Law Commons^™

“Champion Man-Hater Of All Time”: Feminism, Insanity, And Property Rights In 1940s America, Magdalene Zier

Michigan Journal of Gender & Law

Legions of law students in property or trusts and estates courses have studied the will dispute, In re Strittmater’s Estate. The cases, casebooks, and treatises that cite Strittmater present the 1947 decision from New Jersey’s highest court as a model of the “insane delusion” doctrine. Readers learn that snubbed relatives successfully invalidated Louisa Strittmater’s will, which left her estate to the Equal Rights Amendment campaign, by convincing the court that her radical views on gender equality amounted to insanity and, thus, testamentary incapacity. By failing to provide any commentary or context on this overt sexism, these sources affirm the …

Psychiatric Assistance For Indigent Defendants Pleading Insanity: The Michigan Experience, Paul Zisla

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

The federal government and many states already provide psychiatric assistance to indigent defendants pleading insanity. Michigan's statutory scheme for delivering this service presents an opportunity to evaluate an approach that generally favors defendant interests in areas left unresolved by Ake. This Note undertakes that evaluation. Part I summarizes the Ake decision, key problem areas, and the research methodology. Part II describes the Michigan statutory system. Part III evaluates that system using data from interviews with legal and psychiatric practitioners and considers the consequences of Michigan's approach to the issues posed by Ake. The evaluation shows that Michigan's system …

Equality, "Anisonomy," And Justice: A Review Of Madness And The Criminal Law, Andrew Von Hirsch

Michigan Law Review

A Review of Madness and the Criminal Law by Norval Morris

The Insanity Plea: The Uses And Abuses Of The Insanity Defense, Michigan Law Review

Michigan Law Review

A Review of The Insanity Plea: The Uses and Abuses of the Insanity Defense by William J. Winslade and Judith Wilson Ross

Evaluating Michigan's Guilty But Mentally Ill Verdict: An Empirical Study, Gare A. Smith, James A. Hall

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

Because Michigan's GBMI statute has been in effect for several years, enough data exists to assess the statute's use and practical effect. The purpose of this Project is to evaluate the statute and thus provide guidance for those legislatures considering similar proposals. This Project concludes that the new verdict has completely failed in its intended purpose. Part I describes the statute's history, legislative purpose, and procedural mechanics. Part II analyzes the displacing effect of the GBMI verdict on other verdicts, and sets forth empirical data on the disparate characteristics of defendants who raise the insanity defense and are subsequently found …

The Assassination Attempt, Yale Kamisar

Articles

From the moment the would-be assassin opened fire until many days after he was found not guilty by reaaon of insanity, the press was fascinated by the case. The very same day that it reported the assassination attempt "in the open street, and in the broad face of day," the Times considered but quickly dismissed the possibility of insanity: "The defndant's purpose was carried out with the most cold-blooded determination. . . . His demeanor throughout was cool and collected, nor did there appear any evidence of insanity." When, several days later, it became plain that the defendant was indeed …

The Constitutionality Of Michigan's Guilty But Mentally Ill Verdict, John M. Grostic

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

This article will assess the constitutionality of the statute providing for a GBMI verdict by examining the likely, impact of this statute on the constitutional rights of legally insane defendants. Part I will briefly outline the relevant provisions of the GBMI statute. Part II will consider whether legally insane defendants have a constitutional right to an insanity defense. Part III will then argue that some defendants, though legally insane at the time they committed allegedly criminal acts, will nevertheless be found GBMI rather than NGRI.

Disposition Of The Irresponsible: Protection Following Commitment, Travis H. Lewin

Michigan Law Review

Each year more of our fellow citizens are involuntarily committed to a mental institution of one sort or another than are incarcerated for the commission of a crime. To those committed, the walls and barred windows of the hospital, as well as the treatment and mode of living, are probably not significantly different from those of a prison. This is particularly the case with those confined for treatment by court order or by some special statutory procedure following acquittal of a crime on grounds of insanity. Yet these mentally ill, even after perpetrating what would otherwise have been a criminal …

Legislation Requiring Child To Support Mother In State Asylum Is A Denial Of Equal Protection-Department Of Mental Hygiene V. Kirchner, Michigan Law Review

Michigan Law Review

The California Department of Mental Hygiene brought suit under section 6650 of the state's Welfare and Institutions Code, a provision commonly known as a relative support statute, against the administratrix to recover 7,500 dollars from the intestate's estate. This amount represented the cost of food, housing, and treatment received by intestate's mother in a state mental hospital during the four years she had been confined there following a civil sanity hearing. Plaintiff was granted judgment on the pleadings. On appeal to the California Supreme Court, held, reversed. Since mental hospitals serve a proper public function, it is a denial …

Mental Illness And The Law Of Contracts, Robert M. Brucken S.Ed., David L. Genger S.Ed., Denis T. Rice S.Ed., Mark Shaevsky S.Ed., William R. Slye S.Ed., Robert P. Volpe S.Ed.

Michigan Law Review

The traditional and most important problem relative to mental illness and the contract is the situation created when mental illness exists at the time of agreement (the problem of contractual capacity). One principal result of mental illness at this time may be the avoidance of the contract by the mentally ill person. Since case law in this area is extensive, the major portion of the study is concerned with this problem (parts II, III and IV) and the effects of such incapacity throughout the remaining course of the contract. Mental illness occurring after agreement and at the time of performance …

Commitment Of The Mentally Ill: Problems Of Law And Policy, Hugh Alan Ross

Michigan Law Review

A number of recent events makes it timely to reconsider certain aspects of the relation between psychiatry and the law. In the past decade, both the public and the legal profession have been increasingly concerned with the impact of mental illness on the law. In 1952, an outstanding text, Psychiatry and The Law, was published as the joint effort of a lawyer and a psychiatrist. Two years later the Durham case laid down a new test of insanity in criminal cases, rejecting the M'Naghten rule. Interest in the case resulted in a host of law review articles, symposiums, and …

Constitutional Law - Criminal Law - Power Of Federal Government To Commit Mentally Incompetent Persons Charged With Federal Crimes, William C. Becker S.Ed.

Michigan Law Review

Petitioner was indicted for robbery from a United States Post Office. After a series of hearings and examinations, the district court found petitioner so mentally incompetent that he could not stand trial, and that, if released, he would probably endanger the safety of the officers, property, or other interests of the United States. The district court ordered petitioner committed to the custody of the Attorney General for confinement in a mental institution. This order was affirmed by the Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit, one judge dissenting. On certiorari to the Supreme Court of the United States, held, …

Weihofen: Mental Disorder As A Criminal Defense, Winfred Overholser M.D.

Michigan Law Review

A Review of Mental Disorder as a Criminal Defense. By Henry Weihofen.

Criminal Law - Reexamination Of Tests For Criminal Responsibility, Mary Lee Ryan

Michigan Law Review

Criminal law in the Anglo-American system of jurisprudence is based upon the concept that persons should be held responsible for their acts. A strong corrollary to this idea is that certain types of persons, namely the "insane," should not be held responsible for criminal conduct. Although this proposition seems beautifully simple, courts in England and the United States for over a hundred years have wrestled with the problem of what constitutes insanity, or, to phrase it more accurately, what type of mental condition should preclude responsibility for a criminal act.

Bankruptcy-Voluntary Petition By Incompetent On Court Order

Michigan Law Review

A state court adjudged B to be insane, committed him to an asylum, appointed G as guardian of his estate, and later authorized G to file a voluntary petition in bankruptcy on behalf of B. Such a petition was filed by G, the schedule of liabilities showing debts contracted before B was adjudicated insane. The federal district court adjudicated B a bankrupt and appointed a trustee in bankruptcy, who sued C to recover an alleged preference paid to C by B. C then sought to set aside the adjudication of bankruptcy on the ground that an insane person could not …

Irresistible Impulse And Criminal Liability, John Barker Waite

Michigan Law Review

Do you believe in free-will, or mechanistic determinism, or fore-ordination, or fatalism? What do you mean by 'irresistible impulse'? What is the purpose of this prosecution against which you advocate, or deny, irresistible impulse as a defense; and just what do you mean by 'defense'? If, instead of one question, "is irresistible impulse a defense", we should ask these other questions of counsel, judge and medical expert, how often would their answers be in accord? Yet the one question can never be intelligently discussed in the absence of certainty and agreement as to the other premises. There are certain combinations …

Recent Important Decisions, Michigan Law Review

Michigan Law Review

Admiralty - Workmen's Compensation - Is a Hydroplane a Vessel? - Claimant was employed in the care and management of a hydroplane which was moored in navigable waters. The hydroplane began to drag anchor and drift toward the beach, where it was in danger of being wrecked. Claimant waded into the water and was struck by the propeller. Held, claimant is not entitled to compensation under the Workmen's Compensation Law, since a hydroplane while on navigable waters is a vessel, and therefore the jurisdiction of the admiralty excludes that of the State Industrial Commission. Reinhardt v. Newport Flying Service Corp. …

Some Sociological Aspects Of Criminal Law, Harriette M. Dilla

Michigan Law Review

There is a vast need for something that will sometime be written upon the subject of Sociology as a basis of Criminal Law and Procedure. The science of what may be termed Sociological Jurisprudence is in an embryonic state at present and the nearest approach perhaps is what we call Criminal Sociology or Criminology. The progress of this study has been rapid but we may still hope for .a more general application of principle! to practice. It is true that readjustment in law is more difficult than in other fields, as necessary formalities of procedure often seem to impose unreasonable …

Statutory Abolition Of Defense Of Insanity In Criminal Cases, John R. Rood

Articles

The great lengths to which the defense of insanity has been carried in homicide cases has induced numerous legislative attempts to abolish the evil; and the fate which such legislation has met and deserves at the hands of the courts is a matter of considerable interest.

Coyle V. The Commonwealth, Henry W. Rogers

Articles

"Homicidal mania must be proved, not assumed, nor confounded with reckless frenzy; To instruct, however, that it must be proved by 'clearly preponderating evidence' is error. All the authorities require is that the evidence proving it should 'fairly' preponderate.

"An attempt at suicide is not of itself evidence of insanity, and raises no legal presumption thereof....

"It was clearly proved that Coyle killed Emily Myers. That fact is admitted. The only defence set up is that he was insane at the time."

Confinement Of The Insane, Thomas M. Cooley

Articles

The time is almost within the memory of living persons when it was deemed not only lawful but proper to confine persons afflicted with mental disease in dungeons and with chains, and to subject them to beating, at the discretion of their keepers, in order to subdue their senseless fury and drive away their delusions.1 The notions of an ignorant and barbarous age justified such treatment, but the common law on the subject has been so much modified in the greater intelligence of the present century that opinions as to how much of the old rules remain must be expressed …