Religion, "Moral Insanity," and Psychology in Nineteenth-Century America

Datos Bibliográficos

ID4887429
AutoresJodie Boyer (autor de correspondencia)
Año2014
Volumen24
Número1
Páginas70-99
Fecha de publicación2014-01-01
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessSí
TipoARTICLE
RevistaReligion and American Culture A Journal of Interpretation (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 1052-1151 • E-ISSN: 1533-8568
EditorialCambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1525/rac.2014.24.1.70
OpenAlexW2095258915
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas1
Referencias citadas22

This article explores arguments among medico-legal experts (including Amariah Brigham, Isaac Ray, John P. Gray, and W. A. Hammond) about the social and moral ramifications of expanding the definition of insanity to include moral insanity. This is an important corrective to a standard view that sees the movement to transform the insanity defense in nineteenth-century America as a rejection of the explanatory power of human depravity in the face of an optimistic understanding of human nature as found in Scottish common sense philosophy. The debate, especially between Ray and Brigham, on the one hand, and Gray, on the other, finally led to a situation in which religious discussions of sin, the will, grace, and the shape of the human self were legally sidelined

Criminology · Insanity · Insanity defense · Political science · Social science · Sociology · American Constitutional Law and Politics · Historical Psychiatry and Medical Practices · Historical Studies on Reproduction, Gender, Health, and Societal Changes · Law · Psychology