The antagonism of law and medicine in insanity, and its consequences : an introductory lecture / by Thomas Laycock.
- Thomas Laycock
- Date:
- 1862
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: The antagonism of law and medicine in insanity, and its consequences : an introductory lecture / by Thomas Laycock. Source: Wellcome Collection.
Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.
11/16 page 11
![be expected from such an inquiry, except that which did happen ? The exam- ination of the “mad-doctors” was from the very method of procedure a farce; while the whole inquiry constituted unnecessarily a grievous wrong to an indi- vidual : and this because the law makes no difference between imbecility and insanity—between mental disease and mental defect. To all this it may be answered, that modern systematic writers have classed mental defects, like idiocy and imbecility, with mental diseases, like mania and melancholia. This may be admitted as to some, but not as to all. The class of Vesanke of Cullen included both defects and diseases, but insania was carefully distinguished from amentia and dementia. Be this as it may, the jurist had already in the Roman law the practical method of procedure. This distinguished between prodigals from defect and incapacity, to whom it appointed curatores, and the furiosi, or properly insane. [“ Se.d solent.hodie Praetores vel Praesides, si talem hominem invenerint, qui neque tempus neque finem expensarum liabet, sed bona sua dilacerando et dissipando profudit, curatorem ei dare exemplh furiosi; et tamdiu erunt ambo in curatione, quamdiu vel furiosus sanitatem, vel ille sanos mores receperit; quod si evenerit, ipso jure desinunt esse in potestate curatorum.”—Ulpian, Corp. Jur. Civ. Digestor. Lib. xxvii. tit. x. § i.] In Scotland this part of the Roman law is in force at this moment; so that an imbecile or weak youth has curators appointed, without any inquiry into the metaphysical question whether he is of unsound mind or not. The Lord Chancellor wisely proposes to legislate for another class of persons who are mentally defective from another class of causes. He would invest the Lord Chancellor with jurisdiction to provide for the care of aged persons who are in the state of second childhood, by surrounding them with the requisite protection, without the necessity of issuing a commission of lunacy. It is to be hoped, however, that in taking this necessary and too-long-delayed step, the learned lord will remember that, just as the age of discretion may be delayed from corporeal causes, so the period of senile dementia may be anticipated equally from corporeal causes. The natural decay of vital vigour in the brain, ■which is the cause of senile dementia, may occur prematurely, and be ushered in by disorder of the faculties. There are also cases of dementia simply, in which insanity precedes the final change, and which should be specially provided for. To this end, however, medical skill is most undoubtedly necessary ; for the question here arises, whether this premature dementia is final and complete, or not. Having thus cleared away cases of mental defect, let us now examine the Lord Chancellor’s proposed procedure as to mental diseases, or the various forms of insanity. He says, it is a vicious principle to consider insanity as a disease in law; it is a fact to be ascertained in a like manner as any other fact; and for this purpose a jury of ordinary men is sufficient, and no medical opinions are needed. Now, we have lately had a judicial procedure as scandalous in its way as the Windham case, but far more shameful, in which this method was fully carried out. A man named George Clark, a cabinetmaker, killed a tax-collector in Newcastle on October 1, 1861, by stabbing him with a sharp-pointed knife. In the month of May preceding the collector had distrained upon Clark’s tools for the non-payment of his dog-tax; and this was the alleged motive, as it was clearly the exciting cause, of the murder. He was tried on 27th February last, and defended himself. The history of his conduct previously and subsequently to the murder, and his conduct during the trial, abundantly proved that he was an aggressive melancholiac, labouring under notional insanity both at the time he committed the act, and when tried for it. The judge laid down the law of the case to the twelve “ordinary men” who constituted the jury, and who, in accordance with his charge, brought in a verdict of guilty; and then the judge solemnly pronounced the sentence of death. He told the helpless lunatic at the bar he](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b22347616_0013.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
