The defects of the lunacy law; a vindication of the decision of the Lord Chief Baron of the Court of Exchequer, in the case of Nottidge versus Ripley / by T. T. Wingett.

  • Wingett, T. T.
Date:
1849
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The defects of the lunacy law; a vindication of the decision of the Lord Chief Baron of the Court of Exchequer, in the case of Nottidge versus Ripley / by T. T. Wingett. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by Royal College of Physicians, London. The original may be consulted at Royal College of Physicians, London.

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    u unsound mind.” It is sufficiently clear that these maxims set forth the spirit and intention of the common law upon the subject;~ and that the statutes cannot be strained to give any new defini- tions, or extend the limits, or give any new authority over and above that declared by the common law. It matters not what custom had, without authority, introduced into the practice of lunatic asylums ; or what the judge’s own private opinion may have been as to the present demands of society; he took the common and statute law as his guide ; and although he might have had it in his power to have modified the first of the foregoing maxims in accordance with the advancement of medical science and established usage, yet he had no data to go upon; as, unfortunately, our medical literature pronounced and recorded the same rule,* and thus assisted in the creation of this impracti- cable and narrow-minded precedent. Neverthe- less, medical writers, with ineffable inconsistency, appear in the van of those who have attacked the Lord Chief Baron and his dictum. It is, pal- pably, the grossest absurdity to impeach the judge for the results of this case ; he has merely ex- pounded the law—extreme law it may be — but the law nevertheless. The law only is at fault: and if we insist upon attacking the law in the * See Indications of Insanity, by Dr Conolly ; The Duality of the Mind, by Dr Wigan, &c. &c.