Staunton vindicator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1860-1896, 1890-02-21
ANOTHER LOOP HOLE.

We see that bill has been reported ia
vorably by the Finance Committee of the
Virginia Senate to amend the code in rela-
ton to pay patients at the Insane Asylums.
We have not seen the bill, but from the sy-
nopsis of its provisions published, it proposes
inplain Englishto saddle the Commonwealth
with the support of patients able to fully or
partly pay their board, and to save to their
families and relatives their property. The
friends Of this fruitage of a free hand with
the people S taxes, urge as we see that "a
number of cases of great hardship have &C.
Cured under the law as at present admin
istered.' There are some cases of ''great
hardship that occur under every law of the
Commonwealth eXacting money-notably
under that requiring the payment Of taxes
but we presume no wise legislator would
introduce bill abolishing taxation on that
account. To one familiar with the ''free
list'' of the Virginia insane asylums, this
proposition to throw the doors yet wider
open, smacks of an admiXture Of the COM
mune and paternal government deity ad-
justed to the needs of local demagoguery.
There is no more reason that a harmless
insane person should be supported by the
State, than there is for the eleemosynary
maintenance of people otherwise incapaci-
tated by disease, and yet the asylums here,
even under the law already prevailing, are
made dumping grounds for large percen-
tage of people who are simply bothersome in
their homes and nothing more. A good illus
tration of this is the fact that not many
years ago when the adoption was urged OF a
system of boarding out harmless insane pa
tients at the cost Of the State, in order that
the asylums might be used for the purpose
they We're built for-the Superintendent OF
one asylum received applications from many
comfortably off relations of harmless
patients to take them home under the plan
if it went into effect. The result of the
present system in Virginia asylums, has
been that the field of scientific cure has
been overlaid by the broader field of nur-
sery where tonics, diet and re-
straint hold sway. This has not been
brought about by the fact that the State
has been overcropped in her facilities fol
curing and restoring the victims OF insan-
ity, but because these facilities have been
overloaded and built upon until they
have been almost buried out of sight by a
class of patients who should be at home and
should always have been at home. Every
year in his annual report each Superinten-
dent of a Virginia asylum protests that his
institution is becoming simply a refuge fol-
harmless cratic minds, lessening his power
to carry out the true design Of the charity,
and yet the only responses they get are
propositions to yet wider open the doors.
These liberal-handed legislators with the
people s taxes, ought to read the record of
some Of the suits brought by the insane
Asylums to recover board from patients
fully able to pay, if they would learn just
how much imposition the State Of Virgin
ia stands, and just how free people feel to
help themselves to free benefits when they
can be gotten out of that common victim
the Treasury of the Commonwealth.