Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology

Volume 48 | Issue 5 Article 1

1958

Pioneers in Criminology XV--Enrico Ferri

(1856-1929)
Thorsten Sellin

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Justice Commons

Recommended Citation
Thorsten Sellin, Pioneers in Criminology XV--Enrico Ferri (1856-1929), 48 J. Crim. L. Criminology & Police Sci. 481 (1957-1958)

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 POLICE SCIENCE BOOK REVIEWS
i

Edited by
Richard L. Holcomb*

POLICE AND THE PEOPLE. By Paul A. Ashen- cialists in the field exceed half a billion dollars
hurst, Charles C Thomas Publisher, Spring- anunally.
field, Ill., 1957. Pp. 197. Followers instead of leaders in adopting ad-
Public fear of police encroachment on indi- ministrative techniques to match current condi-
vidual rights has always been an underlying tions, police departments have again demon-
feeling of the American people, perhaps an in- strated their tardiness in failing to fall in line
heritance of our forefathers whose love for free- with others in recognizing the value of public
dom gave birth to this nation. Where there is relations. Inspector Ashenhurst points out this
fear, there is misunderstanding. What, then, failing and does something constructive to cor-
can American police do to dispel this fear and rect it.
create understanding and cooperation between The author believes that a large highly
their departments and the people they serve? trained staff of public relations experts is not
Inspector Paul H. Ashenhurst with 35 years required for a police department, but a good
of police experience seeks to answer this ques- job can be done if the chief, commanding offi-
tion with a collection of practical ideas on how cers, and every member of the department are
the police administrator and his men can win awakened to the need for better public relations
friends and influence people. It is a timely 197 and are given basic instructions on how to
page writing under the title, Police and the achieve them.
People, directed at police public relations. He lists the determinative factors in the
Public realtions as a specific field of endeavor attitude of the public toward the police as:
is comparatively new. Just two decades ago a 1. Newspaper and radio publicity.
search of the Manhattan classified telephone 2. Personal contacts by the citizen with the
directory would have yielded only ten names policeman.
listed under the designation "Public Relations." 3. What others say about the police.
And vain would have been the attempt to find 4. What the citizen observes of the indi-
such courses of study in our colleges and uni- vidual police officer.
versities. Each of these points is developed by the author
But today that same telephone book lists with suggestions as to procedure in attaining
seven columns of several hundred names de- the best of public relations. He recognizes that
voted to public relations; and there are now a basic factor in properly utilizing each of the
653 colleges offering courses on the subject or four categories as a means of favorably reach-
related to it. Private and public institutions ing the public is the acquisition of good per-
and every type and kind of organization deal- sonnel and the training of them. "We do not
ing in commodities and services have accepted hire policemen; we select good men and make
the need for public relations as a specific under- policemen out of them," he writes.
taking requiring expert attention. How much Care in police dress, supplemented by careful
money is spent in achieving better public rela- and continuous inspection is important. As a
tions would be impossible to estimate, but it is morale builder and method of individual en-
known that the salaries and fees of hired spe- couragement to the officer, all commendations
* Chief, Bureau of Police Sciences, Institute of of an officer, whether by letter, telephone, or in
Public Affairs, State Univ. of Iowa, Iowa City person should be carefully preserved in the
 POLICE SCIENCE BOOK REVIEWS [Vol 48

officer's personnel file and called to his attention and his organization meet the challenge of win-
through a systematic procedure. ning friends and influencing people.
The annual report of a police department is Inspector Ashenhurst argues for a planned
valuable as an instrument of better public rela- program of better public relations within our
tions. Dry statistics should be presented in in- police departments, large or small. He believes
teresting form through the use of charts, that, unlike other professional men whose con-
graphs, and photographs, and an attractive duct and actions usually reflect on themselves
cover should be used. Distribution of the re- alone, the policeman's acts and omissions are
ports should be to sources that will do the most never relegated to him alone, but attach to the
good, to city officials, other police departments, whole police department. This emphasizes the
newspapers, business men, women's clubs, and importance of the individual officer in achiev-
those who do specific work with the police. ing better relations with the public. "With a
The author advocates community leadership concrete plan and competent supervision, we
as a responsibility of the chief of police if good can succeed," he concludes.
public relations are to be obtained. Through his While many police departments are utilizing
example and encouragement the individual offi- a number of the ideas advanced by Inspector
cer can take part in civic and community affairs Ashenhurst, he is to be congratulated for re-
to the extent time permits and with beneficial emphasizing the points again and in offering
results. them in simple and readable form to those who
In other chapters labeled Employee Rela- have not yet awakened to the importance of
tions, Human Relations, Race Relations, and police public relations.
Press Relations, the author continues to ad- BERNARD C. BRANNON
vance specific ideas for personal and depart- Chief of Police
mental conduct that will help the policeman Kansas City, Mo.

Book Notes

THE TROUBLE WITH Cops. By Albert Deutsch, THE DIcTIONARY OF PoisoNs. By Ibert and Eleano
Crown Publishers, New York 1955, Pp. 243. Mellan. Philosophical Library, New York, 1956.
$3.00. Pp. 150. $4.75.
The title of this book pretty well sets the theme- This book is not complete enough to be of use to
a sensational, negative approach. According to the a physician, and since it fails to deal with the detec-
dust cover, Mr. Deutsch is a famous crusading tion of poisonous substances, it is of no use to a
journalist. This does not qualify him to do much toxicologist. It might prove useful for lay persons
more than he has done here, write a book that seems who are charged with the responsibility of overseeing
based on visiting some police officers and going large groups of children, such as camp counselors,
through newspaper files on cases of corruption.
etc. Because of the large number of technical terms
Incidentally, many law enforcement officers do not
used, such as acetylcholine, dichloroethyl ether,
like to be called "cops". This includes some who
etc., it would be of little use in the home. It does
Mr. Deutsch quotes as though they were old friends
of his. however, repeatedly give the sage advice, CALL
This book probably will not harm law enforce- A PnYsiciAN!
ment, nor will it help it. RLH
 The Journal of
CRIMINAL LAW, CRIMINOLOGY, AND POLICE SCIENCE

VOL. 48 JANUARY-FEBRUARY 1958 NO. 5

PIONEERS IN CRIMINOLOGY

XV-ENRICO FERRI (1856-1929)

THORSTEN SELLIN

Professor Sellin is chairman of the Department of Sociology, University of Pennsylvania; editor of

the Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science (since 1929); and president of
the International Society of Criminology. From time to time, during the last thirty years he has pub-
]ished articles in the Journal on a variety of subjects of interest to criminologists.
The accompanying photograph by Giacomo Brogi, Florence, is reproduced from "The Italy of
the Italians", published by Charles Scribners and Sons. It represents Ferri in middle thirties.
-EDITOR.

edition of his "Criminal Sociology," which was

being printed when he died. During the intervening
five decades he became the acknowledged leader of
the so-called positive school of criminal science,
a highly successful trial lawyer and Italy's perhaps
greatest contemporary forensic orator, member of
Parliament, editor of the Socialist newspaper,
"Avanti," indefatigable public lecturer, university
professor, author of highly esteemed scholarly
works, founder of a great legal journal, and a
tireless polemicist in defense of his ideas. His was a
rich and varied life, to which no brief article can
do justice.
In the book, which Ferri published in 1928 on
the "Principles of Criminal Law,"' a work which
contained the systematic presentation of the legal
principles of the positive school, he listed what he
himself regarded as his most important contribu-
tions. They were the demonstration that the con-
cept of freedom of will has no place in criminal
law; that social defense is the purpose of criminal
justice; the three types of factors in crime causa-
tion; the classification of criminals in five classes;
ENRco FERRI penal substitutes as means of indirect social de-
fense; motivation, rather than the objective nature
When Enrico Ferri died, April 12, 1929, one of of the crime, as the basis for sanctions; the demand
the most colorful and influential figures in the that farm colonies be substituted for cellular
history of criminology disappeared. Born at San isolation of prisoners by day; the indeterminate
Benedetto Po in the province of Mantua, February sentence instead of the dosage by fixed terms o
25, 1856, his active life spanned more than half a institutionalization; the demand that hospitals
century, beginning with the publication of his 1 PRINCIPI IIDI DIRITTO CRIMINALE. xvi, 848 pp.
dissertation in 1878 and ending with the fifth Torino: UTET, 1928.
 THORSTEN SELLIN [Vol. -48

for the criminal insane be established; the abolition made a fine record in mathematics and showed an
of the jury; the stress on the use of indemnification interest in Latin; he simply ignored the require-
as a sanction in public law; and the principle that ment in Greek and was forced to "cheat" in his
4
the crime must be studied in the offender. final examination for the diploma.
Other observers have been inclined to add to this Ferri now enrolled at the University of Bologna
list his invention of the term the "born criminal," where he was to spend three years. The first two of
the introduction of the concept of legal iather than them were evidently much devoted to extra-
moral responsibility, his pioneer work in estab- curricular student activities. He attended the
lishing criminal sociology, and his propaganda for lectures in legal medicine and in criminal law, the
the scientific training of judges and correctional latter given by Pietro Ellero, a prominent represent-
personnel. ative of the so-called "classical school." The third
One manner (usually chosen for a brief biog- year he settled down to serious study. It was then
raphy) of dealing with the work of Enrico Ferri he conceived a thesis in which he tried to demon-
would be to pass quickly over his personal life and strate that the concept of free will, implicit in the
systematically indicate the nature of his scientific current criminal law, was a fiction, and that the
and philosophical contributions in their final form. pretended moral responsibility of a criminal based
But anyone who has immersed himself in the on that fiction should give way to the concept of
writings of Ferri and about him would agree that social or legal responsibility, almost every person,
Ferri, the man, is as fascinating as Ferri, the regardless of his nature being "socially account-
scholar. In this article, I shall, therefore, attempt able" for his actions by the fact that he was a
both to tell the story of his life and to show the member of society and not because he was capable
gradual development of his thinking on crimino- of willing the illegal act. The thesis was brilliantly
logical and criminal law problems, especially defended in 1877 and won him a scholarship.
during his youth and early manhood. He had struck his first blow at the theories of
Ferri was the son of a poor salt and tobacco the classical school and proceeded promptly to
shop keeper.2 His early education was somewhat spend the next academic year at the University
perturbed-private tutoring for two years, then of Pisa, where the acknowledged master and
two years at a school in Mantua where he "learned leader of the traditional philosophy of criminal
nothing," failure in an examination when he tried law, Francesco Carrara, held the chair in that
to jump a school year, transfer to another school subject. Ferri attended lectures, argued with
where he was almost expelled for truancy (he had everybody about his ideas (he was nicknamed
become a bicycle enthusiast), taken out of school "free will Ferri"), and practiced his own system of
by his father who threatened to put him to manual elocution in preparation for a teaching career.
labor, repentance after a week and return to the Later he referred to these exercises in the following
ginnasio, where shortly he took a successful final words: "At Pisa I did not as yet think of the bar,
examination qualifying him to enter the Liceo being all immersed in the thought of gaining a
Virgilio in Mantua.. university chair in spite of my scientific hetero-
At the Liceo, he made a beginning at finding
contributed to a volume honor of his teacher in 1898
himself. Not yet sixteen, he fell under the influence and reprinted in his STUDI SULLA CRIMINALITA ED ALTRI
of a great teacher, Roberto Ardig6, who had just SAGGI (viii, 542 pp. Torino: Bocca, 1901), pp. 474-77.
published a book, "Psychology as a Positive See also his commemorative article, Roberlo Ardigb,
published after Ardigb's suicide in 1920 in LA SCUOrA
Science," and had left his clerical robe to devote PosiTivA, ser. 3, vol. 11, pp. 289-94, 1920.
himself to independent philosophical study. The 4 His stratagem apparently evoked no moral indig-

adolescent Ferri found in Ardigb's lectures a brain nation, for in later life Ferri told the story publicly.
In a defense speech in a forgery case in 1923, while
food "which decided my scientific orientation for discussing signatures, he mentioned how he invented
the rest of my life." 3 Among other subjects, he his own characteristic one. "During the examination
for the liceal diploma, I made a show of writing the
2 Biographical details have been garnered from the paper in Greek, which I did not know and which was
book of his disciple and co-worker BRUNO FRA=cHI, written by my very dear fellow-student Achille Loia.
entitled ENRIco FEREi, IL NOTO, IL MAT NOTO, E L'IG- To distract the professor's attention, I began writing
NORATo. (183 pp. Torino: Bocca, 1908) and from auto- my name in various ways and finally in the manner I
biographical notes frequently found scattered in Ferri's have since repeated for fifty years." See his Dn'EsE
writings. PENALI (3 vols., 3d ed. Milano: UTET, 1925), vol. 2,
3Ferri often acknowledged Ardigb's influence, p. 686. Ferri had reciprocated by writing Loria's
especially in a brief article, Ricordi liceali, which he examination in mathematics.
1958] PIONEERS IN CRIMINOLOGY-FERRI

doxy. But in the interest of this future chair I Ferri would, within a few years, answer that
felt a need to engage in pulmonary gymnastics, question of his in the affirmative, but at the mo-
make speaking easy, and acquire the habit of ment he was getting ready to leave for France,
order and clarity of exposition. I forced myself having won a travelling fellowship by his disserta-
daily-at spots removed from the traffic on the tion. He was to spend a year in Paris. He had set
beaches, along the Arno outside the city--to talk for himself the task of making a study of the trends
aloud for an hour at a stretch, improvising on some and characteristics of criminality in France during
topic which I picked at random from a number of half a century, using the data of the judicial crimi-
cards that I had prepared and put into my pocket nal statistics which had been appearing since 1826,
before leaving home." 5 and which had been little exploited by scholars
Part of the year was spent in revising his disser- since the early days of Quetelet and Guerry.
tation and preparing it for the printer. Before the The collection of the data for his project ab-
end of the term, Carrara, who must have regarded sorbed a great deal of his time, but he also studied
his twenty-year old opponent with a mixture of German at Melzi's institute (he never really
amusement and irritation, and once exclaimed that learned English), attended the lectures of
"instead of learning from us Ferri has come to Laboulaye, political theorist, and Quatrefages,
teach us," permitted him to deliver a lecture on physical anthropologist, and wrote a lengthy
criminal attempts from the point of view of the review of Lombroso's book. In November, 1878, he
"newer ideas." It was to be the first of many, for sent the review to the "Rivista Europea" which
three years before his death, he estimated that he published it.9
had by then delivered some 2300 university lectures He commended Lombroso for having "gone in
and over 600 public lectures of a scientific nature search of the characteristics that should reveal
(on some 40 topics), not counting addresses in to us... the habitual, incorrigible criminal, who
6
court and thousands of political speeches. is such.., because of the inexorable tyranny of
When he published his dissertation in the his own organic constitution, inherited from his
summer of 1878, 7 he sent a copy to Lombroso who ancestors; a criminal who persists in evil ... and
had just brought out the second edition of his who is not reformable by the old spiritualistic
"Criminal Man." Years later, Ferri reported that systems, according to which man commits a crime
Lombroso "responsed in an encouraging and or is good, reforms or relapses solely by the fiat
congratulatory manner, but... gave our mutual of his own will and not due to the necessary effect
friend Filippo Turati... the following appraisal of of the conditions in which he is placed by a given
my book, in which I explicitly affirmed my inten- environment." He was especially pleased to see so
tion to apply the positive method to the science many case histories in the book, for they provided
of criminal law: 'Ferri isn't positivist enough! ' I "a vivid scientific material for any one who wants
remember that at that time, burdened as I was by to search for general juridical principles, not in
a remnant of scholastic and metaphysical concepts abstractions of metaphysical character but in the
(because of which, as Garofalo said, and as I have study of those living beings who, while absent from
since declared and demonstrated in successive all ancient and modern treatises of criminal law
publications, my theory of imputability was little encounter us at every step in the courts of assizes
in harmony with the preceding negation of free and the lower courts. He [i.e. Lombroso] thus offers
will and with the beginning renovation of the us a first ray of light to dispel the most serious
criminal law) Lombroso's opinion seemed to me contradictions at least, which in practice always
inexact and exaggerated. And I wrote to Turati: arise between the conclusions of psychiatry and the
'What,! Does Lombroso suggest that I, a lawyer, so-called eternal verities of an aprioristic criminal
should go and measure the heads of criminals science."
in order to be positivist enough?!' ",s As for the statement by Lombroso that crime is a
5
DIFESE PENALI, vol., p. 5.
6Cited by Teresa Labriola in an article on Enrico criminale positiva. (1886) Reprinted in Smni suLrLA
Ferri, in ScaRn n ONORE Di ENuco FEPam PER 3 CRIMINALTA ED ALTRI SAGGI, pp. 234-329; p. 245;
CINQUANTMSIMO A'NO DI SUO INSEGNAMIEN'O UNI- extract from a symposium with the same title, of which
VERSITAIUO (526 pp. Torino: UTET, 1929), p. 265. he, Lombroso, Garofalo, and Fioretti were co-authors.
7 9Studi Criticisu "L'Uomo delinquente" del Prof. C.
LA NEGAZIONE DEL LIBERO ARBIMI E LA TEORIcA
DELL'IMPUTABILITA, 476 pp. Lombroso. Reprinted in STuDI SULLA cRmahNArr.L
s ENmico FEmu, Polemica in difea della scuola ED ALTRI SAGGI, pp. 1-12.
 THORSTEN SELLIN [Vol. 48

natural necessity-a statement which had caused faced tough opposition. One very influential Coun-
his critics to point out that one could hardly punish cil member, averse to his views, nearly defeated
a person unless one assumed his moral responsi- his application, but finally he received his license
bility-Ferri simply replied that Lombroso had and promptly afterward gave his introductory
been grossly misunderstood. Crime is not a social lecture at the University on "Penal Substitutes."10
need but it is inevitable in society. But equally By this term he meant all the social measures,
inevitable is the law, because society believes including non-criminal legislation, which a nation
that punishments are necessary and inevitable for might take in order to prevent crime and thereby
its protection. Since society has the right to defend reduce the need for using criminal sanctions. It was
itself against aggressors, it has the right to punish. in this lecture that he stated what he called his
That is all there is to justice. Justice is the will of law of criminal saturation, according to which the
the majority, which considers a given provision level of a country's criminality is determined by
necessary. "When an institution is desired by the factors in the social environment and changes
majority of the citizens as being necessary for the when they change.
public welfare, it is-and only because of Ferri completed his analysis of the French data
this-just." Ferri was to be quite consistent in and prepared a manuscript for publication while
holding this view. Toward the end of his life it he was in Turin." He had begun that research
helped him to come to terms with fascism and because he recognized that Lombroso's studies,
even to accept, within certain limits, the death which had been largely limited to habitual and
penalty to.which he had been a lifelong opponent. insane prisoners, dealt only with a narrow aspect
If he had not been a complete positivist when he of the problem of criminality. "Crime," he said,
left Italy, his stay in France completed his educa- "like every other human action, is the effect of
tion. He later looked upon his study of the French multiple causes, which, although always inter-"
criminal statistics and his attendance at the lec- laced in' an indissoluble net, can nevertheless be
tures of Quatrefages as a "healthful naturalistic separated for research purposes. The factors of
bath from which I issued a true and convinced crime are anthropological or individual, physical
positivist." It is not that he accepted the positivis- or telluric, and social. Anthropological factors
tic philosophy in toto, but that he would from then are: the offender's age, sex, civil status, occupation,
on repeatedly declare that the "experimental," residence, social class, degree of training and educa-
i.e. inductive method of investigation, the method tion, organic and mental constitution. Physical
of Galileo and Bacon, was the only one that would factors are: race, climate, fertility and distribution
yield knowledge that would permit a nation to deal of soil, the daily cycle, the seasons, the meteoro-
intelligently with the problem of crime. logical factors, the annual temperature. Social
It is not surprising that Ferri went to the factors are: increase or decrease of population,
University of Turin the following year: Lombroso migration, public opinion, customs and religion,
was professor of legal medicine there. Some time the nature of the family; political, financial and
before he left Paris in the spring of 1879, Ferri commerical life; agricultural and industrial pro-
had asked the Council of Higher Education in duction and distribution; public administration
Rome for a license as titular docent in criminal of safety, education and welfare; penal and civil
12
law and had also applied to the University of legislation, in general.
Turin for a docentship in criminal procedure with He chose the social factors for investigation for
the right to hold examinations. To qualify for this two good reasons: the scope of the investigation
latter position he lectured on the jury system of the "phenomenon of crime" needed to be
before the examining committee. He remained a widened, and these factors had a more direct
consistent opponent to jury trials for ordinary relationship with sociology and legislative practice.
crimes, for in a scientifically oriented court pro-
I0 Dei soslitutii penali,ARCH. DI PSlCHIATRIA, Vol. 1,
cedure, judges trained in the social and psychologi- 1880.
cal sciences would be better able to dispose of " Studi sidla criminalild in Francia del 1826 al 1878,
offenders properly. The lecture, which won him secondo i dadl contenuti nei "Comptes generaux de
L'administration de la Justice criminelle". ANNALI
the docentship, grew into a celebrated monograph DI STATISTICA, serl. 2, vol. 21, 1881; reprinted in SruDi
published late in 1880. SULLA CRUNALIT), ED AI.TII SAGGI, pp. 17-59. Cita-
tions are to the reprint.
In the Council at Rome, Ferri's application '12 Ibid., p. 18.
19581 PIONEERS IN CRIMINOLOGY-FERRI

Even when the legislator in this area of "social believed he had identified. The classification
pathology" had some understanding of the im- included "(1) the born or instinctive criminal,
portance of anthropological and physical factors who carries from birth, through unfortunate
there was little he could do to modify them; social heredity from his progenitors (criminals, alcoholics,
factors could be influenced because they were syphilitics, subnormals, insane, neuropathics,
more tractable. His findings convinced him of the etc.) a reduced resistance to criminal stimuli and
wisdom of his judgement, for he arrived at the also an evident and precocious propensity to crime;
conclusion that criminality had shown an enormous (2) the insane criminal, affected by a clinically
increase (i.e. total criminality, divided into identified mental disease or by a neuropsychopathic
offenses against persons, property and public condition which groups him with the mentally
order) in France, and at the conviction that since diseased; (3) the passional criminal, who, in two
both physical and anthropological factors undergo varieties, the criminal through passion (a prolonged
relatively minor changes in time, changes in the and chronic mental state) or through emotion
social environment must have been responsible for (explosive and unexpected mental state), repre-
the increase. 3 sents a type at the opposite pole from the criminal
This first empirical study of Ferri's, begun in a due to congenital tendencies and, besides having
positivistic spirit and pursued with great skill, was good personal antecedents, has a normal moral
very well received. He was soon after (1882) character, even though he is nervously very ex-
appointed by the Minister of Justice, Zanardelli, citable; (4) the occasional criminal who constitutes
a member of the Commission on Judicial and No- the majority of lawbreakers and is the product of
tarial Statistics and remained as such for a dozen family and social milieu more than of abnormal
years. personal physico-mental conditions, and therefore
Ferri had gone to Turin, because of his belief has psychological traits less deviating from those of
that "in order to formulate principles concerning the social class to which he belongs; (5) the habitual
crimes, penalties, and criminals, it is firsi necessary criminal, or rather, the criminal by acquired habit,
to study... criminals and prisons, since facts who is mostly a product of the social environment
should precede theories. "I therefore went for a year in which, due to abandonment by his family, lack
to Turin to study with Lombroso and, as his of education, poverty, bad companions in urban
student, visited prisons, mental hospitals, and centers, already in his childhood begins as an
laboratories."' 4 It was the year in which Lombroso occasional offender; add to this his moral deforma-
started to edit his periodical, the ARcmVo DI tion, caused or not hindered by contemporary
PsicHLATh. Ferri contributed to its first volume prison systems where he enters into contacts with
not only his lecture on penal substitutes but also a other and worse criminals in the prisons, as well as
a paperontherelationship of criminal anthropology the difficulties of social readaption once he has
and criminal law,' s which contained what he served his term, and he will acquire the habit of
alvays regarded as one of his basic ideas, a scientific criminality and, besides constant recidivism, may
classification of criminals, which would serve as
actually come to make crime a trade.""6
the basis for a rational system of sanctions. In
Ferri did not believe that every criminal always
presenting this classification, consisting of five
fitted completely into his classification. Classes do
classes, he coined the term "born criminal" to
designate the atavistic type which Lombroso not exist in nature, he said, but they are a neces-
sary instrument by which the human mind can
13Two decades later, Ferri added a footnote to the
better understand the multiform reality of things.
reprinted study, in which he congratulated himself on
having stressed the importance of social factors as In daily life, criminals would often not appear so
early as in 1880. This, he said, proved that Italian and well-defined as the classification suggested.
French critics, who claimed that the positive school
dealth only with anthropological factors, were wrong. Rather, a judge would find that the defendant
It also served "to explain the logical evolution of my would present mixed characteristics. This realiza-
thinking, which has gradually, but on the basis of tion was to cause Ferri, in a near future, to study
scientific research in the field of both general and of
criminal sociology, arrived at the ultimate conse- the murderer with greater care in order to acquire
quences of socialistic doctrines" Ibid., p. 19.
"Polemica in difesa della scuola criminale posiliva, 16As elaborated in his L'OMIcmA NELLA PSICOLOGIA
loc. cit. E NELLA PSICOPATOLOGIA cRnmiNALE. 2d ed.-L'OMI-
I Dr limilifra diritlo penale ed antropologia crini- cmio-Suicmio. RESPONSABiLITA GrU'RmicA. 5th ed.
nale ARcH. Di rsIcH. I, pp. 444 if, 1880-81. (xii, 768 pp. Torino: UTET, 1925), pp. 54-5.
 THORSTEN SELLIN [Vol. 48

knowledge about aggressive dangerous criminals exact, and always challenging prose."" It was this
that would aid judges in identifying them as such. lecture, which grew into his best known work, the
The classification remained unchanged in Ferri's "Criminal Sociology."' 9
mind for most of his life. In fact, his addition of a Ferri was a born and imaginative teacher. He
sixth class in the fifth edition of his "Sociologia began at Bologna a plan which he continued to
Criminale" (1929-30) appears to have been a kind follow later in teaching criminal law-he took his
of afterthought which, although clear, was so students on a tour of penal institutions and mental
poorly integrated that he forgot or had no time to hospitals, true to his belief that the future system
revise other sections of his book that still men- of criminal justice must be administered by people
tioned only five classes. Even his co-worker, who have a knowledge of the criminal.
Arturo Santoro, who had seen his book through In the fall of 1881 he began a study of 699 pris-
press, later mentions only the five classes in his oners in the prisons of Castelfranco Emilia and
biography of Ferri. Yet, in the work just men- Pesaro, 301 insane in the mental hospital of
tioned, Ferri said: "To these five categories of Bologna and 711 soldiers in the military barracks
voluntary criminals it is necessary to add a class, of Bologna, the soldiers being a control group so
which is becoming more and more numerous in our selected that they would belong to the same sec-
mechanical age and in the vertiginous speed of tions of Italy from which the experimental groups
modern life, namely the involuntary criminals... came. The research was based on individual case
They are pseudo-criminals who cause damage and studies. He assembled as much information about
peril by their lack of foresight, imprudence, negli- each individual as possible from the institution's
gence or disobedience of regulations rather than records, observed each prisoner discretely in his
through malice, and they represent various degrees
isQuoted in FRANCHI, op. cit.,
p. 94.
of dangerousness." Some of them have a weak
"9The first and second editions of 1881 and 1884
sense of moral sensitivity, some lack technical carried the title I NUOVI ORRIZONTI DEL )IRITTO E
knowledge, some are inattentive, and others are DELLA PROCEDURA PENALE. The third edition, with
the title of SOCIOLOGIA CRIMINALE was issued in 1892.
exhausted.7
(He had defined the term criminal sociology in an article
Between Ferri and the twenty years older published in 1882.) In the preface Ferri observed that
Lombroso there began a deep and lasting friend- the new title was more in harmony with the content
of the book and he characterized the opus as "a work
ship marked by mutual respect and profit to both, of propaganda and an elementary guide for anyone
for while Ferri owed much of his system of ideas to who intends to dedicate himself to the scientific study
the stimulation of Lombroso, he also became the of offenders and of the means of prevention and social
defense against them. Hence the almost superabundant
catalyst who synthesized the latter's concepts with citations and the voluminous bibliography." The fourth
those of the sociologist and had no little influence edition came in 1900 and he claimed that he had ex-
amined all the literature of the previous decade to
on Lombroso's thinking. complete his documentation. The fifth and final edition
Ferri stayed but a year in Turin. Pietro Ellero was published in two volumes in 1929 (vol. I) and 1930,
had been appointed a justice of the Supreme post-humously. Arturo Santoro, who had been assisting
Ferri, and who had been asked to complete the foot-
Court and before he left his chair at Bologna he notes, wrote the preface and saw the work through to
expressed the desire that Ferri be appointed as his publication. It seems clear that in the nearly three
decades between the last two editions, Ferri had
successor. Ferri thus returned to his Alma Mater found less and less time to keep up with the literature,
as professor of criminal law three years after re- except that of his own country. Of the circa 4700 foot-
note references in the 5th edition less than 1100 date
ceiving his degree. In December 1880, before he from this century and 75 percent of these are to Italian
was twenty-five years old, he held his introductory sources, compared with 48 percent of the references to
works published before 1900. Ferri used to say during
lecture on the subject of "the new horizons in his later years that he found nothing written of such
criminal law and procesure." One present de- importance that it had caused him to change his views.
scribed it as one of those events "that are epoch- Translations of this or that edition were published
in different countries. A partial translation into English
making in university annals." The young professor of the third edition appeared in a "Criminology Series",
"spoke impassionately for two hours, with growing edited by a British clergyman, W. DOUGLAS MORRISON
(CRIminAL SOCIOLOGY, xx, 284 pp., London and New
enthusiasm, irresistibly. Borne upon impetuous York: Appleton, 1896), who, according to Ferri,
waves of eloquence were the daring, magnificent omitted the entire first section of the work, because it
was too heterodox. The American Institute of Criminal
and original ideas dressed in a limpid, imaginative, Law and Criminology sponsored a translation of the
fourth edition (CRIMINAL SoCIoLoGY, xiiii, 577 pp.
17SOCIOLOGIA CRIMINALE, 5th ed. vol. II, pp. 295-6. Boston: Little, Brown, and Co., 1917).
 19581 PIONEERS IN CRIMINOLOGY-FERRI

cell or in the prison yard, interviewed him and criminality" were written. The book on homicide-
examined him for about half an hour, on the aver- suicide was published and a second edition of his
age, one part of the examination being somatic, "New Horizons." The International Prison Con-
the other psychological. Out of this research which gress, in 1885, and the simultaneous first Congress
occupied him intensively for three years, grew his of Criminal Anthropology gave him an oppor-
monograph on homicide-suicide and his work on tunity to present his views on prison reform in an
homicide, both of them important.n address on the cellular (i.e. Pennsylvanian)
And so he finally also "measured the heads of system and the labor of prisoners, in which he
criminals!" A few years later, 1886, be was to condemned the cellular system as the greatest
write: "Having digested and assimilated some mistake of the century.
kilograms of criminal statistics and added some But, he was soon to leave, for a long time,
anthropological researches, I believed that I had the calm atmosphere of the university. In the
gained an adequate enough concept of reality to province of Mantua a large group of peasants were
be able to undertake the construction of a truly being prosecuted for incitement to civil war,
positive legal system. That is what I am now doing the case having grown out of certain troubles be-
with the monograph on homicide, studied both tween them and their landlords. Ferri was engaged
naturalistically and juridically, at which I have as one of their defense attorneys. His brilliant
been working for three years (because positivistic socio-economic address to the court secured their
studies are slower and more difficult than the con- acquittal.2 Two months later, in May, 1886,
struction of fantastic syllogisms) and which will be, Mantua elected him a deputy to the national
I hope, an eloquent response, for my part, to the Parliament, where he was to sit, through eleven
minute criticisms now being directed at us even re-elections, until 1924, representing various
though the scientific edifice of the new school is boroughs of the country.
unfinished (we have worked at it only seven years) The election was a personal victory, because
... Then I also understood clearly what'Lombroso Ferri carried no party label. His studies had
meant by his opinion of my first book and therefore brought him close to socialism, but the brand of
I now understand the psychological state of mind naive utopian socialism current in Italy did not
and the intellectual phase in which our critics appeal to his rational mind. He had at various
find themselves, for at that time, I too did not times pointed out to those who claimed that a
have that scientific attitude, which can only be socialist society would eliminate crime that crime
acquired by the methodical examination of facts."-" is an inevitable phenomenon and that every
He had already left Bologna, before the works society, whatever its nature, had its own forms of
just mentioned were seen in print. In 1882, he criminality. Where in a feudal society crimes
accepted a chair at the University of Siena, where against the person dominated; in a capitalistic
he remained for four years. This was a fruitful society, crimes of theft and fraud prevailed; in a
period of teaching and study. Papers on "the right socialist society, new forms would arise. His
to punish as a social function" (in which his con- Mantuan defense speech revealed how far he
cept of legal responsibility took final form); "the had progressed toward a consistent Marxism. At
positive school of criminal law;" "collective prop- least, it revealed it to Ferri himself who, after
erty and the class struggle" and "socialism and re-reading it in 1925, said that doing so made him
20Already cited. The monograph on homicide- realize "that already then, in 1886, I was a Marxist
suicide appeared first serially in 1883-84 in the ARcHivio without knowing it. The speech is, in fact, com-
DI PSICH. E SCrENZE PENALI and in book form in later pletely oriented toward historical materialism
editions in 1884, 1892, and 1925. The monograph on (which I have called economic determinism) by
homicide was not published until 1895; the second
edition of 1925 omitted all the anthropological and means of which it can be demonstrated that histor-
statistical data which occupied 216 pages in the first ical individual and social facts are the direct or
edition, together with several hundred pages of graphic indirect product of the underlying and determining
material. The second edition was entirely devoted to
the psychology and psychopathology of the homicide economic conditions of the individual and the
and was frankly addressed to judges, prosecutors collectivity."' '
and defense attorneys. For a comment on the first
edition, see H. Znni=ou', Enrico Ferri on Homicide. 22 "Iconladini Mantovani al processo di Venezia
Pop. Sci. Mo. 49: 678-84, 828-37, Sept. Oct., 1896. impufati di 'eccitamento alla guerra civile"'. DIFESE
21Polemica in difesa della scnola criminale positiva, PENALT, vol. I, pp. 85-156
loc. cit. 21 bid., p. 8.
 THORSTEN SELLIN [Vol. 48

And so the Ferris moved to Rome. He had up an investigating commission, which discovered
married a Florentine woman in 1884, Camilla that the charges made by Ferri were true. He was
Guarnieri, a marriage which proved most successful openly praised in Parliament, the sentence against
from all points of view and was to give him two him was dropped and he was called, in 1906,2 to
sons and a daughter. In Parliament Ferr attached succeed Impallomeni as professor of criminal law
himself to the radical liberals. He had given up his at the University of Rome. He had been a candi-
chair at Siena but continued to teach in Rome as date for this chair and for professorships at other
"libero docente," wrote about the positive school universities several times during the previous
and its mission, began to increase his fame as a decade, but had always been by-passed because of
trial lawyer and started to organize labor co- his political views and the government's preference
operatives among the poverty-stricken agricul- for more traditional ideas on criminal law, al-
tural workers of Mantua. In 1890, he was-miracle though he had, as already mentioned, been lectur-
of miracles-called to succeed Francesco Carrara ing as "libero docente." He had also given lecture
at the University of Pisa, but he was to hold the courses at the University of Brussels every other
chair only three years, because Marxian doctrines year from 1895 to 1903, and at the School of
were becoming known in Italy and he was led, Advanced Social Studies in Paris in 1889 and 1901,
partly by his philosophy of economic determinism not to mention a lecture tour at Dutch and Flemish
and partly by his loyalty to his constituents who Universities.
were being drawn into the newly organized (1892) His campaign for the reform of the criminal
Italian Socialist Labor Party, to join the Party law had suffered nothing in the meanwhile. In 1892,
in 1893. This act led to the loss of his professor- Ferri had founded a legal journal, "La Scuola
ship. Positiva." This gave the positivists an organ of
The family now moved to San Dominico, near their own, where they could propagate their ideas.
Fiesole, where he was to live for several years. The journal bceame a worthy opponent to Luigi
Life was becoming more and more hectic. Ferri Lucchini's "Rivista Penale," chief organ of the
soon discovered the weakness of the Party in classicists, and complemented Lombroso's "Ar-
Parliament and threw himself into the task of chivio." He remained editor, or chief of the edito-
educating the masses. Franchi claims that during rial board, until his death, though he had many
twenty years Ferri spent 200 out of 365 nights in a collaborators and associates.
pullman sleeper. He became the people's orator, In 1908, Ferri went to South America on a
par excellence, lecturing on some 40 topics of lecture tour, giving 80 lectures in 110 days. The
scientific, historical, economic, and sociological tour was evidently handled by some impressario
character. There was no village in Italy where he and the topics were chosen to appeal to a lay public.
had not been at least once; the urbanites heard His success was phenomenal. Two years later he
him more often. In 1896 when the National Social- returned there at the invitation of universities
ist Congress decided to start a party newspaper, when he lectured to professional audiences. He
it was Ferri who went out on a three weeks' died before he could realize his ambition to lecture
lecture tour to collect the necessary 10,000 lire, in the United States.D
and later, during a brief period, he edited the 25 In addition to his Criminal Sociology, translated
"Avanti." into English in 1896 and 1917, a few books and articles
In the Parliament he achieved nation-wide by Ferri appeared in the United States. The books were
SOCIALISM AND MODERN SCIENCE (DARwIN-SPEN-
attention on more than one occasion, but especially cER-MARx), 213 pp. New York: Intern. Libr. Pub].
when he led a filibuster against the government Co., 1900, and Tim PosITivE SchooL OF CnmINOLOoY,
125 pp. Chicago: Charles H. Kerr & Co., 1913. An
in 1899 and particularly when he campaigned for an article of his on The Delinquent in Art and Literature
investigation of graft in the Navy Department. appeared in the ATLANTIC, vol. 60, pp. 233-40, Aug.
1897, and the following appeared in the JOURNAL OF
That experience, 1903-1906, involved him in law CRIMINAL LAW AND CRIMINOLOGY: Present Movement
suits. He was even sentenced to 11 months in in Criminal Anthropology (Part 2 of a symposium on
CHARLES GORING'S THE ENGLISH CoNvicT), vol. 5,
prison in a criminal libel suit brought by the pp. 224-7, July, 1914; Nonination of a Cominission
Minister of the Navy, but finally Parliament set for the Positivist Reform of the Italian Criminal Code.
vol. 11, pp. 67-76, May, 1920; Reform of Penal Law in
24It was during this period that portraits of Ferri Italy, vol. 12, pp. 178-98, August, 1921; A Character
appeared in American magazines. See MuNsEY's Study and Life History of Violet Gibson, who attempted
26: 829, March, 1902; WORLD To-DAY 9: 876, Aug., the life of Benito Mussolini, on the 7th of April, 1926,
1905; OUTLOOK 85: 692, May 23, 1907. vol. 19, pp. 11-19, Aug., 1928.
19581 PIONEERS IN CRIMINOLOGY-FERRI

His views also became well-known abroad due to which was adopted in 1930. In the 5th edition of
his participation in nearly all international con- his Criminal Sociology, in connection with a
gresses of criminal anthropology and in many sim- discussion on the need for social reforms that would
ilar congresses of the International Criminalistic eliminate poverty and other social evils, he wrote
Society (now the International Association of in a footnote: "While in the 4th edition (1900) I
Criminal Law); of the International Prison alluded hopefully to socialist trends-to which I
Congresses he attended only the one in Rome, have given my fervid enthusiasm, especially by the
1885, and the one in London, 1925. propaganda I have carried on for the moral and
The positive school placed great emphasis on social education of the Italian masses-now in the
trained judges and the professionalization of all 5th edition (1929) I have to note with regard to
who dealt with crime or criminals. In 1912 Ferri Italy that since the influence of the Socialist Party
founded, in Rome, a School for Applied Criminal disappeared after the war, because it neither knew
Law and Procedure (Scuola di applicazione giuri- how to make a revolution nor wanted to assume the
dico-criminale) which drew many students, even responsibility of power, the task of the social
from abroad. prevention of criminality was assumed and has be-
Finally, at the end of the first world war, it gun to be realized by the Fascist government,
seemed that the time of harvest had arrived for the which both in the Rocco Project of a Penal Code
positivists. In 1919, the Minister of Justice, and in many special statutes has accepted and is
Ludovico Mortara, one of Ferri's schoolmates putting into effect some of the principles and the
in the Liceo at Mantua, invited him to take the most characteristic practical proposals of the
presidency of a commission that would prepare a positive school." ' 7 In theory, he objected to many
project of a criminal code to replace the one of concepts in the Rocco project, which carried the
1889. The Commission was to have a membership stamp of the middle of the road school of thinking
drawn from all the various "schools" of thinking on of the neo-classicists, but as a practical man he
such matters, but in the end, as a result of resigna- viewed it as a step in the right direction and as a
tions, it came to represent mostly a positivistic partial victory for his idea. As for Fascism, he
orientation. The resulting Project was presented in saw something of value in it, so far as criminal
1921 and is the greatest achievement of the positiv- justice was concerned, because it represented to
ists, even though it contained some compromises. him a systematic re-affirmation of the authority
It was translated into several languages, including of the State against the excesses of individualism,
English, and was widely distributed." John H. which he had always criticized.
Wigmore, to cite but one example, wrote Ferri on His last years were devoted chiefly to the work
April 17, 1921: "I am happy to have received the which was to contain the entire legal formulation
Italian project. It is a masterpiece, even judging of positivistic thought in the field of criminal law.
from a cursory examination. What a marvelous He had for nearly fifty years taught this subject
reward for your patient, brilliant apostolate, which and out of this teaching grew his "Principles of
has permitted you to translate your ideas into a Criminal Law," which he sent to the printer the
code! I hope that the Parliament will approve this summer before he died. He was also working on the
project." final revision of his Criminal Sociology and had
This hope was not fulfilled. Post-war Italy be- just completed it at his death. A month before
came more and more unsettled. The Fascist that event he had been nominated Senator, but
revolution succeeded because the government was his confirmation never took place.
unable to cope with the country's economic and
social problems. Ferri had left the Socialist Party An activity as varied and rich as Ferri's could
before the war and in 1924 he was to close his be exercised only by a man whose life was well
parliamentary career by refusing re-election. His organized. He reserved his mornings from seven to
attempts to save his Project failed; the need for a half past twelve for his authorship-the prepara-
new code was to be filled by one drafted by the tion of books, articles, briefs, etc. In the afternoon
new government. Ferri was made a member of the he read professional literature, made notes for
commission which, in 1927, presented a project
27SOCIOLOGIA CRTM12mALx, vol. 1, pp. 11-12. See also
26 Relozione sul Progctto preliminare di Codice Penale his Fascisno e Scuola Positiva ndla difesa sociale control
Italiano (Libro I), LA ScuoLA PosrrlvA, N.S. I, pp. la criminalitd. LA SCUOLA POSITIVA, n.s. 6: 241-74,
1-130, 1921. The project itself follows on pp. 131-156. 1926.
 THORSTEN SELLIN [Vol. 48

future use, and took care of his correspondence. people who constitute the great majority.3
He never worked after eight in the evening and Practically, "the positive school consists7 of the
went to bed after his evening meal. He was following: study first the natural origin of crime
abstemious, never smoked, believed in physical and then its social and legal consequences in order
exercise and manual labor, which he took some to provide, by social and legal means, the various
opportunity to engage in during his vacations. In remedies which will have the greatest effect on the
the summer he usually took his family to different various causes that produce it. This is our assump-
parts of Italy so that his children would become tion, this the innovation we have made, not so
acquainted with them. During these periods he much in our particular conclusions as in our
9
rested from all work as much as possible. In August research method."2 Ferri repeatedly contrasted
and September he travelled to international con- this mode of thinking with that of the "classical
gresses. He was no theater or concert goer; it school." In 1886, he said, in a polemic against the
interfered with his sleep. critics of that persuasion, who were attacking the
As he became more and more famous as a lawyer, new movement, "Very well, what can we positivists
he learned more and more about the practice of do against such critics? Frankly speaking, nothing.
advocacy. The lengthy prefaces to the editions of We speak two different languages. For us, the
his "Difese penali," a veritable case book for the experimental [i.e. inductive) method is the key to
aspiring trial lawyer, are a manual on the art of all knowledge; to them everything derives from
the advocate, not only how to prepare and develop logical deductions and traditional opinion. For
an oration but on the personal hygiene of the them, facts should give place to syllogisms; for
orator. us the fact governs and no reasoning can occur
without starting with facts, for them science needs
Ferri's system of ideas has been, at least par- only paper, pen and ink and the rest comes from
tially, evoked in the preceding pages. A remarkable a brain stuffed with more or less abundant reading
fact is that his basic philosophy of criminal justice of books made with the same ingredients. For us
and most of his fundamental concepts had been science requires spending a long time in examining
formulated and stated in various publications by facts one by one, evaluating them, reducing them
the time he was 26 years old. Looking backward, to a common denominator, extracting the central
he was able to say, in the preface to his collected idea from them. For them a syllogism or an
essays in 1901, that he was fortunate in that his anecdote suffices to demolish a myriad of facts
"early theoretical and practical conclusions were gathered through years of observation and analy-
firm, for while their integration has inevitably sis; for us the reverse is true."-*
evolved and been completed and corrected in The positive school cultivated a "science of
some details, they have remained basically un- criminality and of social defense against it."
changed." As Ferri conceived it, this disipline consisted
Ferri was essentially a legal reformer. His solid (a) of the scientific study of the crime as an in-
contributions to the study of the etiology of dividual fact (somato-psychological condition of
criminal conduct were incidental means for achiev- the offender) by anthropology, psychology and
ing a greater understanding of the course which criminal psychopathology; and (b) as a social fact
the reformation of criminal justice should take. A (physical and social environmental conditions)
broad vein of practicality ran through all his work; by criminal statistics, monographic studies and
a desire to achieve a demonstrably effective crimi- comparative ethnographic studies-for the pur-
nal justice, which would afford maximum protec- pose of systematizing social defense measures
(a) of a preventive nature, either indirect or remote
tion or defense of society against the criminal.
(through "penal substitutes") or direct or proxi-
The "positive school" of which Ferri was the
mate (by the police); or (b) of a repressive nature
chief architect stood in clear opposition to tradi-
through criminal law and procedure, techniques
tional, "classical" criminal jurisprudence. His-
of prison treatment, and after-care. This science
torically, the principal reason for the rise of a
positivistic view of criminal justice was the zons.., 2Preface to the Spanish edition of the NVe-w Hori-
reprinted in S ini SULLA CRIMINALrTTr ED
necessity... to put a stop to the exaggerated ALTRi sAGGi, pp. 320-33; p. 324.
individualism in favor of the criminal in order to Ibid., p. 323.
3oPolemica in difesa della scuola crimninale positlia,
obtain a greater respect for the rights of honest op. cit., p. 244.