Penal Reformers Of The Antebellum Era

Proponents at that point insisted that the Pennsylvania system would involve only mild disciplinary measures, reasoning that isolated men would have neither the resources nor the occasion to violate rules or to escape. But from the outset Eastern State's keepers used corporal punishments to enforce order. Officials used the "iron gag," a bridle-like metal bit placed in the inmate's mouth and chained around his neck and head; the "shower bath," repeated dumping of cold water onto a restrained convict; or the "mad chair," into which inmates was strapped in such a way so as to prevent their bodies from resting.
Ultimately, only three prisons ever enacted the costly Pennsylvania program. But nearly all penal reformers of the antebellum period