Chapters in the History of the Insane in the British IslesTuke, Daniel Hack
History
Chapters in the History of the Insane in the British Isles
Tuke, Daniel Hack
Mental health laws -- Great Britain; Mental illness -- Great Britain; Mentally ill -- Care; Psychiatric hospitals -- Great Britain
Thus all the mass of valuable and decisive evidence which had been
collected with so much labour, and had occupied the time and thought of
two Committees of the House of Commons, was, for the time, thrown away,
and the misery of the inmates of asylums allowed to go unrelieved. The
facts, however, had been made widely known. The inertia, torpor, and
indifference to human suffering--in short, the crime which characterized
the majorities who threw out the Bills calculated to remove the abuses
in asylums, had at last to give way to the popular demand. What was
gained by prolonging the dismal condition of these abodes of woe for
some years longer, I leave others to discover.
After the lapse of three years, namely, on the 10th of March, 1819, Mr.
Wynn[151] rose to move for leave to bring in a "Bill for the Regulation
of Mad-houses," and observed that, as this subject had been already
several times before the House, he did not feel it necessary to trespass
long upon its attention. It would be remembered, he said, that some
years ago the Report of a Committee had been laid before the House,
detailing such scenes of misery and wretchedness in mad-houses, as had
perhaps never been paralleled, and after such an exposure it was the
obvious duty of the House to follow up the Report by the adoption of
some legislative measure calculated to put an end to the evils
complained of. There was, however, no fault to be found with the
conduct of that House; for it had done its duty by repeatedly sending up
a Bill to the other House, which it had thought proper to reject.
Although no mad-houses could be legally opened without a licence, the
College of Physicians was not in possession of funds to prosecute. He
therefore proposed that a general Board of Inspection for mad-houses
should be appointed, and that the members of that Board should be at
liberty to visit such houses throughout the country, at different and
uncertain times, so as to ascertain the manner in which they were
conducted, and to report any existing evil to the Board, which should be
invested with power to enforce their correction. Mr. Wynn moved for
leave to bring in a Bill for repealing the Act of the 14th and 55th of
the King with respect to mad-houses, and for making other provisions for
their better regulation.[152]
Leave was given to bring in the Bill.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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