The Modern Foundation for the Insanity Defense: The Cases of James Hadfield (1800) and Daniel McNaughtan (1843)

Richard Moran

The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, 1985, vol. 477, issue 1, 31-42

Abstract: The modern foundation for the insanity defense was put in place during the first half of the nineteenth century, between the years 1800 and 1843. During this brief period the reaction to the acquittals by reason of insanity of James Hadfield (1800) and Daniel McNaughtan (1843) shaped the present function and administration of the insanity defense in the Anglo-American world. In the case of Hadfield, the reaction of the House of Commons to his acquittal led to the passage of the automatic confinement statutes that now accompany a successful plea of insanity in most jurisdictions. In McNaughtan's case, the reaction of the House of Lords to his acquittal led to the establishment of the famous right-from-wrong test of criminal responsibility that bears his name.

Date: 1985
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0002716285477001004 (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:anname:v:477:y:1985:i:1:p:31-42

DOI: 10.1177/0002716285477001004

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science
Bibliographic data for series maintained by SAGE Publications ().