If it appears on the trial of a person accused of committing the
crime of murder that the deceased was killed by the accused under
circumstances which, nothing else appearing, made a case of murder,
the jury cannot properly return a verdict of guilty of the offense
charged if, upon the whole evidence, from whichever side it comes,
they have a reasonable doubt whether, at the time of killing, the
accused was mentally competent to distinguish between right and
wrong or to understand the nature of the act he was committing.
No man should be deprived of his life under the forms of law
unless the jurors who try him are able, upon their consciences, to
say that the evidence before them, by whomsoever adduced, is
sufficient to show beyond a reasonable doubt the existence of every
fact necessary to constitute the crime charged.
The plaintiff in error was indicted for murder, tried in the
court below, and convicted. In the opinion of this Court, the issue
brought here for decision is stated as follows:
"The
Page 160 U. S. 470
court below instructed the jury that the defense of insanity
could not avail the accused unless it appeared affirmatively, to
the reasonable satisfaction of the jury, that he was not criminally
responsible for his acts. The fact of killing being clearly proved,
the legal presumption, based upon the common experience of mankind,
that every man is sane, was sufficient, the court in effect said,
to authorize a verdict of guilty although the jury might entertain
a reasonable doubt upon the evidence whether the accused, by reason
of his mental condition, was criminally responsible for the killing
in question. In other words, if the evidence was
in
equilibrio as to the accused's being sane -- that is, capable
of comprehending the nature and effect of his acts -- he was to be
treated just as he would be if there were no defense of insanity or
if there were an entire absence of proof that he was insane. "
Page 160 U. S. 474
MR. JUSTICE HARLAN delivered the opinion of the Court.
Dennis Davis was indicted for the crime of having, on the 18th
day of September, 1894 at the Creek Nation, in the Indian
Territory, within the Western District of Arkansas, feloniously,
willfully, and of his malice aforethought killed and murdered one
Sol Blackwell.
He was found guilty of the charge in the indictment. A motion
for a new trial having been overruled, and the court having
adjudged that the accused was guilty of the crime of
Page 160 U. S. 475
murder, as charged, he was sentenced to suffer the penalty of
death by hanging.
At the trial below, the government introduced evidence which, if
alone considered, made it the duty of the jury to return a verdict
of guilty of the crime charged.
But there was evidence tending to show that, at the time of the
killing, the accused, by reason of unsoundness of weakness of mind,
was not criminally responsible for his acts. In addition to the
evidence of a practicing physician of many years' standing, and
who, for the time, was physician at the jail in which the accused
was confined previous to his trial, "other witnesses," the bill of
exceptions states,
"testified that they had been intimately acquainted with the
defendant for a number of years, lived near him, and had been
frequently with him, knew his mental condition, and that he was
weak-minded, and regarded by his neighbors and people as being what
they called 'half crazy.' Other witnesses, who had known the
defendant for ten or twenty years, witnesses who had worked with
him, and had been thrown in constant contact with him, said he had
always been called half crazy, weak-minded, and, in the opinion of
the witnesses, defendant was not of sound mind."
The issue therefore was as to the responsibility of the accused
for the killing alleged and clearly proved.
In its elaborate charge, the court instructed the jury as to the
rules by which they were to be guided in determining whether the
accused took the life of the deceased feloniously, willfully, and
with malice aforethought. "Where," the court said,
"a man has been shot to death, where the facts, as claimed by
the government here, show a lying in wait, show previous
preparation, show the selection of a deadly weapon, and show
concealment to get an opportunity to do the act -- where that state
of case exists, if there is a mental condition of the kind that
renders a man accountable, why there is crime, and that crime is
murder."
Referring to the evidence adduced to show that the accused was
incompetent in law to commit crime, the court observed:
"Now when a man premeditates a wicked design that produces
Page 160 U. S. 476
death, and executes that design, if he is a sane being -- if he
is what the law calls a sane man, not that he may be partially
insane, not that he may be eccentric, and not that he may be unable
to control his will power if he is in a passion or rage because of
some real or imaginary grievance he may have received -- I say, if
you find him in that condition, and you find these other things
attending the act, you would necessarily find the existence of the
attributes of the crime of murder known as 'willfulness' and
'malice aforethought.�"
But the court said the law
"presumes every man is sane, and the burden of showing it is not
true is upon the party who asserts it. The responsibility of
overturning that presumption, that the law recognizes as one that
is universal, is with the party who sets it up as a defense. The
government is not required to show it. The law presumes that we are
all sane; therefore, the government does not have to furnish any
evidence to show that this defendant is sane. It comes in here with
the fact established in legal contemplation until it is overthrown.
The government takes and keeps that attitude until the evidence
brought in the case overthrows this presumption of sanity. Now, let
us see what the nature of this defense is. The defendant interposes
the plea of insanity, and he says by this plea that he did the
killing, but the act is not one for which he can be held
responsible -- in other words, that the act was and is excusable in
the law because he was insane at the time of its commission. Now I
say to you in this connection, and it is a fact admitted in
argument by the counsel, that under the evidence there is nothing
that justifies the act of the killing; nor was it such an act that
the law upholds it or mitigates it, or reduces it to a grade lower
than murder. If it was committed by the defendant while he was
actually insane, it is excusable."
Again:
"Now, I will undertake or endeavor to tell you, and I bespeak
your most earnest attention, especially upon this proposition of
'insanity.' The term 'insanity,' as used in this defense, means
such a perverted and deranged condition of the mental and moral
faculties as to render a person incapable of distinguishing between
right and wrong, or unconscious at
Page 160 U. S. 477
the time of the nature of the act he is committing, or where,
though conscious of the nature of the act, and able to distinguish
between right and wrong, and know that the act is wrong, yet his
will -- by which I mean the governing power of his mind -- has
been, otherwise than voluntarily, so completely destroyed that his
actions are not subject to it, but are beyond his control. Such
insanity, if proved to your reasonable satisfaction to have existed
at the time of the commission of the act -- that is the test -- at
the time of its commission, is in the law an excuse for it, however
brutal or atrocious it may have been. For a person to be excused
from criminal responsibility, it is not necessary that he be a
raving maniac, but ordinarily it requires something more than mere
eccentricity of a natural character. Such insanity does not
excuse."
Later in the charge, the court recurred to the defense of
insanity, and said:
"Now, as I have already told you, the law presumes every person
who has reached the years of discretion to be of sane mind, and
this presumption continues until the contrary is shown. So that
when, as in this case, insanity is interposed as a defense, the
fact of the existence of such insanity at the time of the
commission of the offense charged must be established by the
evidence to the reasonable satisfaction of a jury, and the burden
of proof of the insanity rests with the defendant. Although you may
believe and find from the evidence that the defendant did commit
the act charged against him, yet, if you further find that at the
time he did so he was in such an insane condition of mind that he
did not and could not understand and comprehend the nature of the
act, or that, thus knowing and understanding it, he was so far
deprived of his will, not by his own passion, conceived for the
purpose of spurring him on to commit the violence, not by his own
passion of mind engendered by some real or fancied grievance, but
that he was so far deprived of his will by disease or other cause
over which he had no control as to render him unable to control his
actions -- then such killing was not a malicious killing, and you
will acquit him of the crime charged against him."
In concluding its charge, the court thus summarized the
Page 160 U. S. 478
principles by which the jury were to be guided in their
deliberations:
"Now gentlemen, the propositions are few in this case. First,
inquire whether there was a killing; then whether the act of
killing was done by the defendant, and what was his condition of
mind under the law at that time, as I have given it to you. See
what his mental condition was at that time under the law as I have
given it to you, and if he is to be held responsible for his
actions. If so, you are then to take a step further and see whether
these attributes of the crime of murder existed as I have defined
them to you -- that is, that the killing was done willfully and
with malice aforethought."
"Gentlemen, I have given you the law in the case, and you are to
take it as the law, and by this law and the testimony you are to
make up your verdict. You are to be satisfied beyond a reasonable
doubt of the guilt of this defendant before you convict. When you
start into a trial of a case, as I have already told you, you start
in with the presumption of sanity. Then comes in the responsibility
resting upon the defendant to show his condition; to show his
irresponsibility under the law. He is required to show that -- to
your reasonable satisfaction, I say, to your reasonable
satisfaction -- that it is a state of case where he is excusable
for the act."
These extracts from the charge of the court present this
important question: if it appears that the deceased was killed by
the accused under circumstances which -- nothing else appearing --
made a case of murder, can the jury properly return a verdict of
guilty of the offense charged if, upon the whole evidence, from
whatever side it comes, they have a reasonable doubt whether, at
the time of killing, the accused was mentally competent to
distinguish between right and wrong or to understand the nature of
the act he was committing? If this question be answered in the
negative, the judgment must be reversed, for the court below
instructed the jury that the defense of insanity could not avail
the accused unless it appeared affirmatively to the reasonable
satisfaction of the jury that he was not criminally responsible for
his acts. The fact of killing being clearly proved, the legal
presumption,
Page 160 U. S. 479
based upon the common experience of mankind that every man is
sane, was sufficient, the court in effect said, to authorize a
verdict of guilty, although the jury might entertain a reasonable
doubt upon the evidence whether the accused, by reason of his
mental condition, was criminally responsible for the killing in
question. In other words, if the evidence was
in
equilibrio as to the accused being sane -- that is, capable of
comprehending the nature and effect of his acts -- he was to be
treated just as he would be if there were no defense of insanity or
if there were an entire absence of proof that he was insane.
This exposition of criminal law is not without support by
adjudications in England and in this country. In
Regina v.
Stokes, 3 Car. & K. 185, 188 -- a case of murder -- Baron
Rolfe said:
"If the prisoner seeks to excuse himself upon the plea of
insanity, it is for him to make it clear that he was insane at the
time of committing the offense charged. The onus rests on him, and
the jury must be satisfied that he actually was insane. If the
matter is left in doubt, it will be their duty to convict him, for
every man must be presumed to be responsible for his acts until the
contrary is clearly shown."
The same judge, in
Regina v. Layton, 4 Cox C.C. 149,
155, which was also a case of murder, and the defense insanity,
after observing that in cases of that description it was a cardinal
rule "that the burden of proving innocence rested on the party
accused," said that the question for the jury was "not whether the
person was of sound mind, but whether he had made out to their
satisfaction that he was not of sound mind."
But the most deliberate and careful statement of the doctrine in
the English courts is to be found in
M'Naghten's Case, 10
Cl. & Fin.199, 203, 210, decided in 1843. The accused having
been found not guilty on the ground of insanity, his trial became
the subject of discussion in the House of Lords, and much was said
about insane delusions and partial insanity as giving or not giving
immunity for acts which, being committed by sane persons, were
punishable criminally. The judges were summoned to give their
opinion on that question,
Page 160 U. S. 480
although there was no case pending before the house. 67
Hansard's Parliamentary Debates, vol. 67, 3d series, 714 to 743.
Among the questions propounded to the judges were these:
"What are the proper questions to be submitted to the jury when
a person alleged to be afflicted with insane delusions respecting
one or more particular subjects or persons is charged with the
commission of a crime (murder, for example), and insanity is set up
as a defense? In what terms ought the question to be left to the
jury as to the person's state of mind at the time when the act was
committed?"
Mr. Justice Maule delivered a separate opinion in which he
expressed great difficulty in answering the questions put to the
judges, because they did not appear to arise out of, and were not
propounded with reference to, a particular case, or for a
particular purpose, which might explain or limit the generality of
these terms, and also because he had heard no argument at the bar
or elsewhere on the subject referred to in the questions. He
expressed fear that any answers made would embarrass the
administration of justice in criminal cases. He nevertheless said
that
"to render a person irresponsible for crime on account of
unsoundness of mind, the unsoundness should, according to law as it
has long been understood and held, be such as rendered him
incapable of knowing right from wrong,"
and that the judge, in the particular case on trial, should
employ such terms in his instructions as, in his discretion, would
be proper to assist the jury in coming to a right conclusion as to
the guilt of the accused. Lord Chief Justice Tindal, speaking for
himself and the other judges, said in response to the questions
propounded that the jurors ought to be told in all cases where
insanity is set up as a defense that
"every man in presumed to be sane and to possess a sufficient
degree of reason to be responsible for his crimes until the
contrary be proved to their satisfaction, and that to establish a
defense on the ground of insanity, it must be clearly proved that,
at the time of the committing of the act, the party accused was
laboring under such a defect of reason, from disease of the mind,
as not to know the nature and quality of the act he was doing, or,
if he did know it, that he did not know he was doing what was
wrong. "
Page 160 U. S. 481
In
Commonwealth v. Rogers, 7 Met. (Mass.) 500, 504, 506
(1844), it was said by Chief Justice Shaw, in his charge to the
jury, that:
"The ordinary presumption is that a person is of sound mind
until the contrary appears, and in order to shield one from
criminal responsibility, the presumption must be rebutted by proof
of the contrary satisfactory to the jury. Such proof may arise
either out of the evidence offered by the prosecutor to establish
the case against the accused or from distinct evidence offered on
his part. In either case, it must be sufficient to establish the
fact of insanity, otherwise the presumption will stand."
The jury, after being in consultation for several hours, came
into court and asked whether they must be satisfied beyond a doubt
of the insanity of the prisoner to entitle him to an acquittal. The
court responded that if the preponderance of the evidence was in
favor of the insanity of the prisoner, the jury would be authorized
to find him insane. A verdict was returned of not guilty by reason
of insanity. In
Commonwealth v. York, 9 Met. (Mass.) 93,
116 (1845), the charge was murder, and the defense provocation or
mutual combat, making the offense at most only manslaughter. The
court held that the guilt of malicious homicide was established
beyond reasonable doubt by proof beyond reasonable doubt of the
fact of voluntary killing, without excuse or justification apparent
upon the evidence introduced in behalf of the prosecution; that in
such case the proof must preponderate in favor of the fact of
sudden and mutual combat in order to justify a finding in favor of
the prisoner in respect to the fact, it not being sufficient to
raise a doubt, even though it be a reasonable doubt, of the fact of
extenuation. In that case, Mr. Justice Wilde dissented in an able
opinion, holding that
"the burden of proof in every criminal case is on the
commonwealth to prove all the material allegations in the
indictment, and if, on the whole evidence, the jury have a
reasonable doubt whether the defendant is guilty of the crime
charged, they are bound to acquit him."
P. 134. In
Commonwealth v. Eddy, 7 Gray 584 (1856), in
which the crime charged was murder and the defense insanity, Mr.
Justice Metcalf, speaking for himself and Justices Bigelow
Page 160 U. S. 482
and Merrick, said:
"The burden is on the commonwealth to prove all that is
necessary to constitute the crime of murder. And as that crime can
be committed only by a reasonable being -- a person of sane mind --
the burden is on the commonwealth to prove that the defendant was
of sane mind when he committed the act of killing. But it is a
presumption of law that all men are of sane mind, and that
presumption of law sustains the burden of proof, unless it is
rebutted and overcome by satisfactory evidence to the contrary. In
order to overcome the presumption of law and shield the defendant
from legal responsibility, the burden is on him to prove, to the
satisfaction of the jury, by a preponderance of the whole evidence
in the case, that at the time of committing the homicide he was not
of sane mind."
It would seem that later cases in Massachusetts do not go to the
extent indicated by the above cases. In
Commonwealth v.
Heath, 11 Gray 308, which was tried before Justices Dewey,
Metcalf, and Thomas, the charge was murder and one question was
whether the defendants were of sufficient intelligence to be
responsible for a homicide. Upon this point, and as to the burden
of proof, the court said:
"The law presumes men and women of the age of the prisoners to
be sane, to be responsible agents. Where, therefore, a homicide is
proved to have been committed in such way and under such
circumstances as, when done by a person of sane mind, would
constitute murder, the presumption of law, as of common sense and
general experience, supplies that link. It presumes men to be same
till the contrary is shown. The presumption of law stands until it
is met and overcome by the evidence in the case. This evidence may
come, of course, as well from the witnesses for the government as
the witnesses for the defense, and when the evidence is all in, the
jury must be satisfied, in order to convict the prisoner, not only
of the doing of the acts which constitute murder, but that they
proceeded from a responsible agent, one capable of committing the
offense. This is the rule to be applied to a case where the defense
is idiocy, an original defect and want of capacity. Whether the
rule is modified where the defense relied upon is insanity,
disease
Page 160 U. S. 483
of the mind, or delusion, it is not necessary now to
inquire."
In respect to that case, we observe that, upon principle, the
rule as to the burden of proof in criminal cases cannot be
materially different where the defense is insanity, disease of the
mind, or delusion, from the rule obtaining when the defense is an
original defect and want of capacity. In
Commonwealth v.
Pomeroy, 117 Mass. 143 (reported in Wharton on Homicide, 2d
ed. 753, Appendix), which was tried in 1875 before MR. JUSTICE GRAY
(then Chief Justice of the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts)
and Mr. Justice Morton, afterwards Chief Justice of the same court,
it was contended by the prosecution that the question of sanity
raised by the defendant was to be determined by the preponderance
of proof; that the commonwealth was not bound to prove the sanity
of the accused beyond a reasonable doubt. But the court said:
"The burden is upon the government to prove everything essential
beyond reasonable doubt, and that burden, so far as the matter of
sanity is concerned, is ordinarily satisfactorily sustained by the
presumption that every person of sufficient age is of sound mind,
and understands the nature of his acts. But when the circumstances
are all in on the one side and on the other, on the one side going
to show a want of adequate capacity, on the other side going to
show usual intelligence -- when the whole is in, the burden rests
where it was in the beginning, upon the government, to prove the
case beyond a reasonable doubt."
In
State v. Spencer, 21 N.J.L. 196, 202, 212 (1846),
which was a case of murder tried before Chief Justice Hornblower,
it was said that
"when the evidence of sanity on the one side and of insanity on
the other leaves the scale in equal balance, or so nearly poised
that the jury have a reasonable doubt of his sanity, then a man is
to be considered sane and responsible for what he does,"
and that the
"proof of insanity at the time of committing the act ought to be
as clear and satisfactory in order to acquit him on the ground of
insanity as the proof of committing the act ought to be in order to
find a sane man guilty."
Again, in the same case:
"If in your opinion it is clearly proved that the prisoner at
the bar at the time of the homicide was unconscious that what he
did was
Page 160 U. S. 484
wrong, and that he ought not to do it, you must acquit him on
the ground of insanity; but if in your opinion this is not clearly
established beyond a reasonable doubt, then you must find him
guilty of the act, and proceed to investigate the nature of the
homicide."
There are other cases to the same general effect, some of them
holding that the presumption of sanity will prevail and that the
jury may properly convict unless the defense of insanity is
established beyond a reasonable doubt, others that it is the duty
of the jury to convict unless it appears by a preponderance of
evidence that the accused was insane when the killing occurred.
We are unable to assent to the doctrine that, in a prosecution
for murder, the defense being insanity and the fact of the killing
with a deadly weapon being clearly established, it is the duty of
the jury to convict where the evidence is equally balanced on the
issue as to the sanity of the accused at the time of the killing.
On the contrary, he is entitled to an acquittal of the specific
crime charged if, upon all the evidence, there is reasonable doubt
whether he was capable in law of committing crime.
No one, we assume, would wish either the courts or juries, when
trying a case of murder, to disregard the humane principle,
existing at common law and recognized in all the cases tending to
support the charge of the court below, that "to make a complete
crime cognizable by human laws, there must be both a will and an
act," and
"as a vicious will without a vicious act is no civil crime, so,
on the other hand, an unwarrantable act without a vicious will is
no crime at all. So that, to constitute a crime against human laws,
there must be first a vicious will; and secondly an unlawful act,
consequent upon such vicious will."
4 Bl.Com. 21. All this is implied in the accepted definition of
murder, for it is of the very essence of that heinous crime that it
be committed by a person of "sound memory and discretion," and with
"malice aforethought," either express or implied. 4 Bl.Com, 195; 3
Inst. 47; 2 Chitty's Cr.Law 476. Such was the view of the court
below, which took care in its charge to say that the crime of
murder could only be committed by a sane being,
Page 160 U. S. 485
although it instructed the jury that a reasonable doubt as to
the sanity of the accused would not alone protect him against a
verdict of guilty.
One who takes human life cannot be said to be actuated by malice
aforethought, or to have deliberately intended to take life, or to
have "a wicked, depraved, and malignant heart," or a heart
"regardless of society duty and fatally bent on mischief," unless
at the time he had sufficient mind to comprehend the criminality or
the right and wrong of such an act. Although the killing of one
human being by another human being with a deadly weapon is presumed
to be malicious until the contrary appears, yet,
"in order to constitute a crime, a person must have intelligence
and capacity enough to have a criminal intent and purpose, and if
his reason and mental powers are either so deficient that he has no
will, no conscience, or controlling mental power, or if, through
the overwhelming violence of mental disease, his intellectual power
is for the time obliterated, he is not a responsible moral agent,
and is not punishable for criminal acts."
Commonwealth v. Rogers, 7 Met. (Mass.) 501. Neither in
the adjudged cases nor in the elementary treatises upon criminal
law is there to be found any dissent from these general
propositions. All admit that the crime of murder necessarily
involves the possession by the accused of such mental capacity as
will render him criminally responsible for his acts.
Upon whom, then, must rest the burden of proving that the
accused, whose life it is sought to take under the forms of law,
belongs to a class capable of committing crime? On principle, it
must rest upon those who affirm that he has committed the crime for
which he is indicted. That burden is not fully discharged, nor is
there any legal right to take the life of the accused, until guilt
is made to appear from all the evidence in the case. The plea of
not guilty is unlike a special plea in a civil action, which,
admitting the case averred, seeks to establish substantive grounds
of defense by a preponderance of evidence. It is not in confession
and avoidance, for it is a plea that controverts the existence of
every fact essential to constitute the crime charged. Upon that
plea the accused
Page 160 U. S. 486
may stand, shielded by the presumption of his innocence, until
it appears that he is guilty, and his guilt cannot, in the very
nature of things, be regarded as proved if the jury entertain a
reasonable doubt from all the evidence whether he was legally
capable of committing crime.
This view is not at all inconsistent with the presumption which
the law, justified by the general experience of mankind as well as
by considerations of public safety, indulges in favor of sanity. If
that presumption were not indulged, the government would always be
under the necessity of adducing affirmative evidence of the sanity
of an accused. But a requirement of that character would seriously
delay and embarrass the enforcement of the laws against crime, and
in most cases be unnecessary. Consequently the law presumes that
everyone charged with crime is sane, and thus supplies in the first
instance the required proof of capacity to commit crime. It
authorizes the jury to assume at the outset that the accused is
criminally responsible for his acts. But that is not a conclusive
presumption which the law, upon grounds of public policy, forbids
to be overthrown or impaired by opposing proof. It is a disputable,
or, as it is often designated, a rebuttable, presumption resulting
from the connection ordinarily existing between certain facts, such
connection not being
"so intimate nor so nearly universal as to render it expedient
that it should be absolutely and imperatively presumed to exist in
every case, all evidence to the contrary being rejected, but yet it
is so general and so nearly universal that the law itself, without
the aid of a jury, infers the one fact from the proved existence of
the other, in the absence of all opposing evidence."
1 Greenl.Ev. § 38. It is therefore a presumption that is liable
to be overcome, or to be so far impaired in a particular case that
it cannot be safely or properly made the basis of action in that
case, especially if the inquiry involves human life. In a certain
sense, it may be true that where the defense is insanity and where
the case made by the prosecution discloses nothing whatever in
excuse or extenuation of the crime charged, the accused is bound to
produce some evidence that will impair or weaken the force of the
legal presumption
Page 160 U. S. 487
in favor of sanity. But to hold that such presumption must
absolutely control the jury until it is overthrown or impaired by
evidence sufficient to establish the fact of insanity beyond all
reasonable doubt or to the reasonable satisfaction of the jury is
in effect to require him to establish his innocence by proving that
he is not guilty of the crime charged.
In considering the distinction between the presumption of
innocence and reasonable doubt, this Court, in
Coffin v. United
States, 156 U. S. 432,
156 U. S.
459-460, upon full consideration, said:
"The presumption of innocence is a conclusion drawn by the law
in favor of the citizen, by virtue whereof, when brought to trial
upon a criminal charge, he must be acquitted, unless he is proven
to be guilty. In other words, this presumption is an instrument of
proof created by the law in favor of one accused whereby his
innocence is established until sufficient evidence is introduced to
overcome the proof which the law has created. This presumption on
the one hand, supplemented by any other evidence he may adduce, and
the evidence against him on the other, constitute the elements from
which the legal conclusion of his guilt or innocence is to be
drawn."
Reasonable doubt, it was also said, was
"the result of the proof, not the proof itself, whereas the
presumption of innocence is one of the instruments of proof, going
to bring about the proof, from which reasonable doubt arises. Thus,
one is a cause, the other an effect. To say that the one is the
equivalent of the other is therefore to say that legal evidence can
be excluded from the jury, and that such exclusion may be cured by
instructing them correctly in regard to the method by which they
are required to reach their conclusion upon the proof actually
before them."
Strictly speaking, the burden of proof, as those words are
understood in criminal law, is never upon the accused to establish
his innocence or to disprove the facts necessary to establish the
crime for which he is indicted. It is on the prosecution from the
beginning to the end of the trial, and applies to every element
necessary to constitute the crime. Giving to the prosecution, where
the defense is insanity, the
Page 160 U. S. 488
benefit in the way of proof of the presumption in favor of
sanity, the vital question, from the time a plea of not guilty is
entered until the return of the verdict, is whether, upon all the
evidence, by whatever side adduced, guilt is established beyond
reasonable doubt. If the whole evidence, including that supplied by
the presumption of sanity, does not exclude beyond reasonable doubt
the hypothesis of insanity, of which some proof is adduced, the
accused is entitled to an acquittal of the specific offense
charged. His guilt cannot be said to have been proved beyond a
reasonable doubt -- his will and his acts cannot be held to have
joined in perpetrating the murder charged -- if the jury, upon all
the evidence, have a reasonable doubt whether he was legally
capable of committing crime, or (which is the same thing) whether
he willfully, deliberately, unlawfully, and of malice aforethought
took the life of the deceased. As the crime of murder involves
sufficient capacity to distinguish between right and wrong, the
legal interpretation of every verdict of "Guilty as charged" is
that the jury believed from all the evidence beyond a reasonable
doubt that the accused was guilty, and was therefore responsible
criminally for his acts. How, then, upon principle, or consistently
with humanity, can a verdict of guilty be properly returned if the
jury entertain a reasonable doubt as to the existence of a fact
which is essential to guilt -- namely, the capacity in law of the
accused to commit that crime?
The views we have expressed are supported by many adjudications
that are entitled to high respect. If such were not the fact, we
might have felt obliged to accept the general doctrine announced in
some of the above cases; for it is desirable that there be
uniformity of rule in the administration of the criminal law in
governments whose constitutions equally recognize the fundamental
principles that are deemed essential for the protection of life and
liberty.
In
People v. McCann, 16 N.Y. 58 -- a case of murder --
the jury were instructed that if any reasonable doubt existed as to
the proof of the deed itself, the prisoner should be acquitted,
"but, as sanity is the natural state, there is no presumption of
insanity, and the defense must be proved beyond a reasonable
Page 160 U. S. 489
doubt." This instruction was held to be erroneous by the
unanimous judgment of the Court of Appeals of New York, of which at
the time, Judges Denio, Johnson, Comstock, and Selden were members.
The judges who delivered opinions concurred in the view that while
there was no presumption of insanity, and while the law presumes a
sufficient understanding and will to do the act, the fact of the
killing by the accused being established by proof, the burden was
upon the prosecution to show from all the evidence the existence of
the requisites or elements constituting the crime, one of which was
the sanity of the prisoner. In that case, Mr. Justice Brown
said:
"If there be a doubt about the act of killing, all will concede
that the prisoner is entitled to the benefit of it, and if there be
any doubt about the will, the faculty of the prisoner to discern
between right and wrong, why should he be deprived of the benefit
of it when both the act and the will are necessary to make out the
crime?"
And:
"If he is entitled to the benefit of the doubt in regard to the
malicious intent, shall he not be entitled to the same benefit upon
the question of his sanity, his understanding? For if he was
without reason and understanding at the time, the act was not his,
and he is no more responsible for it than he would be for the act
of another man."
Pp. 67, 68. So in
Brotherton v. People, 75 N.Y. 159,
162, Chief Justice Church, speaking for the court, after observing
that crimes can only be committed by human beings in a condition to
be responsible for their acts, and that the burden of overthrowing
the presumption of sanity and of showing insanity is upon the
person who alleges it, says:
"If evidence is given tending to establish insanity, then the
general question is presented to the court and jury whether the
crime, if committed, was committed by a person responsible for his
acts, and upon this question the presumption of sanity and the
evidence are all to be considered, and the prosecutor holds the
affirmative; and, if a reasonable doubt exists as to whether the
prisoner is sane or not, he is entitled to the benefit of the
doubt, and to an acquittal."
To the same effect are
O'Connell v. People, 87 N.Y.
377, 380, and
Walker v. People, 88 N.Y. 81, 88.
Page 160 U. S. 490
In
Chase v. People, 40 Ill. 352, 358, reaffirming the
rule announced in the previous case of
Hopps v. People, 31
Ill. 385, 392, the court, speaking by Chief Justice Breese,
said:
"Sanity is an ingredient in crime as essential as the overt act,
and if sanity is wanting, there can be no crime; and, if the jury
entertain a reasonable doubt on the question of insanity, the
prisoner is entitled to the benefit of the doubt. We wish to be
understood as saying, as in that case, that the burden of proof is
on the prosecution to prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt,
whatever the defense may be. If insanity is relied on, and evidence
given tending to establish that unfortunate condition of mind, and
a reasonable, well founded doubt is thereby raised of the sanity of
the accused, every principle of justice and humanity demands that
the accused shall have the benefit of the doubt."
The same principle is recognized in New Hampshire. Bellows, J.,
speaking for the court, after observing that a plea of not guilty
in a criminal cause puts in issue all the allegations of the
indictment, said:
"A system of rules therefore by which the burthen is shifted
upon the accused of showing any of the substantial allegations are
untrue, or, in other words, to prove a negative is purely
artificial and formal, and utterly at war with the humane principle
which,
in favorem vitae, requires the guilt of the
prisoner to be established beyond reasonable doubt."
Again, in the same case, after saying that, to justify a
conviction, all the elements of the crime charged must be shown to
exist, and to a moral certainty, including the facts of a sound
memory, an unlawful killing, and malice, he proceeded:
"As to the first, the natural presumption of sanity is
prima
facie proof of a sound memory, and that must stand unless
there is other evidence tending to prove the contrary, and then,
whether it come from the one side or the other, in weighing it, the
defendant is entitled to the benefit of all reasonable doubt, just
the same as upon the point of an unlawful killing or malice.
Indeed, the want of sound memory repels the proof of malice in the
same way as proof that the killing was accidental, in self-defense,
or in heat of blood, and there can be no solid distinction founded
upon the
Page 160 U. S. 491
fact that the law presumes the existence of a sound memory. So
the law infers malice from the killing when that is shown, and
nothing else; but in both cases, the inference is one of fact, and
it is for the jury to say whether, on all the evidence before them,
the malice or the sanity is proved or not. Indeed, we regard these
inferences of fact as not designed to interfere in any way with the
obligation of the prosecutor to remove all reasonable doubt of
guilt; but are applied as the suggestions of experience, and with a
view to the convenience and expedition of trials, leaving the
evidence, when adduced, to be weighed without regard to the fact
whether it comes from the one side or the other. . . . The criminal
intent must be proved as much as the overt act, and without a sound
mind such intent could not exist, and the burthen of proof must
always remain with the prosecutor to prove both the act and
criminal intent."
State v. Bartlett, 43 N.H. 224, 231.
So in
People v. Garbutt, 17 Mich. 8, 22, the court,
speaking by Chief Justice Cooley, after observing that the
prosecution may rest upon the presumption of sanity until that
presumption is overthrown by the defendant's evidence, said:
"Nevertheless it is a part of the case for the government. The
fact which it supports must necessarily be established before any
conviction can be had. And when the jury come to consider the whole
case upon the evidence delivered to them, they must do so upon the
basis that, on each and every portion of it, they are to be
reasonably satisfied before they are at liberty to find the
defendant guilty."
In
Cunningham v. State, 56 Miss. 269, the question was
carefully examined, and the rule was stated by Chalmers, J., to be
that whenever the condition of the prisoner's mind is put in issue
by such facts proved on either side as create a reasonable doubt of
his sanity, it devolves upon the state to remove it and to
establish the sanity of the prisoner to the satisfaction of the
jury beyond all reasonable doubt arising out of all the evidence in
the case.
In
Dove v. State, 3 Heiskell 348, 371, Chief Justice
Nicholson, delivering the unanimous opinion of the Supreme Court of
Tennessee, thus stated its view of the question:
"When the
Page 160 U. S. 492
proof of insanity makes an equipoise, the presumption of sanity
is neutralized; it is overturned, it ceases to weigh, and the jury
are in reasonable doubt. How, then, can a presumption which has
been neutralized by countervailing proof be resorted to to turn the
scale? The absurdity to which this doctrine leads will be more
obvious by supposing that the jury should return a special verdict.
It would be as follows:"
"We find the defendant guilty of the killing charged, but the
proof leaves our minds in doubt whether he was of such soundness of
memory and discretion to have done the killing willfully,
deliberately, maliciously, and premeditatedly."
"Upon such a verdict no judge could pronounce the judgment of
death upon the defendant."
So in
Plake v. State, 121 Ind. 433, 435, Judge Elliott,
speaking for the Supreme Court of Indiana, said:
"If the evidence is of such a character as to create a
reasonable doubt whether the accused was of unsound mind at the
time the crime was committed, he is entitled to a verdict of
acquittal.
Polk v. State, 19 Ind. 170;
Bradley v.
State, 31 Ind. 492;
McDougal v. State, 88 Ind.
24."
To the same effect are many other American cases cited in
argument. The principle is accurately stated by Mr. Justice Cox, of
the Supreme Court of the District of Columbia, as follows:
"The crime, then, involves three elements --
viz., the
killing, malice, and a responsible mind in the murderer. But, after
all the evidence is in, if the jury, while bearing in mind both
these presumptions that I have mentioned --
i.e., that the
defendant is innocent until he is proved guilty, and that he is and
was sane, unless evidence to the contrary appears -- and
considering the whole evidence in the case, still entertain what is
called a reasonable doubt on any ground (either as to the killing
or the responsible condition of mind), whether he is guilty of the
crime of murder as it has been explained and defined, then the rule
is that the defendant is entitled to the benefit of that doubt and
to an acquittal."
Guiteau's Case, 10 F. 161, 163.
It seems to us that undue stress is placed in some of the cases
upon the fact that, in prosecutions for murder, the defense of
insanity is frequently resorted to, and is sustained by the
Page 160 U. S. 493
evidence of ingenious experts whose theories are difficult to be
met and overcome. Thus it is said crimes of the most atrocious
character often go unpunished, and the public safety is thereby
endangered. But the possibility of such results must always attend
any system devised to ascertain and punish crime, and ought not to
induce the courts to depart from principles fundamental in criminal
law, and the recognition and enforcement of which are demanded by
every consideration of humanity and justice. No man should be
deprived of his life under the forms of law unless the jurors who
try him are able, upon their consciences, to say that the evidence
before them, by whomsoever adduced, is sufficient to show beyond a
reasonable doubt the existence of every fact necessary to
constitute the crime charged.
For the reasons stated, and without alluding to other matters in
respect to which error is assigned, the judgment is reversed, and
the cause remanded, with directions to grant a new trial, and for
further proceedings consistent with this opinion.
Reversed.