Publication information
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Source: Journal of Mental Science
Source type: journal
Document type: article
Document title: “America”
Author(s): Bannister, H. M.
Date of publication: January 1902
Volume number: 48
Issue number: 164
Series: new series
Pagination: 124-26 (excerpt below includes only page 125)

 
Citation
Bannister, H. M. “America.” Journal of Mental Science Jan. 1902 v48n164 (new series): pp. 124-26.
 
Transcription
excerpt
 
Keywords
McKinley assassination (personal response); Leon Czolgosz; anarchism (psychology of).
 
Named persons
Leon Czolgosz; Edward C. Spitzka.
 
Notes
This article (below) appears in a long, multi-authored report collectively titled “Epitome” (pp. 124-96; denoted as Part III). The specific section featuring Bannister’s article is labeled “Progress of Psychiatry in 1901” (pp. 124-42).

From page 124: By Dr. H. M. Bannister.
 
Document

 

America [excerpt]

     The experts, who examined the assassin Czolgosz as to his mental condition, have made their report and declared him sane. Whether or not he had accomplices may never be known. Dr. E. C. Spitzka, in a published review of his case, seems to think he had, and that the murder of the President may have been plotted by men who used the murderer as their tool. Of course his persistent denial of the participation of anyone with him in the act does not necessarily command credence—it is only what might have been expected if there had been a plot and his courage had not failed. The psychology of the anarchist of the present day is, in some respects, a problem, and it is an unpleasantly large one in connection with a certain proportion of the foreign-born labour element in this country. Czolgosz himself was hardly a native; though born in America, his associations had not been American. It has been said that he was educated in the public schools, but I am informed that such was not the case. It is not hard to define insanity in a legal sense in a way that might easily be made to include the modern anarchists; they are certainly out of harmony with their environment in any decently organized society, and if we credit them with any sort of sincerity, they are the most deluded of individuals. No one is inclined, however, to believe them irresponsible, and the prompt conviction and execution of Czolgosz has certainly had the full endorsement of public opinion.

 

 


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