MENTALLY UNFIT

Hokitika Guardian, 17 November 1932, Page 3

MENTALLY UNFIT

MARRIAGE PROHIBITION

REPRESENTATIONS OF W.D.F.U

WELLINGTON, November 15

Efforts ait* at present being made by the Women's Division of the New Zealand Farmers’ Union to have rcstor-u in the Mental Defectives Amendment Act, 1928, two of t'.ie withdrawn clauses which, if they had .become law, would have prohibited the marriage of idiots, imbeciles, feeole-minded persons epileptics, or peiuons socially detective, and in certain cases would have authorised the sterilisation of certain persons special circumstances. Four years now elapsed since these clauses were withdrawn, and eight yearn since the Committee of Inquiry stiited\that the -evil tiad already attained “appalling dimensions.” Mrs T. iR. Barrel’, M.A., of Masterton, a vice-president of the division, who has been authorised to give addresses in various parts of the Dominion. on the states that the Mental Defectives Amendment Act, 1928 marks a distinct advance in social legislation, especially in those clauses, authorising the setting up of a eugenics board of experts .with power to compile a register of mental defectives, exclusive of the inmates of. asylums, and those suffering from senile decay, and \2) making provision tor institutions in the form of farm or industrial colonies where those whose names are On the register may be segregated. Those classes whose names may be placed on the register are idiots, imbeciles, feebleminded persons, epileptic?, and persons socially defective.

PROHIBITION OF MARRIAGE

Clause 21 (withdrawn) prohibited the marriage- of members of these five classes, (The Committee, of Inquiry into the problem of mental deficiency, which wa 6 .set up in J 984-, took exhaustive evidence, and finally sent Dr Gray, Inspector-General of Mental Hospitals, on a tour of inquiry in England, Europe, and America. As a result of all these investigations, th e committee made the following statements; (1) That the unchecked multiplication of the feeble-minded and epileptic is leading- to a continually. growing addition to the sum of human misery, an everfncreasing burden On the State, and the serious deterioration of the race ; .(2) that it would be .sound economy, ae well-as in the best interests of humanity, to deal with the problem at once, even though it involve substantial expenditure.

Yet in spite of these findings, and in an age of scientific knowledge, the clause prohibiting the marriage of persons registered under these five classes Was fictually withdrawn, Mrs Barrer statcis. It. j,s obvious that the cost) to the country for the charge and maihtenance of the unfortunate off pi ing of these unnatural marriages must be enormous. 'lt has been estimated that i 50 per cent, of our prison inmates are mentally defective ; while our asylums iu’e seriously overcrowded. In addition the provision of farm or industrial colonies, and the whole machinery for dealing with the problem, will be ari immense expense to the country. Some persons who come within th e fi' e classes above mentioned, are" capable of wholly or partially supporting themselves if at large in the community, yet are a menace owing to their capacity/ for transmitting their taint to their descendants.

STERILISATION IN SOME CASES

Claus© 25 proposed that the board in tjhe public interest might authorise the -sterilisation of any registered person, if in.' special circumstances it thought fit to d 0 so. The operation proposed was a. minor one, and it was possible fo r the patient afterward to marry and live a normal life, deprived only of tbe power of bringing into the world offsprings doomed from the outset. Henry Devine. M.D., F.R.C.P., state s in the ‘‘Medical Annual, 1930” : “Nobody claims that sterilisation will abolish the need for colonies, institutions and supervision, but on'-y that it will give freedom to those worthy of it. will reduce public expenditure, and will take ‘its place as an essential element in a complete and well organised pro'erramme of mental hygiene.”

This clause also was withdrawn. T-he Prime Minister stated that the withdrawal of both clauses was only temporary, until the country had gained a fuller and clearer knowledge of their significance and intentions.