Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1929-12-31
BY THOMAS r. HENRY.

Oh AnOMAS n. HENRY.
Lawyer and psychiatrist clashed be-
fore the American Sociological Society
yesterday afternoon.
THE criminal must be protected
against society,"" declared DR.. BENJAMIN
Karpman Of ST. Elizabeth's Hospital.
Society must be protected against
the criminal" said Gregory Hankln,
Washington lawyer and writer on legal
topics.
DR.. Karpman. who refers 10 the muir
derers and degenerates with whom he
works as my MISUNDERSTANDING, as
a father speaking of my children
insisted that society itself in its age-old
ignorance is solely responsible for the
anti-social conduct of some of it's men,
bers and that the accepted forms of
punishment are worse than useless.
Crime Conditioned Hate"
Describing crime generally as "con-
hate" DR.. Karpman said that
1t was Society'S duty, instead of punish
ing the offender to try to mend the
mess it had made, or, failing in that,
to resort to form of Segregation"
which would be very different from
present forms of imprisonment.
The only effect of imprisonment. lie
said, is to increase the very hate which
was responsible for the original crime,
so that when the man is released he is
more dangerous than before.
The alternative of lmprisoning every
for life for societys protection
would do no good. he said, because while
present social conditions continue there
would be continual crop Of new Grim
inals
The criminal, said DR.. Karpman, is
generally the product of an unhappy
childhood. The observation is based
upon long study of the inter-psychic
processes of criminals confined in st.
famous Howard Hall. 1t is
noteworthy, he said, that an only child,
and petted by parents, almost
never becomes a criminal He may be-
come neurotic, but that is something
else. The criminal is usually the scape-
goat of the family, jealous of the at
tention paid to more favored brothers
and sisters or left almost completely I'M
noticed. Consequently, he seeks the
emotional outlets denied in his normal
environment elsewhere. This may lead
to the reform school, and most crimi-
nails, DR.. Karpman insisted, are the di-
rect products Of the reform school.
Intelligence Small Factor.
He denied that either physical condi-
ton or intelligence has much to do
with criminality. Low intelligence, he
said, doesn't make the criminal, but it
does make 1t easier to catch him, so
that a survey of jails might show that
The inmates were below normal. The
curve of criminality, he said, rises al
most directly as does that of the eco
nomic level of the families
Present forms of punishment, the
pSychiatrist insisted, are based on the
WORKOUT theological concept of original
sin. Punishment for anti-social be-
havior starts in the nursery when, DR..
Karpman said, parents take the pre-
sumptuous prerogative of Furnishing be-
fore the child has learn the right or
wrong of its acts" The result, he said,
Is not to teach the child that certain
form OF behavior is wrong. It only
arouses feelings of fear, injustice, anger
and hatred against the punisher. It
may bring obedience, but no sense of
guilt.
Thus, he insisted. whipping a child
simply aggravates the situation and de-
velops a fertile soil for criminality. Re-
venge motives make their appearance,
and, If they are strong and persistent
enough, lead to serious crimes later on.
There should be no punishment"
DR.. Karpman said, until the child has
learned the difference between good and
bad. Then punishment will be neces-
sary, unless hatred already has been
conditioned into the little mind"
It Is sometimes asserted, he said, that
criminals have an Unsuitable craving for
publicity, eagerly reading the newspaper
accounts of their misdeeds and taking
vain delight in the attention focused on
them. They often call eagerly for the
papers, he explained but for very diff
'erent reason-pride in having put over
on the hated authorities.
Conscience Is Protection.
Society's one great protection, DR..
he designated it the "su-
per-ego or cultural imperative, the final
result Of the individuals cultural
heritage. or his conditioning to the
moral ideas of the social group of
which he is q member If this con-
dittoning has been proper, he said, the
cultural imperative" must be obeyed
md society has no need to punish any,
body for wrongdoing. The criminal
will be forced to punish himself, as
Is shown by suicide following murder
n so many cases.
The criminal himself has this super
cBO, uuI Has Ue6I1 SO
thwarted that 1t is obscured by strong
according to DR.. Karpman.
Thus murderers, he said, often are ex-
cellent citizens whose "super-ego" is
paralyzed by some strong
emotion. He has found among the
criminals with whom he deals a high
sense of honor, another expression of
the cultural imperative" which no HUI
man being can entirely escape.
In this way Dr. Karpman arrived at
his conclusion that the criminal should
be protected from society,"" for society
IS no better than the cultural impera-
Tive which it imposes.
Pain Not a Deterrent.
The law, he said, has acted on the
Invalid assumption that pain, whether
physical or mental, such as comes from
is a deterrent to future
crime. I'VE have certainly been gen.
erous with pain for our criminals" he
said.
This is done on the theory that the
is afraid that repetition of the
pain will come with repeating the act.
But, he said, pain conditions into the
another psychic factor, intense
hate, which usually offsets the fear
D. c. WOMAN TO