Tonopah bonanza. [volume] (Butler City [i.e. Butler], Nev.) 1901-1909, 1908-06-20
INSANITY AND THE LAW.

Doctors and lawyers agree that the present legal test for criminal
responsibility is inadequate, says Golfers Weekly. The socaned right
and wrong test came into existence in the year 1913. when an insane
person named MeNaughton, under the delusion that a certain retiring
and inofensive citizen was Sir Robert Peel, saw fit to shoot and kill
him. He was acquitted ION the ground of insanity and thereupon
there a much excitement as to who. then, should be hanged. The
Lords propounded four questions to the judges of England, who evolved
four learned answers, the gst of which was that persons who had Il
knowledge Of the nature and quality of their acts. and could dinerent-
ate between right and wrong, must be regarded as responsible. These
solemn judges probably knew even less about insanity than their broth
ers OF the present day. Admitting that insanity in itself is no defense
TO crime and that many insane persons should be punished for their
ohenses, not only for their own sakes, but for the sake OF others, the
right and wrong" test has but little relevancy. Probably seventy per
cent of the morally irresponsible insane know right from wrong, and >
wise physician recently asserted publicly that only maniacs and idiots
had no knowledge. Juries realize this instinctiveIy and only in the most
atrocious cases hold defendants to the strict legal definition. once hav-
lug abandoned the law for their own enlightened common sense, they
are equally likely TO acquit a perfectly responsible and cruel murderer
OF o ndhs y mSefaDe creature VINO ought TO be in a lunatic asylum
Or course, the legal test should be made TO conform to modern medical
science. That tests should be one that iuries can conscentously amply
y should take some cognizance of the medical fact that certain of the
insane, notably the paranoiacs, have little or no inhibitory power. The
great trouble with the law as it stnds in most of the States is that it
provides no enlightened method of ascertaining before trial whether a
defendant 81 irresponsible Q not AS a general thing. the defense of in
SANITY MAJ be proved under the general plea of mot guilty and may
be Sprung" suddenly upon the prosecution without ny ntimation
that it is to be interposed.
We venture to suggest that defendants who intend to claim thai
they re irresponsible should be compelled by law to enter a specific
plea to that effect Mr.. Arthur Train has recently been urging this al.
iteration in the law, and W think his reasons are unanswerable. The
court could then at once refer the matter to a commission, and its evil
ueHee "oula AIRY vastly most weight than that OF q heterogeneous body
OF experts retained by either side. and that monumental farce known as
ne hypothetical question would be largely done away nidi Commo1
F-nse would indicate that witt srth a law. a sermanent conmission
each particular case. The chief practical advantage Of such a system
Would Be that the necessity for jures to apply any test of responsibilities
would be greatly reduced. 1t is doubtful whether any perfect definition
!" offmMu RESPONSIBILITY is possible; but where each defendant was
subjected to thorough and impartial observation ON the pat Of N most,
expert physicians In the community it is unlikely that he wold be,
brought TO trial II in their opinion he were irresponsible. n % matter
wha the purely legal test might be Furthermore. he would bave urcb
less chance o. escape than now~f these same physicians found that he
was sane at the time OF his ofensc.