CAUSES OF CRIME.
Under this general heading, Dr. William Healy, Director of the Juvenile Psychopathic Institute of Chicago, read a paper on “The Problem of the Causation of Criminality,” and Dr. William Martin Richards, of New York, gave an address on “Physical Defects as a Factor in the Making of Criminals.” No synopsis of these papers can do them justice. They represent the latest investigations along these lines, and when published should be read by all who are interested in the betterment of humanity. Dr. Healy recited numerous specific instances of abnormal children whose lives were directly aimed at defiance of law, because of physical or mental defects or because of trivial circumstances, most of whom could be more or less readily reformed when handled in a rational manner.
Dr. Richards dwelt on such defects as bad eyesight, nasal imperfections, “flat foot,” and various spinal troubles, all of which were responsible for criminal tendencies. He told of some cases where the restoration of correct vision had resulted in changing lives, criminally inclined, into right habits.
Frederick Howard Wines, the only charter member of the Association present, said that in all the sessions he had ever attended he had not heard two such illuminating addresses.