that in this prison school many a boy who has not had a chance at an elementary education learns to read and write and the elements of arithmetic. When one considers that all these prisoners are natives, many of them Igorrotes, who a few years ago were head-hunters, one wonders whether the education given them might not be more practical.

Discipline in Bilibid is of the semi-military variety. The chief question asked me by the newspaper reporters after my first visit was, "What about the discipline?" On inquiry I learned that the introduction of strict military discipline a few years ago was looked upon as a distinct innovation, and a progressive measure. This military discipline shows itself in the prisoners standing at military attention when the officers are met, and in the drills which occur each afternoon at five o'clock. The officers believe it has a salutary effect on the deportment of the men. The discipline is not obtrusive when the men are at work. Breach of discipline is punished by reduction in grade, deprivation of privileges, doing hard and disagreeable work.

I was struck by the sight of prisoners in stripes working the large fans hanging from the ceiling over the workrooms. I asked why these men were doing this work, and was told that it was a form of punishment. In another part of the prison we came upon a group of men in stripes mauling a tough knot of wood. It did not seem to me to be worth trying to split it, so I inquired why those five men were working so hard with maul and wedge. "They are being disciplined for something," I was told. A guard stood over them to see that they did not relax their efforts. The solitary confinement cells are kept for only the most recalcitrant. When I was there, there were no inmates. I looked at this large room and found that it was light and airy. Those who attempt to escape or are considered dangerous wear leg irons joined by a chain. These, however, are held up by straps tied to a belt around the waist so that they will not gall the ankles. Among the more than two thousand inmates I should estimate roughly that five per cent were undergoing discipline of some sort.

"Why do you retain stripes and leg irons here, when these things have been condemned by the best penological thought in our country?" I asked the director. "Ah," he replied, "we have to deal with people here in a different stage of social development than those you deal with in the United States. I use these punishments because they have a good effect upon those who see them." I had heard that argument before. Repress and intimidate by exemplifying punishment before their eyes! At the daily "retreat" at five o'clock the prison band plays.

At this "retreat" all the prisoners assemble from the shops to the space beside their respective dormitories. The outstanding group is the "Bilibid Scouts." This is composed of men selected because of good conduct, who live in a separate dormitory, enjoy special privileges, and are trained in maneuvers and gymnastic exercises. The "Scouts" and the band are the "crack" show units of the prison. Almost every day at five o'clock visitors fill a kind of rude gallery built on the roof of  the central tower and watch these performers. It must be said that the maneuvers are very impressive. The director believes that through these exercises an esprit de corps is built up among the prisoners which has a wholesome influence. After the "retreat" the prisoners file away to their dormitories, take their baths, and eat their supper.

All executions in the Islands take place at Bilibid. While twenty-eight men were in the death house when we were there, it was uncertain whether any of them would be executed, as it is necessary in the Islands for each case to be reviewed by the Supreme Court of the Islands, and every one of the nine judges must sign the execution warrant. Even after that the defendant may take an appeal to the Supreme Court of the United States. However, in spite of all these difficulties, a number of men are electrocuted each year, depending largely upon the policy of the Governor-General. The only peculiarity about the mode of execution is the number of witnesses who must be present. On the floor about the chair are painted the names of the different officers who must attend. Not only must the director and his assistant be present, but also a representative of the Supreme Court and of the Governor-General.

“Bilibid is an old prison built by the Spaniards in 1865. A high wall encloses about seventeen acres of ground. Inside that wall the ground is divided into two equal parts by a wall running through the center. In the center of the wall is a circular building with a watchtower from which every part of the enclosure is visible. In this tower, constantly on duty, are two guards armed with rifles. At frequent intervals along the walls are stationed guards similarly armed, while in the tower over the entrance gate and at the corners of the wall are machine guns. At the entrance is the familiar double gate as seen in most American prisons. However, these gates are opened and shut by a man in a tower who operates the gates in response to electric signals from the outside gate. Moreover, he is in a barred enclosure reached by a circular stairway also surrounded by bars so that no one may reach him without a key to the lock at the bottom of the winding stair. Aloft the tower over the entrance is the central telephone switchboard from which a full view of the entire prison yard is provided. In the Spanish days the lower part of the central building referred to above was divided into dark cells, which, when the Americans occupied the city, were filled with political prisoners chained to the walls and floors. These are now used as storerooms, and only a few of the rings are to be seen. The former instruments of torture are to be seen in the museum.

Inside the walls on each side of the dividing wall, the various buildings are arranged like the spokes in a wheel from the central tower building as the hub. Then other buildings are arranged around the walls, workshops for the most part, for the prison is a great manufacturing establishment. Each of these spokes is a dormitory in which the prisoners sleep, or in which certain classes of prisoners are kept. Thus, one of the spokes houses 160 women prisoners. There they live and work. Moreover, their wing is shut off from the others by another wall. Another spoke contains the cells for the condemned prisoners awaiting execution, and the death house with its electric chair. There are no individual cells except the punishment cells, which were empty except for one or two in which were confined men who were suspected of being insane. All prisoners sleep in dormitories, in which there are triple-decked beds. These also serve as the dining rooms for each dormitory to which the food is carried and there eaten on a long center table. There is a large common kitchen. The dividing wall through the prison serves to separate the new arrivals from the other prisoners, the younger prisoners from the older, and the short termer from the long termer. Moreover, an attempt is made to classify the prisoners by segregation in different dormitories. In Bilibid Prison are also housed the jail prisoners of Manila. These, however, are worked outside the walls in gangs on the streets and public works of the city.

Bilibid is a great industrial prison. Various shops occupy some of the large buildings around the grounds. Here are various kinds of industries. There is an automobile repair shop, in which are repaired and repainted not only publicly owned cars, but also private cars, the work covering all the operations from adjusting a carburetor to putting on a new coat of paint. Another shop is devoted to the manufacture of bullock carts. All the work is done by hand in this shop as in most of the others, for it is the belief of the management that the work done in the prison should be as much as possible like that carried on outside. In connection with this shop is a carpenter shop in which lumber is sawed and planed partly by hand and partly by power machinery. The two large industries, however, are the wood and the rattan furniture departments. Bilibid furniture has a world-wide reputation. Here fine furniture is manufactured under the supervision of trained foremen. The work is done on orders from people on the outside. When we were there (January, 1928), the prison was eight months behind on the wooden furniture and a year behind on orders for rattan furniture. These two industries provide most of the profitable work of the prison. Most of the men are employed in them. However, other industries are carried on, among them being blacksmithing, carriage-making and repairing, tailoring, shoe-making and repairing, machine woodworking, tinsmithing, and hammock-weaving. The women make embroidery, do the domestic work of their department, make lace, weave and crochet. For their products, especially embroidery and lace, there is a heavy demand. One thing can be said, everyone able to do so works.

The organization of the industries in Bilibid Prison, designed primarily to provide instructive employment for the inmates and teach the earnest convicts a trade with which to earn a living after they are released, provides for eight main departments in addition to certain miscellaneous activities which also provide a measure of trade training. The following description of the organization by Mr. Alzate, Assistant Director of Prisons in the Philippines, concisely states the organization:

We have at Bilibid Prison an Industrial Division which is operated primarily to provide instructive employment for deserving inmates and to teach every earnest convict a trade with which to earn an honest livelihood after his release. With this end in view, all the industries established in the various departments have been organized into courses of training developed so as to fit the needs and peculiarities of all industrial classes of inmates. The courses of training in the various shops and industrial plants are so laid down that an inmate, when he is received in prison, can be assigned in the calling for which he is best fitted by nature, ability, or past experience. Each industry is placed under the direction of a thoroughly competent Superintendent or Foreman, who is in charge of shop operation, production, and training of the inmates.

The industries of Bilibid Prison are divided into eight departments, numbered from A to H.

In Department A are various mechanical trades. Here are the general machine shop, the electrical, the automobile, and motorcycle repair shops, the carriage shop, the blacksmith shop, the sheet metal shop, and shops for millwrighting, upholstering, and a few other trades. These trades have value as training for prisoners who will be discharged and also as profitable enterprises for the prison. Here you see three hundred men working and repairing all sorts of articles appropriate to such shops in the Philippines. Watch the men in the carriage shop making all kinds of vehicles from carabao carts, heavy wagons, trucks, trailers, street sprinklers, to the fine carriage for the grandee or the pony cart for his children. All kinds of vehicles are repaired and repainted.

In that next building is Department B, where three hundred fifty men make all kinds of furniture from the various fine Philippine hardwoods such as nana, acle, lumbayao, lauan, tonguile, tindalo, and camagon. A thoroughly competent furniture maker is at the head. His assistants are skilled woodcarvers and polishers. Go over to the storeroom where the finished products are kept until they can be sent to those who have ordered them. These artistic tables, chairs, stools, cabinets, etc., have been produced by prisoners from the cutting of the trees on the penal colony lands at Iwahig to the last polishing touch in Bilibid. While the main purpose is to provide occupational training for the prisoners, so much in demand is the product that they are usually behind orders. This department is one of the most profitable in the prison. The men on discharge are in demand by furniture manufacturers on the outside. This department is second only in importance to Department D.  

Department C employs one hundred fifty prisoners on the construction and repair of buildings for the prison and on the manufacture and repair of equipment for the prison. Here the prisoner is trained as carpenter and concrete build many designs, handsome tea-tables, stools, bookracks, flower baskets. Here are bedsteads made of the hardwoods mentioned above but with head and footboards woven of rattan and with rattan bottom in place of our bed springs. Such beds are considered "the thing" in that part of the world, although on the basis of my experience in sleeping on one, I prefer an American bed spring. Split bamboo shades and curtains are produced here. It is this furniture which first made Bilibid furniture world-famous. The medals the prison has received on this furniture at various expositions are as numerous and dazzling as those of a French or Italian World War veteran's. "Nuff said!" So popular is this type of furniture in the Orient that a prisoner who has become skilled in this department can easily get a job on the outside.