467
Index to Periodicals feigned defense. In such cases‘the officers of the state would not be taken by surprise, but would have ample time to prepare themselves with testimony as to the sanity of the accused. The law should provide that when the accused, at his arraignment, has pleaded ‘insanity,’ he shall be confined at once in some suitable, safe place
where he may be observed and studied by ex perts appointed by the court for a reasonable time under good conditions for the observation of his conduct at a time when he does not know that he is being observed and when his shamming may be the more easil detected. This plan, without any statute en orcin
it, has been suc
cessfully tried in St. Louis. he court and the jury will thus have the benefit of the examina tions and observations of disinterested experts who will probably be able to detect whether the accused is really unsound in mind or only feigning." “Proposed Reforms in Criminal Procedure." By Charles F. Bostwick. 2 Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology 216 (July). "The defendant should not be granted the privilege of silence. It is not to be denied that in the days when almost every offense was punishable by death, and the defendant himself was not permitted to testify, it was eminently proper that he should not be com lied to testify against himself.
It would be e rontery on my
part to call your attention to the changed con ditions in which this rule is now invoked. Sufiice it to say, that the honest and innocent man when accused, demands a hearing and insists upon explanation. The Lord Chief Justice of England has said: ‘For an innocent man, the sooner his defense is raised, the better.’ (Rex. v.
Maxwell, 2 Crim. App. Cases, 28.) The rule has therefore come to be only another aid to the hardened criminal in his efforts to escape pun ishment, with no corresponding benefit to the innocent; thus adding another of the causes that have made the administration of the criminal law a disgrace. A change in this respect would tend to abolish the examination by the police before hearing, which is now necessary because of this privilege, and which has caused so much adverse comment.
"The judge should not be restrained from com menting upon the facts. The successful opera tion of this rule in England has made every thinking prosecuting attorney admit that it is, in theory at least, the better practice: and the
vulgar notions, a man must act himself . be now the same man who acted, have been himself at the time of the act, have had sense enough to
know what he was doing, and to know good from bad.
In addition, where ignorance is wrong,
not to have known does not remove accounta bility though the degree of it may be doubtful. And everything said of commission applies equally well to omission or negligence." From this topic the author takes up the con troversy over Freedom and Necessity. Necessi tarianism "fails in this, that it altogether ignores the rational self in the form of will; it ignores it in the act of volition, and it ignores it in the
abiding personality, which is the same through out all its acts, and by which alone imputation gets a meaning. . . . “If the self is ignored in the psychology of our Determinists, or recognized in a sense which is not the vulgar sense, then responsibility and punishment and all the beliefs intellectual and moral, which hang from (as we have seen) and
involve in their being the reality of the vulgar sense, with the non-reality thereof, fall and are destroyed; or survive, at most, in a form and a
shape which, whatever and however much better it may be, is absolutely irreconcilable with the notions of the ple. A criminal (in that view) is as ‘responsi Is’ for his acts of last year as the Thames at London is responsible for an accident on the Isis at Oxford, and he is no more responsible." “The Sexual Root of Kleptomania." By Dr. Wilhelm Stekel. 2 Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology 239 (July). This paper is an abridgment, by Mr. Adal bert Albrecht, of Dr. Stckel's article in the
Zeitschrift fur Sexualwissenschaft. Many cases of kleptomaniacs whose acts were caused by un gratified sexual desire are given. Many of the subjects are persons of high mental and moral character who reform after the physiological cause has been removed. "These examples show us the tremendous importance of sexual instinct in the origin of kleptomania. Similar examples might be given relating to pyro mania, the impulse to set fire to something; and hydromania, the pleasure of playing with water." See Juvenile Delinquency. Employers’ Liability. See Workmen's Com pensation. Evidence. "Testimony of Defendants in Criminal Prosecutions." By John Appleton.
only substantial and effective argument that
has been offered against it is, that the character and ability of the elected judges in certain localities would make the rule unworkable here. An argument to which I must admit there is some force." See Evidence, Procedure. Self-Incrimination.
Criminology. "Anglo-American Philosophies of Penal Law, IV; The Philosophy of Responsi bility." By F. H. Bradley. From his "Ethical Studies" (London, 1876). 2 Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology 186 (July). What the ordinary man means by moral re sponsibility is first considered. “According to
4 Maine Law Review 259 (June).
This article is a copy of a letter written by Chief Justice Appleton of the Supreme Judicial Court of Maine in 1866 upon the propriety of admitting defendants in criminal cases to give testimony, on their own behalf, if they so elect. Government. "The Unlimited Franchise." By Max Eastman.
Atlantic Monthly, v. 108,
p. 46 (July). "The disorder, the indignity and irregularity, the scattered extravagance, squabblin, and mud-slinging, and general uncertainty-a l these aspects of our government which make it un satisfactory to contemplate—are signs that it
