In most of the statutes and decisions to which we have referred there appears a distinct trend towards treating the deaf quite as normal persons, and the tendency may be considered to be general to-day to hold them very much as other citizens. The greater part of all the special legislation has ceased of late years, and it is seldom now that a particular enactment is placed upon the statute books. Where such does occur, it arises chiefly where some peculiar protection of the deaf has been felt to be needed. Discriminatory legislation has practically disappeared, as has also beneficial legislation of the old sort, the only kind likely to be enacted in the future being along the new lines pointed out. In judicial proceedings likewise particular usage in respect to the deaf has almost entirely passed away, and the deaf to-day receive little distinctive treatment. Practically the sole special consideration now accorded them is in the procurement of interpreters for proper occasions. On the whole, then, the present attitude of the law may be said to be to regard the deaf more and more fully as citizens, to allow them all the rights and duties of such, and to consider them in little need of particular aid or attention.[93] FOOTNOTES: [61] The legal treatment of the deaf, however, in past times has not been as severe as has been often supposed. Both the Justinian Code and the Civil Law, as well as the Common Law, granted a number of rights to the deaf, these being in some cases as far as the policy of the law would permit. In a few instances a not unsympathetic attitude was displayed towards them. In the early Roman law and in some other systems word of mouth was necessary to accomplish certain legal acts, and this of course bore hardly upon the deaf. In all cases it was the deaf-mute from birth who suffered most. On this subject, see A. C. Gaw, "The Legal Status of the Deaf," 1907; H. P. Peet, "Legal Rights and Responsibilities of the Deaf," 1857 (Proceedings of Convention of American Instructors, iv., p. 17). [62] Constitution, 1890, sec. 243. The blind are also included in the exemption. [63] In New York we find an early reference to the deaf in the rules adopted in 1761 by the state assembly regarding suffrage qualifications in the election of its own members, one of which rules declared that "no man deaf and dumb from his nativity has a vote," though this may have been partly due to the fact that nearly all voting then was _viva voce_. William Smith, "History of the Late Province of New York," 1830, ii., p. 358. [64] Laws, p. 110. A Kentucky statute refers to "idiots and those by speech or sign incapable" of understanding (Stat., 1894, Sec. 2149), but the deaf may not necessarily be included. [65] Cod. Laws, 1865, ch. 3, Sec. 2; 1884, Sec. 1378. [66] Civ. Code, 1838, Sec. 1852; 1898, Sec. 1591.