Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1914-12-22


with the comment that they could not
enter into a habeas corpus proceed
ing and that they were proper aues-
tions for the state of New York to
decide.
Actually, the celebrated Thaw case
the killing of stanford White-was
not before the supreme court. Merely
the question of returning Thaw on
the conspiracy indictment was UP for
decision.
Justice Holmes announced the
courts unanimous decision today. He
first overruled the contention that it
was not a crime for a man confined
in an insane asylum to walk out if he
could and that, therefore, a conspiracy
to do so was not crime.
I'VE do not regard it as open to de-
bate that the withdrawal, by con-
nivance, of a man from an insane asy-
lum, to which he has been COMMITTEES,
as Thaw was, did tend to obstruct the
due administration of the law. At
least, the New York courts may SO
decide Therefore, the indictment
charges a crime. If there is any re-
mote defect in the earlier proceedings
by which Thaw was committed. whiea
we are far from intimating, this is not
the time and place for that question
to be tried"
Justice Holmes said the most seri-
Gus argument for Thaw was that il
he were insane when he contrived his
escape he could not be guilty CT
crime; while, If he We're not insane
he was entitled to be discharged and
that his confinement and other facts
in the record required the supreme
court to assume that he was insane.
But this is not Thaws trial,
commented the justice. upon the line
of argument, THE Constitution says
nothing about habeas corpus in this
connection but peremptorily requires
that, upon proper demand, the per
son charged shall be delivered up TO
be removed to the state having jul
risdietion of the crime. There is no
discretion allowed, no inquiry into mo-
tives.
1.-The technical sufficiency of the jim
dietment is not open, And, even If it be
true that the argument stated offers
nice question, 1t Is a question as TO the
law of New York which the New York
courts must decide.
1.-THE statute that declares an act done
by lunatic not a crime adds that a per-
son Is not excused from criminal liza
bility except upon proof that at the time
he was laboring under such defect of
reason as:
"1-Not to know the nature and quality
of the act he is doing; or
'2-Not to know that the act was
wrong.
1.-THE inmates of lunatic asylums are
largely governor, it has been remarked,
by appeal to the same motives that gov
ern other men. and it we'll might be that
man who was insane and dangerous,
nevertheless, in many directions under
stood the nature and quality of his acts
as well, and was as open to be. affected
by the motives of the criminal law. as
anybody else.
How far such considerations shall be
taken into account it is for the New
York courts to decide, as it is for a New
York jury to determine whether at the
moment of the conspiracy Thaw was in
sane in such sense as they may be in
structed would make the fast defence.
when, as here, the identity of the
person, the fact that he is fugitive
from justice, the demand in due form,
the Indictment by a grand jury for what
the governor of New York alleges to be
a crime in that state and the reasonable
possibility that it may be such, all APP
pear. the constitutionally required sur.
render is not to be interfered with by the
summary process of habeas corpus upon
speeulations as to what ought to be the
result of a trial in the place where the
constitution provides for it's taking
place.
eve regard it as too clear for lengthy
discussion that Thaw should be delivered
up at once"