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29 Fed. Probation 3 (1965)
The Prisoner Rehabilitation Act of 1965

handle is hein.journals/fedpro29 and id is 259 raw text is: The Prisoner Rehabilitation Act of 1965
BY SENATOR EDWARD V. LONG
Chairman, United States Senate Subcommittee on National Penitentiaries

AST MARCH, President Johnson sent to the
89th Congress an important and historic
message devoted exclusively to the crime
problem in the United States.
As chairman of the U.S. Senate Subcommittee
on National Penitentiaries, which is deeply con-
cerned with improving the correctional process,
I was particularly pleased that, in outlining the
major goals of his message, the President made
this point:
We cannot tolerate an endless, self-defeating cycle
of imprisonment, release, and reimprisonment which
fails to alter undesirable attitudes and behavior. We
must find ways to help the first offender avoid a con-
tinuing career of crime.
His message included significant proposals
which, I am happy to say, became law during the
1965 session. Among these was the Law Enforce-
ment Assistance Act which, among other things,
authorizes a search for new ways to make the
correctional process more effective.
The President also appointed this summer his
Commission on Law Enforcement and Admin-
istration of Justice, and charged this body of
distinguished citizens with the responsibility of
finding answers tc a number of specific questions
relating to the growing crime problem. One of
these questions was: What correctional pro-
grams are most promising in preventing a first
offense from leading to a career in crime ?
Our Subcommittee on National Penitentiaries
had long been concerned with this very problem.
We believe if society is to salvage offenders more
effectively we must provide a wider range of
facilities and more flexible procedures for their
correctional treatment.
In the Subcommittee report of February 27,
1964, we had urged that the Attorney General
give study to several suggestions introduced in
our January hearings. The report also expressed
the intention of the subcommittee to develop
legislation which would adapt the principle of
Wisconsin's Huber Law to the federal jurisdiction,
and extend the halfway house idea to selected
adult federal prisoners.

Provisions of the New Legislation
Early in the new     year, Attorney    General
Nicholas deB. Katzenbach transmitted to Con-
gress a legislative proposal to facilitate the re-
habilitation  of persons convicted   of offenses
against the United States. It was designed to
amend the provision of law which authorizes the
Attorney General to designate where a convicted
federal prisoner shall be confined and to transfer
him from one institution to another. The new bill
authorized the Attorney General to commit or
transfer prisoners to residential community treat-
ment centers, to grant them brief periods of un-
escorted leave under certain emergency circum-
stances or for purposes related to release pre-
parations, and to permit them to work in private
employment or participate in community training
programs while continuing as prisoners of the
institutions to which they are committed.
It was my pleasure to join with Senator Roman
L. Hruska, the Subcommittee's ranking minority
member, in introducing on April 23, Senate bill
1808, which incorporated these new techniques
for rehabilitation of inmates of federal penal and
correctional institutions. A similar bill, H.R. 6964,
was introduced in the House of Representatives
by Congressman Emanuel Celler, chairman of the
Committee on the Judiciary, and hearings were
conducted by a subcommittee headed by Congress-
man Edwin E. Willis of Louisiana.
The significance of the bill was made appar-
ent by its inclusion in the legislative package re-
quested by the Johnson Administration for an in-
tensified national campaign against crime. The
Attorney General described the measure as a
greatly promising and practical way of helping
to reduce crime.
He said:
The procedures would help to provide the Department
of Justice with much needed additional latitude in
dealing with salvageable convicted offenders. The pro-
posal reflects the growing trend in the correctional field
to augment inherently limited institutional resources
with potentially greater community resources. The Fed-
eral Government has exercised a leadership role in de-
veloping programs of correctional treatment and should
be enabled to employ every promising procedure which
will bring about the reduction of criminal behavior in
the United States.

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