The Defective Classes. 
183 
tutions of cases that would otherwise have been hidden at home and 
partly by calling things insanity which formerly would have been called 
by some other name — such as senile dementia, epilepsy eccentricity or 
primary dementia. I believe that these statistics show that insanity is not 
now increasing faster in England than the population. 
In the United States insanity is obviously increasing very rapidly. In 
ten years in Wisconsin the insane under public care have increased from 
about 1,700 to about 3,000. This is partly due to the causes discussed 
above. But it is also due to another fact, to which I was the first to call 
attention, now generally accepted, that the ratio of insanity to the popu¬ 
lation is much greater in the older states than in the newer ones and in 
the older counties of Wisconsin than in the newer ones. 
In 1860 there were only 200 or 300 insane in the state. In 1880 there were 
2,200 including those at home. And now there are probably 3,300 including 
those at home. The pioneers of Wisconsin were healthy young people, 
who left their insane behind them. It has taken two generations to 
reach the amount of insanity we now have. But if we had the proportion 
of insanity to the population which Massachusetts now has, we should 
have nearly twice the number of insane we now have. We may expect 
to keep on with our increase till we reach the proportion of Massachusetts 
and of England. Already some of the older counties in Wisconsin are 
approaching that proportion, while those in the north have only the ratio 
of our far western states and territories. 
The rapid increase of crime in this country is doubtless an incident of 
the rapid growth of city population. But probably the more careful 
administration of the laws has increased the number of prisoners, while 
the system of reformatories for boys and girls and all the good influences 
of Christian civilization have been resisting the increase of crime. It is 
noteworthy that a better prison system in England than we have in this 
country, joined to the private reformatory work of all kinds, has brought 
the increase of crime to a stop, and that there is absolutely less crime in 
Great Britain now than there was fifteen years ago notwithstanding the 
increase of population. 
It is fair to call attention to the fact that the only reliable statistics of 
crime are from the state prisons, partly for the reason that jails and police 
stations do not always keep accurate registers, and for the more important 
reason that officers make petty crimes appear to be less or more at their 
pleasure. For the sake of fees or to get a reputation for efficiency officers 
and magistrates often largely swell the number of prisoners by ‘ ‘ running 
in ” tramps and drunks to suit their own notions. 
The same causes have made an increase of pauperism in this country — 
the growth of cities and the foolish or corrupt use of public money in aid¬ 
ing undeserving applicants for poor relief. 
To a considerable extent these three defective classes link into one 
another. It is hard to say whether a tramp is a pauper or a criminal. 
