Editing Probation (section)

===United States===
{{see also|United States federal probation and supervised release}}

Probation first developed in the United States when [[John Augustus]], a [[Boston]] cobbler, persuaded a judge in the [[Boston Municipal Court|Boston Police Court]] in 1841 to give him custody of a convicted offender, a "drunkard", for a brief period and to help the man to appear rehabilitated by the time of sentencing.<ref name="credo">{{cite web|title=Probation|url=http://www.credoreference.com/entry/worldcrims/probation|access-date=29 August 2017|website=Credo|publisher=Credo Reference}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|title=History of Probation|url=http://www.nyc.gov/html/prob/html/about/history.shtml|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181030012916/http://www.nyc.gov/html/prob/html/about/history.shtml|archive-date=30 October 2018|access-date=29 August 2017|website=NYC Probation|publisher=City of New York}}</ref>

Even earlier, the practice of suspending a sentence was used as early as 1830 in Boston, Massachusetts, and became widespread in U.S. courts, although there was no statutory provision for such a practice. At first, judges, most notably Peter Oxenbridge Thatcher of Boston, used "release on recognizance" or bail and simply refrained from taking any further action. In 1878, the mayor of Boston hired a former police officer, the ironically named "Captain Savage", to become what many recognize as the first official probation officer. By the mid-19th century, however, many Federal Courts were using a judicial reprieve to suspend sentences and this posed a legal question. In 1916, the [[Supreme Court of the United States|United States Supreme Court]], in ''Ex parte United States Petitioner Mandamus Judge Killets'' (also known as the Killets Case), held that Federal Judge Killets was without power to suspend a sentence indefinitely.<ref name="Chappell 1938">{{cite book|author1=((United States Bureau of Prisons))|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=zFYKAAAAMAAJ&q=killets|title=Decisions Interpreting the Federal Probation Act|last2=Chappell|first2=Richard A.|date=1938|publisher=Federal Prison Industries|language=en}}</ref> This decision led to the passing of the National Probation Act of 1925, thereby, allowing courts to suspend the imposition of incarceration and place an offender on probation.<ref name="Chappell 1938" /> 

[[Massachusetts]] developed the first statewide probation system in 1878,<ref>{{cite web|title=Probation and Pretrial Services History|url=http://www.uscourts.gov/services-forms/probation-and-pretrial-services/probation-and-pretrial-services-history|website=U.S. Courts|publisher=Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts|access-date=29 August 2017}}</ref> and by 1920, 21 other states had followed suit.<ref name="Katz 2019">{{cite journal|last=Katz|first=Elizabeth D.|date=2019-09-01|title=Criminal Law in a Civil Guise: The Evolution of Family Courts and Support Laws|journal=University of Chicago Law Review|language=en|location=Rochester, NY|ssrn=3168243}}</ref> With the passage of the National Probation Act on March 5, 1925, signed by President [[Calvin Coolidge]], the U.S. [[Federal Probation Service]] was established. At the state level, pursuant to the Crime Control and Consent Act of 1936, a group of states entered into an agreement wherein they would supervise probationers and parolees who resided in each other's jurisdictions on each other's behalf. Known as the Interstate Compact For the Supervision of Parolees and Probationers, this agreement was originally signed by 25 states in 1937. By 1951, all the states in the United States of America had a working probation system and ratified the Interstate Compact Agreement. In 1959, the new states of [[Alaska]] and [[Hawaii]], the Commonwealth of [[Puerto Rico]], and the territories of the [[United States Virgin Islands|Virgin Islands]], [[Guam]], and [[American Samoa]] ratified the act as well.

==== Probation in child support in the United States ====
{{See also|Child support in the United States}}
When child support nonpayment was criminalized in the early 20th century, probation was the primary punishment levied on nonsupporters.<ref name="Katz 2019" /> Those in favor of criminalizing nonsupport wanted a penalty that "would maximize deterrence, preserve the family (at least in a financial sense), and lighten the burden on charities and the state to support women and children."<ref name="Katz 2019" /> When New York authorized probation as a punishment in 1901, the New York City magistrates cited four benefits to probation as opposed to incarceration: "(1) 'Punishment without disgrace, and effective without producing embitterment, resentment or demoralization,' (2) judicial discretion to make the punishment fit the crime, (3) '[p]unishment that is borne solely by the guilty and displacing a system that frequently involved the innocent and helpless,' and (4) punishment attended by increased revenue to the City and by a saving in expense.'"<ref name="Katz 2019" /> The existence of probation officers in child support cases made it so the state was involved in family life in previously unprecedented ways.<ref name="Katz 2019" /> Probation officers would often attempt to reconcile separated couples, encourage husbands to drink less alcohol, and teach wives housekeeping skills.<ref name="Katz 2019" /> Employing probation in nonsupport cases also led to more revenue captured by nonsupporting spouses.<ref name="Katz 2019" /> The National Probation Association (NPA) was instrumental in the creation of designated [[Family court|family courts]] in the United States as well, which subsequently assumed jurisdiction of nonsupport cases.<ref name="Katz 2019" />