Centralization to Consolidation: Some Historical Antecedents of Unified Correctional Systems

Abstract

Autonomous prisons in the nineteenth century were often inefficient and highly political. Many state legislatures and governors attempted to move toward centralized control of their state facilities. In the twentieth century the Federal Bureau of Prisons was seen by the Wickersham Commission as a model for institutional centralization. Consolidation of all correctional services was recommended by the National Advisory Commission in 1973. Today only a few states – Alaska, Delaware, Rhode Island, and Vermont – have fully unified adult correctional systems; each is described.