Alienists Were Considered Experts

Alienists became more important as experts to draw on after psychiatry became more established.

Dr. William A. White, for many years the superintendent of the federal government’s first hospital for the insane, St. Elizabeths, was an especially important figure.

His book, Outlines of Psychiatry, became a classic in its field and was used as a textbook for many years.

Dr. White’s Textbook

The first edition was published in 1907, the year before Dr. Harry R. Hummer left St. Elizabeths to become the superintendent of the Canton Asylum for Insane Indians. White’s book was comprehensive, covering such topics as: “Nature and Definition of Insanity”; “Causes of Mental Disorders”; “Treatment”; and “Examination of the Insane”; as well as various psychoses common to most mental institutions.

Hummer probably had a copy of the book when he left St. Elizabeths, and he certainly ordered a later edition during his time as superintendent of Canton Asylum. Interestingly, White explained that it was impossible to really define insanity, saying that “mind is a function of the highest nerve centers of the brain . . . it does not seem strange, therefore, that the disorders of this complex should not be reducible to the simplicity of a definition.”

Dr. William A. White, Senator Stanley of Kentucky, and Clarence Darrow, March 1925, courtesy Library of Congress

He did give some commonly accepted definitions, but it would have been plain to readers that they would have to use judgment in determining insanity. Unfortunately for many of his patients, Hummer did not dig deeply into any previous history of their behavior, but simply accepted the assessments of laymen (usually reservation agents) as to the sanity of the people they wanted to send him.