Politics & Penology

Sprawled on the outskirts of Salem, the state capital, Oregon's 102-year-old penitentiary has long been a favorite target of downtown politicians. During the early 1950s, after repeated turmoil and unrest at the prison, some sarcastically suggested putting up a sign on a nearby road: "Drive carefully. Prisoners escaping here." Lately the prison has again been beset by problems, including several inmate suicides, harsh punitive practices and trafficking in marijuana. Fortnight ago, the speaker of the state house of representatives, F. F. ("Monty") Montgomery, loudly demanded an investigation. Embarrassed by such clangor from a fellow Republican, Governor Tom McCall warned him that any undue public outcry might stir the 1,200 convicts to do some protesting of their own.

His warning came too late. Next day, 700 inmates went on a savage rampage. They quickly captured the five major cellblocks. set fires in all of them, and threatened to execute four guards they held as hostages--one every 20 minutes. Before TV cameras and reporters, Oregon's chief corrections officer, George W. Randall, a cigar-chomping prison reformer from North Carolina, dickered through the night with six convict leaders, forswore any physical reprisals against the rioters and acceded to many of their demands, most of which were no more unreasonable than the right to daily showers. Four days later, the rioters were back in the remaining undestroyed cells. The toll: more than a dozen inmates injured and damage of up to $2.5 million.

The rioting also wrecked the facade of unity among Oregon's top Republicans. Montgomery raised the prison issue in his effort to win the nomination for secretary of state over the incumbent in Oregon's May 28 primary. McCall had helped bring the problem on himself by not acting sooner to replace ailing Warden Clarence T. Gladden, 73, whose dismissal was one of the rioters' key goals.

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