Imbecility

In Medical Jurisprudence. A form of mental disease consisting in mental deficiency, either congenital or resulting from an obstacle to the development of the faculties supervening in Infancy.

Idiocy.

Generally, It Is manifested both In the intellectual and moral faculties; but occasionally it is limited to the latter, the former being but little, If at all, below the ordinary standard. Hence It Is distinguished into intellectual and moral. In the former there are seldom any of the repulsive features of Idiocy, the head, face, limbs, and movements, being scarcely distinguishable, at first sight, from those of the race at large. The senses are not manifestly deficient nor the power of articulation: though the use of language may be very limited. The perceptive faculties exhibit some activity; and thus the more obvious qualities of things are observed and remembered. Simple industrial operations are well performed, and, generally, whatever requires but little intolllgence is readily accomplished. For any process of reasoning, or any general observation or abstract ideas, imbeciles are totally Incompetent. Of law, Justice, morality, property, they have but a very imperfect notion. Some of the affective faculties are usually active, particularly those which lead to evil habits, thieving, incendiarism, drunkenness, homicide, assaults on women. The kind of mental defect here mentioned is universal in imbecility, but it exists in different degrees in different individuals, some being hardly distinguishable, at first sigbt, from ordinary men of feeble endowments, while others encroach upon the ill-defined line which separates them from idiocy; Tayl. Jur. 689. The various grades of Imbecility, however interesting in a philosophical point of view, are not very closely considered by courts. They are governed in criminal cases solely by their tests of responsibility, and in civil cases by the amount of capacity in connection with the act in question, or the abstract question of soundness or unsoundness. Touching the question of responsibility, the law makes no distinction between iu^becility and insanity.

See 1 G. & K. 129.

In clril cases, the effect of imbecility is differently estimated. In cases Involving the validity of the contracts of imbecile persons, courts have declined to gauge the measure of their Intellects, the only question with them being one of soundness or unsoundness, and “no distinction being made between important and common affairs, large or small property,” 4 Dane, Abr. 561.

See Jackson v. King, 4 Cow. (N. Y.) 207, 15 Am. Dec. ^54.

Courts of equity, also, have declined to invalidate the contracts of imbeciles, except on the ground of fraud; 1 fdderatlons. If the contract were for necessaries, or showed no mark of fraud or unfair advantage, or if the other party, acting in good faith and ignorant of the other’s mental infirmity, cannot be put in statu quo, the contract has been held to be valid; Chltty, Oontr. 112; Story, Oontr, § 27; Poll. Contr. 88; 4 Exch. 17. The same principles have governed the courts in cases involving the validity of the marriage contract. If suitable to the condition and circumstances of the party, and manifestly tending to his benefit, it has been confirmed, notwithstanding a considerable degree of Incompetency. If, on the other hand, it has been procured by improper infiuences, manifestly for the advantage of the other party, it has been invalidated; 1 Hagg. 355; Ray, Med. Jur. 100. The law has always shown more favor to the wills of Imbeciles than to their contracts. “If a man be of a mean understanding, neither of the wise sort nor of the foolish, but Indifferent, as it were, betwixt a wise man and a fool, — yea, though he rather inclined to the foolish sort, so that for his dull capacity he might worthily be called grossum caput, a dull pate, or a dunce, — such a one is not prohibited to make a testament;’’ Swinb. Wills, part 2, s.

4.

Whether the testament be established or not, depends upon the circumstances of the case; and the English ecclesiastical courts have always assumed a great deal of liberty in their construction of these circumstances. The general principle is that if the will exhibits a wise and prudent disposition of property, and is unquestionably the will of the testator, and not another’s, it should be established, in the face of no inconsiderable deficiency; 1 Hagg. 384. Very different views prevailed in a celebrated case in New York, Stewart’s Ex’r v. Llspenard, 26 Wend. (N. Y.) 266. The mental capacity must be equal to the act; and if that fact be established, and no unfair advantage have been taken of the mental deficiency, the will, the marriage, the contract, or whatever it may be, is held to be valid. The term moral imbecility is applied to a class of persons who, without any considerable, or even appreciable, deficiency of intellect, seem to have never been endowed with the higher moral sentiments. They,are unable to appreciate fully the distinctions of right and wrong, and, according to their several opportunities and tastes, they indulge in mischief as if by an instinct of their nature. To vice and crime they have an Irresistible proclivity, though able to discourse on the beauties of virtue and the claims of moral obligation. While young, mamy of them manifest a cruel and quarrelsome disposition, which leads them to torture brutes and bully their companions. They set all law 6 and admonition at defiance, and become a much light 4n the nature of this condition, that a very large proportion of this class of persons labor under some organic defect. They are scrofulous, rickety, or epileptic, or, if not obviously suffering from such diseases themselves, they are born of parents who did. Their progenitors may have been insane, or eccentric, or highly nervous, and this morbid peculiarity has become, unquestionably, by hereditary transmission, the efficient cause of the moral defect under consideration. Thus lamentably constituted, wanting in one of the essential elements of moral responsibility, they are certainly not fit objects of punishment; for though they may recognize the distinctions of right and wrong In the abstract, yet they have been denied by nature those faculties which prompt men more happily endowed to pursue the one and avoid the other. In practice, however, they have been regarded with no favor by the courts; Ray, Med. Jur. 112. See Insanity; Dementia.