Gender, Indigeneity, and Social Class: Criminal Sentencing at the Turn of the 20th Century in British Columbia

Abstract

We employ a rich data set that includes detailed information on crime class, sentencing, and the socioeconomic and physical characteristics of the criminals admitted to BC's provincial prisons during our period of study. Using specifications founded on models of rational judicial decision-making, we show that even after controlling for a highly granular categorization of crime class, women consistently received disproportionately short sentences. Prisoners who were older, "short", "stout", or disabled in some visibly obvious way, also consistently received relatively short sentences. In contrast, prisoners that looked "unhealthy" or had more unflattering physical characteristics, such as facial pock marks, menacing tattoos, or scars, tended to receive longer sentences. With respect to socioeconomic characteristics, we find that skilled workers faced harsher penalties once convicted (consistent with previous work), while less-skilled and illiterate workers faced weaker penalties. Indigenous prisoners, who initially accounted for well over half of the BC provincial prison admissions in our data set, were receiving relatively lenient penalties across all classes of crimes during the 1860s and 1870s. However, as the number of Indigenous prisoners fell during the later pre-WW1 years, Indigeneity became increasingly associated with significantly longer sentences. We discuss all of these findings in light of a classic debate in the economics of crime: Were observed sentencing patterns derived from rational judicial decision-making, or is there evidence of (possibly shifting) taste-based discrimination? If the relatively lenient sentences imposed on those perceived to be “disadvantaged” in some way, reflected both positive and negative discriminatory biases, then judges from this era can be said to have been acting “paternalistically” when imposing criminal sentences. Alternatively, if the sentencing patterns reflect a less-discretionary cost-benefit calculation, then this would imply that in our historical context, prison terms imposed a significantly greater utility cost on those prisoners with visible characteristics that may have been considered disadvantageous.