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Following five prison riots in 1929, Dr. Menninger noted the intolerable, provocative, and inadequate conditions in our prisons. He decried the out-of-date treatment of prisoners as contrary to science and decency. Reform should include the withdrawal of sentencing power from judges, to be replaced by independent sentencing boards which would consider the whole history of the offender. Punishment does not seem to deter other prisoners from committing crimes. Rather it seems only to gratify the general public. We all have repressed a guilt complex for having done forbidden things in childhood. The punishment the child receives from his parents, with its release of anger, contributes to a certain emotional pattern for reacting to offenses. The child then assumes the prerogative of punishment himself. At first this may be self-punishment. Later, through the mechanism of projection, this leads to punishment of others with corresponding severity. Society often has the need for scapegoats upon whom to vent punitive feelings, and criminals fit this role. Thus efforts to improve prisons are ignored by the public which does not want to give up this satisfaction. Capital punishment, too, gratifies the sadism and revenge feelings of many people who project their guilt upon scapegoats. Capital punishment ought to be rejected, for it deprives us of future safeguards that might be gained by learning more about homicide from the