New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1873-06-06
INSANE MALEFACTORS.

INSANE AfdLEFACTORS,
Two years ago a man named Fore killed his
brother-In-law in St. Louis, aud was acquitted
on the ground of insanity. Whether he was
sent to an asylum, or Immediately turned
loose-as the custom is in this part of the world
we have not learned; but he was loose on
Wednesday last, and probably drunk. and he
took advantage of this happy conjunction OF
circumstances to assault his wife in the street
with q hatchet which he had concealed under
his clothing, and to deal her three severe and
perhaps fatal blows. The citizens Of St. Louis
will now probably agree that such person
ought not to have been at large; but whether
il will occur to them That the law for the
treatment OF insane criminals needs radical
revision ia by no means certain.
We have seen many scandalous ae1mttals
on the score of insanity, and it is not unlikely
that the plea which has already saved so
many necks from the gallOws may soon ac-
ouire great prominence again. Are we to go
on forever tempting double catastrophes like
this at st. Louisf In two memorable cases
that occur to us just now men who were IN
sane according to the verdict of jnry) for
Just an instant in their lives and in That un-
fortunate instant committed murder have
subsequently been appointed to positions
under the United States Government. In
another case an assassin who followed his
victim with threatenings for months and
months, and slew him at last on
the second attempt, walked out ct the
court room acquitted on the ground OF In
sanity, and has never shown symptom OF
disordered mind since, as he had shown none
before. In these instances doubtless the plea
of emotional insanity was merely preteXt to
enable prejudced or weak-minded jury to
indulge little maudin sentiment; but there
are insane murdereTs-mOre Of them possibly
than an incredulous public suspects; and for
them the laws of New York make no adequate
provisions whatever. Upon the criminal lunatic
the law imposes no penalty and enforces no
restraint.
When we consider how i'll the boundaries
between reason and unreasOn are defined we
APPRECIATE this enormous defect in our jnris-
prudence Under the old definitions OF the
medical men and the old rulings of the courts,
many classes of prisoners who would now he
unhesitatingly pronounced irresponsible were
supposed to be entirely fit for the halter and
were duly angledaccordingly As the science
of mental pathology has improved, the category
of lunatics has been immensely extended. The
presence of decisions is the cOmmonest test
of insanity, but 1t is not nfalible, for the delu-
sons sometimes are very difficult TO discover.
Inability to distinguish between right and
wrong il no criterion at all, for many insane
persons do what they know to be wrong. The
tendency Of both professions tho legal and the
medical, is to settle the question of response
bllity by this simple rule-If the prisoner was
laboring under mental disease, and If the
act for which he is arraigned was the offspring
of that disease, he cannot be held accountable ;
but when you come to apply this rule to par
ticular cases the difficulties are endless.
1t is agreed on all hands, however, that
mental disease does often manifest itself in
the form of homicdal impulse. The sou of a
drunkard or a libertine often inherits the evil
propensties of his father, but their direction
is sometimes strangely changed in tho course
of transmission. The disorder which is only
incompetence in one generation, may become
marked insanity in the next, or epilepsy, or q
tendency toward homicide or suicide, and vice
versa. Plainly the crime committed by the
victim of such an ancestral talnt il in a
greater or less degree the product of disease.
How far the existence of the disease should
excuse the offender from punishment is n ques-
ton which has received by no means the full
discussion that it deserves. How far it should
relieve him from restraint merits no discussion
whatever. That species of so-callcd emo
tional insanity, which shows itself in a sud
den outbreak of violence under the spur of
some great prOyOcation, can hardly be classed
as mental disease at all. 1t is mere loosing
of the passions and the law has no business
to take it into account. But the genuine
homcidal impulse, whether inherited or not,
is disorder liable TO recur at any time, and
the man afflicted by it should no more be at
large than mad dog or hyena. In any
decently regulated community insane muir
derers would be placed in confinement, not
as punishment, but for the safety of the
public. We in New-York turn them out into
Broadway; and if tragedies like this recent
affair in st. Louis are not more common, il is
only because most of the murderers acquitted
on the plea of insanity never were insane.