Amid the complex textual record of Bentham’s writing on punishment, Richard Smith’s edition, The Rationale of Punishment, provides the most accurate published record of Bentham’s original writing. In particular, The Rationale of Punishment is closer to Bentham’s original writing than is Étienne Dumont’s Théorie des Peines et des Récompenses. Smith’s edition, although first published in 1830 and largely following the outline of Dumont’s 1811 edition, is not a textual translation into English from Dumont’s French edition. Smith’s edition includes much material that Smith copied verbatim from Bentham’s English-language manuscripts.^

Close reading of published Bentham texts concerning punishment provides important insights into their sources and dates of composition. The text of The Rationale of Punishment concerning imprisonment — Book II, Chapters 4 through 7 — appears to have come directly from Bentham manuscripts. That text probably was written about 1778.

The Transcribe Bentham initiative at University College London holds the promise of making Bentham manuscripts, including about a thousand Bentham manuscripts concerning punishment, much more accessible to persons around the world. That project will enable better understanding of what Bentham wrote on punishment. It should also contribute to understanding why Bentham wrote so little and so blandly about prisoners’ communication with family and friends, and why Bentham’s reasoning had little effect on subsequent prison communication policies.