Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1870-12-02

lS44. upon this subject, is applicable to this
case.
'To recur then, to what has already been
stated. In order that punishment may oper-
ate by way of example, to deter others from
committing criminal acts, when under temp
talion to do so, by presenting a strong count
eracting motive, the person tempted must
have memory and intelligence to know that
the act he is about to commit is wrong, to re-
member and understand that if he commits
the act he will be subject 70 the punishment;
and reason and will to enable him to compare
and choose between the supposed advantage
or qualification to be obtained by the criminal
act, and the immunity from punishment which
he will secure by abstaining from it,
"a person, therefore, in order to be punish
able by law, or in order that his punishment
by law may operate an example to deter
others from committing criminal acts, under
like circumstances, must have sufficient men,
Dry, int lligence, reason and will, to enable
hun to distinguish between right and wrong
regard to the particular act about to be
done, to know and understand that it will be
wrong, and that he will deserve punishment
by committing it,"
'Fhis is necessary on two grounds
"lst-To render it just and reasonable to in
tiict the punishment on the accused individu-
Al; and
''2d-To render his punishment, by way of
example, of any utility to deter others in like
situation from doing similar acts, by holding
up counteracting motive in the dread of
punishment, which they cannot feel and COM
prchend.
With more immediate reference to the case,
the Chief Justice proceeded as follows:
'In order to constitute crime, man
must have intelligence and capacity enough
to have a criminal intent and purpose; and
If his reason and mental powers are either
deficient that he has no will, no conscience or
controlling mental power, or if, through the
overwhelming violence of mental disease, his
intellectual power is for the time obliterated,
he is not responsible moral agent, and is
not punishable for criminal acts"
''But these are extremes easily distinguish
ed and not to be mistaken. The difficulty
lies between these extremes, in the cases of
partial insanity, where the mind may be
codded and weakened, but not incapable of
remembering, reasoning. and Judging, or so
perverted by insane delusion as to act under
false impressions and influences. In these
eases, the rule of law, as we understand it, is
this
"a man is not to be excused from respon-
sibility if he has capacity and reason sufficient
to enable him to distinguish between right
and wrong as to the particular act he is then
doing, Il knowledge and consciousness that
the act he is doing is wrong and criminal and
will subject him TO punishment. In order to
be responsible he must have sufficient power
OF memory to recollect the relation in which
he stands to others and in which others stand
to him, that the act he is doing is contrary to
the plain dictates of justice and right, injari-
Gus to others, and a violation of the dictates
If duty. On the contrary. although he may
hn lab rfi 10 st
understands the nature and character of his
act and its consequences, if he has a knowl-
edge that it is wrong and criminal, and men,
tai power sufficient to apply that knowledge
to his own case, and to know that If he does
the act he will do wrong and receive punish
ment. such partial insanity is not suffi cient to
exempt him from responsibility for criminal
acts. If then it is proved to the satisfaction
of the jury, that the mind of the accused was
in a diseased and unsound state, the question
will be, whether the disease existed to so high
a degree that, for the time being, it over
whelmed the reason, conscience, and judg-
ment, and whether the prisoner, in commit
ting the homicide, acted from an irresistible
and uncomfortable impulse; if so, then the
act was not the act of voluntary agent, but
the involuntary act of the body without the
concurrence of a mind directing it,"
1.-The character of the mental disease relied
upon to excuse the accused in this case is
partial insanity, consisting of melancholy,
accompanied by delusion. The conduct may
be in many respects regular, the mind acute,
and the conduct apparently governed by rules
of propriety, and at the same time there may
be insane delusion by which the mind is per-
verted. The most common of the cases is
that of monomania, when the mind broods
over one idea, and cannot be reasoned out of
it, This may operate as an excuse tor GRIM
inal act in one or two modes Either is such
that the person under its influence has a real
and firm belief of some act, not true in itself,
but which if it were true would excuse his
act; as where the belief is that the party
killed had an immediate design upon his life,
and under that belief the insane man killed
HIM in supposed self-defence. common in
stance is where he fully believes that the act
he is doing is done by the immediate COM
mand of God, and he acts under the delusve-
but sincere belief that what he is doing is by
the command of superior power, which SUI
persedes all human laws, and the laws of ma
ture or, I'd, This state of delusion indicates
to an experienced person that the mind il in
diseased state, that the known tendency of
that diseased state of the mind is to break out
into sudden paroxyms of violence, venting it.
self in acts of homicide, or other violent acts
towards friend or foe Unfortunately, so that
although there were no previous indications
of violence, yet the subsequent act, connect
ing itself with the previous symptoms and in
dications, will enable an experienced person
to say that the outbreak was of such a char
acter that for the time being it must have
overcome memory or reason; that the act
was the result of the disease, and not of a
mind capable of choosing; in short, that it
was the result of uncomfortable impulse, and
not of person acted upon by motives and
governed by the will"
Now, gentlemen, this is the law as laid
down by one of the brightest luminaries that
has ever lived in New England perhaps in
the whole country, years ago, and cannot be
said to be the invention of any modern specu-
lators upon this subject, and it is rule OF law
that covers this case.
If the deft for the time being, considering
the condition he had been in before, when he
discovered the evidence of the fact which he
had so long brooded over, was under an I'M
comfortable impulse, irresistible impulse for
the time being to rush upon his victim and
commit the act, without then having the pow
er to reason upon the subject, without having
any control of his will, but merely for the