Orleans County monitor. [volume] (Barton, Vt.) 1872-1953, 1873-05-19
INSANITY AS EXCUSE FOR CRIME.


able and interesting paper on insanity,
considered in connection with crime, be-
fore the medico legal society of New
York few evenings ago. We hope his
able discourse will enlighten judges and
juries to such degree that they will let
no more murderers escape. In ntreating
of his subject Mr.. Field views crime
merely as violation of law. He holds
that nobody has any right to look
at it in any other way. The ques-
ton is,-not whether the act committed
was good or bad in itself, but whether it
was violation of law. If it was, then
it should be punished as such, for the
sole purpose of preventing, or with a
view of preventing, further violation
He makes the work of courts and juries
just what the law evidently intends shall
be their work-namely, the consideration
of the case before them in its purely le
gal aspects, putting behind them all
question of morality, of chivalry, and
everything else that might lead them
astray. This proposition, which is un-
doubtedly a sound one, certainly simpli-
fes the duties of juries, and if they will
heed it. will prevent them wandering in
to irrelevant matters, and keep them
more strictly to their oath Sentimen-
tality has no place on the BENCH or in
the jury-box. AS illustrations, Mr..
Field secuted the charge of the judge in
the case of Sickles Grants minister to
SPAIN, that the jury should aquit Sick
les if they found that he was in such a
mental state at the time he shot Key
that he did not know that he was COM
hitting crime in other words, if the
knowledge that Key had debauched his
wife had so affected his mind that he
did not consider the quality of his
moral action in the shooting, then he
was to be holden guiltless-that is, if
Sickles thought he was doing good
thing, it was all right, and the jury must
not convict. Mr.. Field asks ''was there
ever greater absurdity % Probably
nine-tenths of the intelligent people OF
the world would answer that there never
was. The charge of Judge Hogeboom
in the Cole case at Albany, to the same
effect (Which, by the way was the first
indication of failing mental vigor in that
able and upright judge Mr.. Field ridi.
culed, as we'll as the charges in McFar.
lands and Scannel's cases. He thought
that all these crimes should be punished,
because they were absolute offences
against the law. and as punishment was
to deter, its operation in these cases was
necessary for security.
His views on the whole subject are
summed up as follows:
FIRsT-That children and idiots art
not holden to criminal responsibility.
SEcoND-That mental unsoundness
may excuse crime when the will becomes
the slave of defective reason.
THIRD-Insanity excusing crime mus
be shown by experts to be a brain disease
FoURTH-Neither emotional or per
ceptional insanity is an excuse in itsel
for crime Emotional insanity is mani
tested by impulse, perceptional insanit,
by hallucinations.
FIFTH-All prisoners declared insan
should be put in lupatlc asylums unit
their restoration to health
SIxTH-Tho punishment should b.
graded to suit the quality of the crime
and the intent and relative guilt of tn,
criminal.
Let every reader who is liable to 81
on jury carry these excellent rules il
his head or in his pocket book for refer
ence, and murderers will be likely to ge
their deserts, in this country, at least