CHAPTER XVI
An Opinion on Expert Opinion
(with special regard to the testimony of Experts in Handwriting)
The law admits opinion evidence by experts under certain conditions. This is doubtless right when such experts qualify as specialists who have prepared themselves by recognized methods regarding some department of science, art, or industry; and when their testimony is confined to stating facts and deductions only, omitting all abstract speculations.
The admission of such testimony is, doubtless, necessary. The fields of science, art, and industry are enormous; and in each, one man during one life can only hope to acquire thorough knowledge of one small part of his particular enclosure. Hence “specialties” have arisen—the one lifework of one man. Specialties represent a movement of “from the general to the particular.” In the field of science, for instance, is the department of surgery; and of all kinds of surgeons is one particular specialist, the dentist. So in art, music is but a little part of all art, and the violinist but a specialist in music. Industry classifies into business and agriculture, each in turn susceptible of innumerable sub-divisions, each a specialty. By this arrangement it is seen that almost every man is to some degree a specialist, or should be one; therefore, when particular information is required it must be sought from the specialist. We seek to appropriate his experience, and naturally turn in our inquiry to those who seem best qualified to supply our wants. The true expert should be, then, a very particular specialist. In the field of industry and art we should require that he be experienced and successful. In science, that he possess definite knowledge—exactness.
So far, no complaint whatever can be made against the employment of experts (specialists). It is a necessary thing; it occurs every day in everyday life, and their testimony is very properly allowed in criminal and other court proceedings. But it is undoubtedly wrong when used unjustly; as, for instance, by the State or a very rich man against an opponent too poor to protect himself—and the testimony of experts in handwriting is often so used. It is especially unjust when an expert on a scientific subject holds no other commission or diploma than one bestowed upon him by—himself—an expert in handwriting has no other.
No one would employ a self-instructed physician, retain a self-taught lawyer, or a chemist who never went to school; in fact, the self-educated are almost excluded from the higher professions.
Consider the formal course of study necessary to become a physician, a minister, or lawyer—schools and all their examinations, the four years in college, and all the examinations pertinent thereto, and then the special post-graduate courses at schools of law, medicine, or divinity. We trust and respect these professions, because we know of their preparation; this is their guarantee. They are tested over and over again to see if they can do their work. Only then do they obtain diplomas. We require this very thing from our engineers, firemen, coal miners, and accountants before they are granted a license. But the handwriting expert passes no examinations, and possesses no diploma. He need not even procure a license.
The expert in handwriting may have your life, liberty, and fortune in his hands; but he comes from—where? Who taught him? Who has tested or examined him as to his knowledge and accuracy? Think of it! The right to swear away the life, or liberty, or property of another is bestowed upon this class of “experts” by themselves. And the law permits it. Where do this class of “experts” study their “science”? What school has classes or lectures on this subject? What college has a chair for the instruction of experts in questions of disputed writings? Is there a university with a department for their training? What does Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Columbia in America, or Oxford and Cambridge in England, have to say on this subject? All scientific things are recognized by these great colleges and universities. The study of questions arising from disputed handwritings is recognized in none of them; hence this study is not, at least as yet, a science. Another reason why this study is not a science, is that it is based on the theory of probabilities; it is mere speculation. For this reason experts in handwriting cannot even agree together on their own specialty. They lack the unity of even a trade. Experts in handwriting have no guild—no society. Why is this? Because this class of professional witnesses can never formulate their conflicting theories; they cannot agree on any one point; they have no common standards, no principles laid down and agreed to, no mutual foundation or basis for their theories to rest upon. Again why? Because they would have to violate them in the very next case into which they might be called. Therefore experts in questions of disputed handwriting are not scientists.
In courts of justice no experts should be allowed to plead (ex-parte) for the side they espouse. Experts in handwriting are notorious for this; and their methods and deductions are always according to the testimony desired by the side retaining them. Their opinions are tinctured by retainers. In many cases where large sums of money are involved in litigation, as, for instance, a disputed “will case,” experts in handwriting appear on each side. The question in such cases often narrows down to the simple proposition: “Is the signature of the last will and testament genuine?” It must be either genuine or forged; and yet we find the phenomena of prominent experts in handwriting holding diametrically opposite views, and giving reasons under oath in support of their opinions. Now it naturally follows that if one side is right, the other side must be wrong, and vice versa; the signature cannot possibly be both genuine and forged. If the testimony of all the experts is in accord with conscience, some experts are—to be charitable—inaccurate.