Roberts v. State. be cognizant of the distinction between right and wrong, as regards the act, and yet, by reason of some delusion, overmastering the will, there might be no criminal intent. To apply this proposition, it was admitted by Mr. Erskine that the act itself must be connected with the peculiar delusion under which the prisoner labors. This doctrine can be best understood by illustration, and it is illustrated by Hadfield's case. He had been a soldier in the British armies, and had received several severe wounds, one of which, on the head, it was thought, had injured the brain; and caused the derangement under which he suffered. He imagined that he had constant intercourse with the Almighty, that the world was coming to a conclusion, and like our blessed Savior, he was to sacrifice himself for its salvation. Unwilling to commit suicide, it was argued by Mr. Erskine, he sought to do an act which would forfeit his life to the law, and thus bring about the sacrifice which in his morbid imagination he held necessary to the salvation of the world. Under the influence of this delusion, he shot at the king in the theatre. Now in this case, it was not pretended that Hadfield was a raving maniac, or an imbecile idiot; nor was it contended that he was incapable of knowing that shooting a pistol at the king, would or might kill him, or that if he should kill the king that he would deserve death for the act (for that was really what he desired); or that he was incapable of distinguishing between the right and wrong of the act; but it was contended that the delusion under which he labored had so shattered his intellect as to control his will, and impel him resistlessly to the commission of the act, and therefore there was no criminal motive, no wicked or mischievous intent, and if these were wanting, he was irresponsible. To use the language of Mr. Erskine, "Reason is not driven from her seat, but distraction sits down upon it, along with her, holds her trembling upon it, and frightens her from propriety." Hadfield was acquitted, and since that day, the exception which his case established has been recognized.1 Thus far with safety we may assert that certain principles have been established; yet it is true that these rules do not govern all cases. It is conceded by the courts in England, practically if not in terms, that no rules can be so specific as to embrace the infinite variety of forms in which insanity or derangement may show itself; and that each case must depend very much upon the circumstances, facts and developments which attend it. Thus, Lord HALE says: "It is very difficult to define the invisible line that divides perfect and partial insanity. But it must 1 See Erskine's speech in appendix to Cooper's Med. Jur., 27 How. St. Tr. 1281. Test of Insanity. rest upon circumstances, duly to be weighed and considered by the judge and jury, lest on the one side there be a kind of inhumanity towards the defect of human nature, or on the other, too great indulgence be given to great crimes." So Taylor declares: "There are no certain legal or medical rules whereby homicidal mania may be detected. Each case may be determined by the circumstances which attend it.” 1 In the opinion which C. J. DENMAN, gave before the House of Lords in 1843, although adhering to the old rules he says: "It is difficult to lay down any abstract rule on the subject applicable to all cases, and each case must be decided, in great measures upon the facts and circumstances peculiar to it, under the discretion of the court. In the case at this bar, the evidence shows no particular delusion to control the will "sitting upon reason's seat and holding her trembling, and frightening her from her propriety." It does not come within the exception to the rule laid down by Judge FLOYD, which was established in Hadfield's case. This case is embraced within that rule, and we think the court below correctly gave that rule in charge to the jury. If there was partial insanity in this case, about which we express no opinion, it was the effect of melancholy, growing out of disappointed love; there was no proof of raving madness nor of peculiar mania. The prisoner had addressed Mrs. Julian and been rejected; afterwards he talked occasionally incoherently, looked vacant in the face, sat up late at night, and wrote some silly letters, and all attended with a habit of intemperance. At the time he committed the assault, and previously, he was violent, rude towards Mrs. Julian and her mother, and indecent in his conversation. He seems to have been on that day the very person to whom Mr. Erskine denies the protection of insanity, one "who exhibits only violent passions and malignant resentments, acting upon real circumstances, who is impelled to evil from no morbid delusion, but who proceeds upon the ordinary perceptions of the mind." Let the judgment of the court below be affirmed. 1 Taylor Med. Jurisp. 649. See also 5 C. & P. 168; 9 Id. 525. Notes. NOTES. § 1. Acts of an Insane Person not Punishable. - The common law does not punish the acts of an insane man. "In all jurisdictions everywhere, and among all people, civilized or savage, a defect of reason that renders one unaccountable for his acts is viewed with commiseration, and the subject of it shielded from even the least reproach." "It is," as said in a Delaware case, "one of those visitations of the Creator which all humanity respects, and which confers immunity from punishment upon him who is so unfortunate as to be the victim of it, if I may use an expression of seeming irreverence."1 Reason is the basis of human responsibility; whenever it does not exist the party is not responsible for his acts. The plea of insanity avails the party not as a justification or excuse, but because he is not responsible at all. It may exist from infancy, when it is idiocy, or it may be adventitious, proceeding from various causes, and may be permanent or temporary.2 Admitting this to be the rule of the common law, the courts have from the first endeavored to discover a test by the application of which to a particular case, a jury may decide whether a particular person is or is not a proper subject of punishment. Various tests have been suggested, adopted, and discarded. § 2. The Child Test. The first test which was proposed for the solution of this problem was suggested by Lord HALE.3 "It is very difficult," said he, "to define the indivisible line that divides perfect and partial insanity; but it must rest upon circumstances duly to be weighed and considered both by the judge and jury, lest on one side there be a kind of inhumanity towards the defects of human nature, or on the other side too great an indulgence given to great crimes; the best measure that I can think of is this, such a person as laboring under melancholy distempers hath yet ordinarily as great understanding as ordinarily a child of fourteen years hath, is such a person as may be guilty of treason or felony." This test, as we shall see, comes very near the one now generally adopted by the courts. § 3. The Wild Beast Test. But in the next important trial after Lord HALE wrote, Mr. Justice TRACY laid down a more severe test. On the trial of Arnold, in 1724, for shooting at Lord Onslow, Mr. Chief Justice TRACY said to the jury "This is the evidence on both sides. Now, I have laid it before you; and you must consider of it; and the shooting my Lord Onslow, which is the fact for which this prisoner is indicted, is proved beyond all manner of contradiction; but whether this shooting was malicious, that depends upon the sanity of the man. That he shot, and that wilfully is proved; but whether maliciously, that is the thing; that is the question; whether this man hath the use of his reason and his senses? If he was under the visitation of God and could not distinguish between good and evil, and did not know what he did, though he committed the greatest offence, yet he could not be guilty of any offence against any law what 1 Comegys, C. J., in State v. Brown, 1 Houst. Cr. Cas. 539 (1878). 2 Bayard, J., in State v. Dillahunt, 3 Harr. (Del.) 551 (1840); Cole's Case, 7 Abb. Pr. (N. S.) 321 (1868). 31 Hale's Pleas of the Crown, 30. 4 Arnold's Case, 16 How. St. Tr. 764. Mr. Justice Tracy in Arnold's Case. soever; for guilt arises from the mind, and the wicked will and intention of the man. If a man be deprived of his reason, and consequently of his intention, he cannot be guilty; and if that be the case, though he had actually killed my Lord Onslow, he is exempted from punishment; punishment is intended for example and to deter other persons from wicked designs; but the punishment of a madman, a person that hath no design, can have no example. This is one side. On the other side, we must be very cautious; it is not every frantic and idle humor of a man that will exempt him from justice, and the punishment of the law. When a man is guilty of a great offence, it must be very plain and clear, before a man is allowed such an exemption; therefore, it is not every kind of frantic humor or something unaccountable in a man's actions that points him out to be such a madman as is to be exempted from punishment; it must be a man that is totally deprived of his understanding and memory, and doth not know what he is doiug, no more than an infant, than a brute, or a wild beast, such a one is never the object of punishment; therefore, I must leave it to your consideration, whether the condition this man was in, as it is represented to you on one side, or the other, doth show a man who knew what he was doing, and was able to distinguish whether he was doing good or evil, and understood what he did; and it is to be observed, they admit he was a lunatic, and not an idiot. A man that is an idiot, that is born so, never recovers, but a lunatic may, and hath his intervals; and they admit he was a lunatic. You are to consider what he was at this day, when he committed this fact. There you have a great many circumstances about the powder and the shot, his going backward and forward, and if you believe he was sensible, and had the use of his reason and understood what he did, then he is not within the exemptions of the law, but is as subject to punishment as any other person." The prisoner was convicted under this test and sentenced to death, but was afterwards reprieved at the request of Lord Onslow. § 4. Hadfield's Case — Erskine's Argument. - Erskine's celebrated speech on the trial of Hadfield has been referred to with admiration by many judges in subsequent cases, as containing the first attempt to depart from the barbarity of the ancient test of insanity in criminal cases. The prisoner was indicted in 1800 for high treason in shooting at King George III. Mr. Erskine in opening the defence thus addressed the jury: — "Gentlemen, the law as it regards this most unfortunate infirmity of the human mind, like the law in all its branches, aims at the utmost degree of precision; but there are some subjects, as I have just observed to you, and the present is one of them, upon which it is extremely difficult to be precise. The general principle is clear, but the application most difficult. "It is agreed by all jurists, and is established by the law of this and every other country, that it is the reason of man, which makes him accountable for his actions: and that the deprivation of reason acquits him of crime. This principle is indisputable; yet so fearfully and wonderfully are we made, so infinitely subtle is the spiritual part of our being, so difficult is it to trace with accuracy the effect of diseased intellect upon human action, that I may appeal to all these who hear me, whether there are any causes more difficult, or which, indeed, so often con 1 R. v. Hadfield, 27 How St. Tr. 1282. Notes. found the learning of the judges themselves, as when insanity, or the effects and consequences of insanity, become the subjects of legal consideration and judgment. I shall pursue the subject as the attorney-general has properly discussed it. I shall consider insanity as it annuls a man's dominion over property; as it dissolves his contracts, and other acts which otherwise would be binding; and as it takes away his responsibility for crimes. If I could draw the line in a moment between these two views of the subject, I am sure the judges would do me the justice to believe, that I would fairly and candidly do so; but great difficulties press upon my mind, which oblige me to take a difficult course. "I agree with the attorney-general that the law, in neither civil nor criminal cases, will measure the degrees of men's understandings; and that a weak man, however much below the ordinary standard of human intellect, is not only responsible for crimes, but is bound by his contracts, and may exercise dominion over his property. Sir Joseph JEKYL, in the Duchess of Cleveland's Case, took the clear legal distinction, when he said 'the law will not measure the sizes of men's capacities, so as they be compos mentis.' "Lord COKE, in speaking of the expression non compos mentis, says: 'Many times, as here, the Latin word expresses the true sense, and calleth him not amens, demens, furiosus, lunaticus, fatuus, stultus, or the like, for non compos mentis is the most sure and legal.' He then says: 6 non compos mentis is of four sorts: First, ideota, which is from his nativity by a perpetual infirmity, is non compos mentis; secondly, he that by sickness, grief, or other accident, wholly loses his memory and understanding; third, a lunatic, that hath sometimes his understanding and sometisme not; ali quaddo gaudet lucides intervallis; and therefore he is called non compos mentis, so long as he hath not understanding.' "But notwithstanding the precision with which this great author points out the different kinds of this unhappy malady, the nature of his work, in this part of it, did not open to any illustration which it can now be useful to consider. In his Fourth Institute he is more particular; but the admirable work of Lord Chief Justice HALE, in which he refers to Lord COKE'S Pleas of the Crown, renders all other authorities unnecessary. "Lord HALE says: "There is a partial insanity of mind, and a total insanity. The former is either in respect to things, quoad hoc vel illud insanire: some persons, that have a competent use of reason in respect of some subjects, are yet under a particular dementia in respect of some particular discourses, subjects, or applications; or else it is partial in respect of degrees; and this is the condition of very many, especially melancholy persons, who for the most part discover their defect in excessive fears and griefs, and yet are not wholly destitute of the use of reason; and this partial insanity seems not to excuse them in the committing of any offence for its matter capital; for doubtless most persons that are felons of themselves and others, are under a degree of partial insanity when they commit these offences; it is very difficult to define the invisible line that divides perfect and partial insanity; but it must rest upon circumstances duly to be weighed and considered by both judge and jury, lest on the one side, there be a kind of inhumanity towards the defects of human nature; or on the other side too great an indulgence given to great crimes.' "Nothing, gentlemen, can be more accurately or more humanely expressed; but the application of the rule is often most difficult. I am bound, besides, to admit |