Appendix to the Legislative Journal, Session of 1957, Pennsylvania, pp. 4345-4910. The classic treatise on this subject is: William W. Smithers, Treatise on Executive Clemency in Pennsylvania, Philadelphia: International Printing Co., 1909.
2.
Appendix to the Legislative Journal, Session of 1957, p. 4904.
3.
Ibid., p. 4366.
4.
Ibid., p. 4357.
5.
Information secured from records on file in the office of Justice Thomas D. McBride.
6.
Appendix to the Legislative Journal, Session of 1957, p. 4362.
7.
From a statement of John S. Rice, Commonwealth Secretary, as reported in The Evening Bulletin, Philadelphia: April 11, 1959.
8.
Data on number of prisoners from: National Prisoner Statistics, Number 19, July 1958. Washington. D. C.: Federal Bureau of Prisons.
9.
The 1958 figures are from the files of the Board of Pardons. Including those cases "held under advisement" the author recorded a total of 954 cases, or petitions to the Board.
10.
John C. Yeager, "Summary of Success Rates for Selected Groups of Prisoners Released in Pennsylvania," Dept. of Justice, Bureau of Correction : June 18, 1958. For these 19,317 cases, successes have been checked up to and including May 31, 1956.
11.
Ibid. For these cases, successes have been checked up to and including April 30, 1958.
12.
We are not suggesting by this phrase that the Pardon Board gives any more attention to their cases than does the Parole Board to theirs. We are referring to the fact that the functions of the former body require greater selectivity in granting commutation petitions than do the functions of the Parole Board, which agency desires to have most persons released from penal institutions under supervision. In short, it is desirable to place a prisoner on parole at some time before the expiration of his maximum sentence. Unlike the selectivity of the Board of Pardons. selection for parole is, therefore, principally selection of the best time for parole rather than the best individuals.
13.
See Smithers, op. cit., pp. 143-151.
14.
Throughout the following discussion, we shall employ where appropriate: (a) test of significance of difference between proportions, or, σp1 - p2 = √σP21 + σP22 with its critical ratio, or t value, where t = p1 - p2/σp1-p2 ; also, (b) the chi-square, or, X2 = Σ(O-E)2/E, with a (c) corresponding coefficient of mean square contingency, wherer C = √X2/X2 + N
15.
It is important to note that this number refers to evaluations of petitions to the Pardon Board and not to the number of individual evaluators, for one Judge may have expressed a recommendation in many different cases. Source of these data is from the office of the Board of Pardons, Harrisburg, Penna.
16.
For example, see the testimony of Judge Arthur P. Bretherick before the Joint Legislative Committee Conducting An Investigation of the Board of Pardons, Appendix to the Legislative Journal, pp. 4390-4391.
17.
From the files of the Board of Pardons, Harrrisburg, Pennsylvania.
