No. 635.
Mr. Evarts to Mr. Farman.
Washington, December 30, 1879.
Sir: Your dispatch No. 352, of the 28th ultimo, requesting to be advised in what prison a person sentenced by the United States consular court in Egypt to imprisonment for a term of years could be confined, and also whether the prison for such purpose has facilities for providing the convicts with labor so that they can be sentenced to hard labor as well as confinement, has been received.
In reply I have to state that the convicts should be sent to the United States prison at Smyrna; that it is presumed from the very limited appropriation that the facilities for modern prison discipline are extremely primitive, and that the term hard labor is to be used there technically [Page 999] as expressing the theocratical grade of the penalty in its effect on the convict’s civil status, rather than practically as a means of discipline or prison revenue. The matter would seem to rest in the discretion of the marshal there.
I am, &c.,