If Emerson is right and love is no more than the deification of persons,
the criminalist does not need to bother about this very rare paroxysm of
the human soul. We might translate, at most, a girl’s description of her
lover who is possibly accused of some crime, from deified into human,
but that is all. However, we do not find that sort of love in the law
courts. The love we do find has to be translated into a simpler and more
common form than that of the poet. The sense of self-sacrifice, with
which Wagner endows his heroines, is not altogether foreign in our work;
we find it among the lowest proletarian women, who immolate themselves
for their husbands, follow them through the most tremendous distress,
nurse and sustain them with hungry heroism. This is more remarkable than
poetical self-sacrifice, but it is also different and is to be
differently explained. The conditions which cause love can be understood
in terms of the effects and forces of the daily life. And where we can
not see it differently we shall be compelled to speak of it as if it
were a disease. If disease is not sufficient explanation, we shall have
to say with the Italians, “l’amore é une castigo di Dio.”
Love is of greater importance in the criminal court than the statutes
allow, and we frequently make great mistakes because we do not count it
in. We have first of all to do our duty properly, to distinguish the
biological difference between the human criminal and the normal human
being, rather than to subsume every criminal case under its proper
statute. When a woman commits a crime because of jealousy, when in spite
of herself she throws herself away on a good-for-nothing; when she
fights her rival with unconquerable hatred; when she bears unbelievable
maltreatment; when she has done hundreds of other things--who counts her
love? She is guilty of crime; she is granted to have had a motive; and
she is punished. Has enough been done when the jury acquits a jealous
murderess, or a thrower of vitriol? Such cases are spectacular, but no
attention is paid to the love of the woman in the millions of little
cases where love, and love only, was the impulse, and the statute
sentencing her to so and so much punishment was the outcome.
Now, study the maniacally-clever force of jealousy and then ask who is
guilty of the crime. Augustine says, that whoever is not jealous is not
in love, and if love and jealousy are correlate, one may be inferred
from the other. What is at work is jealousy, what is to to be shown is
love. That is, the evil in the world is due to jealousy, but this cause
would be more difficult to prove than its correlate, love. And we know
how difficult it is to conceal love,--so difficult that it has become a
popular proverb that when a woman has a paramour, everybody knows it but
her husband. Now, if a crime has been committed through jealousy it
would be simply naïve to ask whether the woman was jealous. Jealousy is
rare to discover and unreliable, while her love-affair is known to
everybody. Once this becomes an established fact, we can determine also
the degree of her jealousy.
Woman gives the expression of her jealousy characteristic direction. Man
attempts to possess his wife solely and without trouble, and hence is
naturally jealous. The deceived woman turns all her hatred on her rival
and she excuses the husband if only she believes that she still
possesses, or has regained his love. It will therefore be a mistake to
suppose that because a woman has again begun to love her husband,
perhaps after a long-enduring jealousy, that no such jealousy preceded
or that she had forgiven her rival. It may be that she has come to an
understanding with her husband and no longer cares about the rival, but
this is only either mere semblance or temporary, for the first suspicion
of danger turns loose the old jealousy with all its consequences. Here
again her husband is safe and all her rage is directed upon her rival.
The typical cases are those of the attacks by abandoned mistresses at
the weddings of their lovers. They always tear the wreath and veil from
the bride’s head, but it never is said that they knock the groom’s
top-hat off.
Another characteristic of feminine love which often causes difficulties
is the passion with which the wife often gives herself to her husband.
Two such different authors as Kuno Fischer and George Sand agree to this
almost verbatim. The first says: “What nature demands of woman is
complete surrender to man,” and the second: “Love is a voluntary slavery
for which woman craves by nature.” Here we find the explanation of all
those phenomena in which the will of the wife seems dead beside that of
the husband. If a woman once depends on a man she follows him
everywhere, and even if he commits the most disgusting crimes she helps
him and is his loyalest comrade. We simply catalogue the situation as
complicity, but we have no statutes for the fact that the woman
naturally could do nothing else. We do not find it easy to discover the
accomplices of a man guilty of a crime, but if there is a woman who
really loves him we may be sure that she is one of them.
For the same reason women often bear interminably long maltreatment at
the hands of their husbands or lovers. We think of extraordinary
motives, but the whole thing is explained if the motive was really
feminine love. It will be more difficult for us to believe in this love
when the man is physically and mentally not an object of love. But the
motives of causes of love of woman for man, though much discussed, have
never been satisfactorily determined. Some authorities make strength and
courage the motives, but there are innumerable objections, for historic
lovers have been weak and cowardly, intellectual rather than foolish,
though Schopenhauer says, that intelligence and genius are distasteful
to women. No fixed reasons can be assigned. We have to accept the fact
that a most disgusting man is often loved by a most lovely woman. We
have to believe that love of man turns women from their romantic ideals.
There has been the mistaken notion that only a common crime compels a
woman to remain loyally with a thoroughly worthless man, and again, it
has been erroneously supposed that a certain woman who refused a most
desirable heirloom left her by a man, must have known of some great
crime committed by him. But we need no other motive for this action than
her infinite love, and the reason of that infinity we find in the nature
of that love. It is, in fact, woman’s life, whereas it is an episode in
the life of man. Of course, we are not here speaking of transitory
inclinations, or flirtations, but of that great and profound love which
all women of all classes know, and this love is overmastering; it
conquers everything, it forgives everything, it endures everything.
There is still another inexplicable thing. Eager as man is to find his
woman virgin, woman cares little about the similar thing in man. Only
the very young, pure, inexperienced girl feels an instinctive revulsion
from the real roué, but other women, according to Rochebrune, love a man
in proportion to the number of other women who love or have loved him.
This is difficult to understand, but it is a fact that a man has an easy
task with women if he has a reputation of being a great hand with them.
Perhaps this ease is only an expression of the conceit and envy of
women, who can not bear the idea that a man is interested in so many
others and not in themselves. As Balzac says, “women prefer most to win
a man who already belongs to another.” The inconceivable ease with which
certain types of men seduce women, and at whose heads women throw
themselves in spite of the fact that these men have no praiseworthy
qualities whatever, can only be so explained. Perhaps it is true, as is
sometimes said, that here is a case of sexuality expressing itself in an
inexplicable manner.
Of course there are friendships between men and women, although such
friendships are very rare. There is no doubt that sexual interests tend
easily to dominate such relations. We suppose them to be rare just
because their existence requires that sexual motives be spontaneously
excluded. There are three types of such friendships. 1. When the age of
the friends is such as to make the suspicion of passion impossible. 2.
When from earliest childhood, for one reason or another, a purely
fraternal relationship has developed. 3. When both are of such nature
that the famous divine spark can not set them afire. Whether there is an
electrical influence between couples, as some scientists say, or not, we
frequently see two people irrationally select each other, as if
compelled by some evil force. Now this selection may result in nothing
more than a friendship. Such friendships are frequently claimed in
trials, and of course, they are never altogether believed in. The
necessary thing in treating these cases is caution, for it will be
impossible to prove these friendships unlikely, and hence unjust to deny
them without further evidence. It will be necessary to discover whether
the sexual interest is or can be excluded. If not, the friendship is
purely a nominal one.
Friendship between women is popularly little valued. Comedies, comic
papers, and criticisms make fun of it, and we have heard all too often
that the news of the first gray hair, or the disloyalty of a husband,
has its starting-point in a woman friend, and that women decorate
themselves and improve themselves in order to worry their friends. One
author wanted to show that friendships between two women were only
conspiracies against a third, and Diderot said that there is a secret
union among women as among priests of one and the same religion--they
hate each other, but they protect each other. The latter fact we see
frequently enough in the examination of women witnesses. Envy, dislike,
jealousy, and egoism play up vividly, and he is a successful judge who
can discover how much of the evidence is born of these motives. But
beyond a certain point, women co-operate. This point is easy to find,
for it is placed where-ever feminine qualities are to be generalized. So
long as we stick, during an examination, to a concrete instance, and so
long as the witness observes no combination of her conduct and opinions
with that of the object of her testimony, she will allow herself to be
guided partly by the truth, partly by her opinions of the woman in
question. But just as soon as we expressly or tacitly suggest common
feminine qualities, or start to speak of some matter in which the
witness herself feels guilty, she turns about and defends where before
she had been attacking. In these cases we must try to find out whether
we have become “general.” If we have, we know why the witness is
defending the accused.
We may say the same things of feminine hate that we have said of
feminine love. Love and hate are only the positive and negative aspects
of the same relation. When a woman hates you she has loved you, does
love you, or will love you,--this is a reliable rule for the many cases
in which feminine hatred gives the criminalist work. Feminine hatred is
much intenser than masculine hatred. St. Gregory says that it is worse
than the devil’s, for the devil acts alone while woman gets the devil to
help her, and Stolle believes that a woman seeking revenge is capable of
anything. We have here to remember that among women of the lower
classes, hate, anger, and revenge are only different stages of the same
emotion. Moreover, nobody finds greater joy in revenge than a woman.
Indeed I might say that revenge and the pursuit of revenge are
specifically feminine. The real, vigorous man is not easily turned
thereto. In woman, it is connected with her greater sensibility which
causes anger, rage, and revenge to go further than in men. Lombroso has
done most to show this, and Mantegazza cites numberless examples of the
superior ease with which woman falls into paroxysms of rage. Hence, when
some crime with revenge as motive is before us, and we have no way of
getting at the criminal, our first suspicion should be directed toward a
woman or an effeminate man. Further, when we have to make an orderly
series of inferences, we will start from this proposition into the past,
present, and future, and shall not have much to wonder at if the
successful vengeance far exceeds its actual or fanciful occasion, and
if, perhaps, a very long time has elapsed before its accomplishment.
Nulla irae super iram mulieris.
Feminine cruelty is directly connected with feminine anger and hatred.
Lombroso has already indicated how fundamental woman’s inclination to
cruelty is. The cases are well known, together with the frequent and
remarkable combination of real kindness of heart with real bestiality.
Perhaps it would be proper to conceive this cruelty as a form of
defence, or the expression of defence, for we often find cruelty and
weakness paired elsewhere, as among children, idiots, etc. It is
particularly noticeable among cretins in the Alps. The great danger of
the cretin’s anger is well known there. Once, one of these unfortunates
was tortured to death by another because he thought that his victim had
received from the charitable monks a larger piece of bread than he.
Another was killed because he had received a gift of two trousers
buttons. These instances, I should think, indicate the real connection
between cruelty and weakness. Cruelty is a means of defence, and hence
is characteristic of the weaker sex. Moreover, many a curious bit of
feminine cruelty is due to feminine traits misunderstood, suppressed,
but in themselves good. Just as we know that frugality and a tendency to
save in housekeeping may often lead to dishonesty, so we perceive that
these qualities cause cruelty to servants, and even the desire to put
out of the way old and troublesome relatives who are eating the bread
that belongs to husband and children.
These facts serve not only to explain the crime, but to reveal the
criminal. If we succeed, other things being equal, in adducing a number
of feminine characteristics with one of which the cruelty of the crime
may be connected and explained, we have a clew to the criminal. The
instances mentioned,--the motherly care of house and family, frugality,
miserliness, hardness to servants, cruelty to aged parents,--seem rare
and not altogether rational, yet they occur frequently and give the
right clew to the criminal. There are still other similar combinations.
Everybody knows feminine love for trials at court, for the daily paper’s
reports of them, and for public executions. While the last were still
common in Austria, newspapers concluded regularly with the statement
that the “tender” sex was the great majority of the crowd that witnessed
them. At public executions women of the lower class; at great trials,
women of the higher classes, make up the auditors and spectators. Here
the movement from eagerness, curiosity, through the desire for vigorous
nervous stimulation, to hard-heartedness and undeniable cruelty, is
clear enough.
There would be nothing for us to do with this fact if we had not to deal
with the final expression of cruelty, i.e., murder; especially the
specifically feminine forms of murder,--child-murder and poisoning.
These, of course, in particular the former, involve abnormal conditions
which are subjects for the physician. At the same time it is the judge
who examines and sentences, and he is required to understand these
conditions and to consider every detail that may help him in drawing his
conclusion.
That poisoning is mainly a feminine crime is a familiar fact of which
modern medico-legal writers have spoken much; even the ancient authors,
not medical, like Livy, Tacitus, etc., have mentioned it. It is
necessary, therefore, carefully to study the feminine character in order
to understand how and why women are given to this form of murder. To do
so we need consider, however, only the ordinary factors of the daily
life; the extraordinary conditions, etc., are generally superfluous.
Every crime that is committed is committed when the reasons for doing it
outweigh the reasons for not doing it. This is true even of passional
crimes, for a _pro_ and _contra_ must have presented themselves in spite
of the lightninglike swiftness of the act. One appeared and then the
other, the _pro_ won and the deed was done. In other crimes this
conflict lasts at least so long as to be definitely observable, and in
the greater crimes it will, as a rule, take more time and more motive.
The principles of good and of evil will really battle with each other,
and when the individual is so depraved as no longer to have good
principles, their place is taken by fear of discovery and punishment,
and by the question whether the advantage to be gained is worth the
effort, etc. The commission of the crime is itself evidence that the
reasons for it were all-powerful. Now suppose that a woman gets the idea
of killing somebody. Here for a time _pro_ and _contra_ will balance
each other, and when the latter are outweighed she will think that she
_must_ commit murder. If she does not think so she will not do so. Now,
every murder, save that by poison, requires courage, the power to do,
and physical strength. As woman does not possess these qualities, she
spontaneously makes use of poison. Hence, there is nothing extraordinary
or significant in this fact, it is due to the familiar traits of woman.
For this reason, when there is any doubt as to the murderer in a case of
poisoning, it is well to think first of a woman or of a weak, effeminate
man.
The weakness of woman will help us in still another direction. It is
easily conceivable that all forms of weakness will seek support and
assistance, whether physical or moral. The latter is inclined in cases
of need to make use, also, of such assistance as may be rendered by
personal inward reflection. Now this reflection may be on the one hand,
dissuasion, on the other hand persuasion, self-persuasion; the first
subduing self-reproach, the latter, fear of discovery. Hence, a woman
will try to persuade not only herself, but others also that she was
justified in her course and will assign as reason, bad treatment. Now
there might have been some bad treatment, but it will have been altered
and twisted so utterly as to lose its original form and to become
imaginatively unbearable. Thus, a series of conclusions from the
reactions of the suspect to her environment may be easily found, and
these are the more convincing if they have occurred within a rather long
period of time, in which they may be chronologically arranged, and from
which a slow and definite intensification, usque ad ultimum, can be
proved. Such an analysis is, of course, troublesome, but if done
systematically, almost always rich in results.
The tricks of persuasion which are to suppress the fears of discovery
are always helps of another sort. As a rule they are general, and point
to the fact that the crime contemplated had occurred before without
danger, that everything was intelligently provided for, etc. Now these
circumstances are less dangerous, but they require consideration when
they count on certain popular views, especially superstitions and
certain customs and assumptions. Suppose, for example, that a young wife
wants to get rid of her old husband whom she had married for the sake
of his money. Now certain proverbs point to the fact that old men who
marry young women die soon after marriage. This popular view may be
entirely justified in the fact that the complete alteration in the mode
of life, the experience of uncustomary things, the excitement, the
extreme tension, then the effort _in venere_, finally, perhaps also the
use of popularly well-known stimulants, etc., may easily cause
weakening, sickening, and as conclusion the death of the old man. But
the public does not draw this kind of inference, it simply assumes,
without asking the reason, that when an old man marries a young woman,
he dies. Therefore a young wife may easily think, “If I make use of
poison nobody will wonder, nobody will see anything suspicious about the
death. It is only an event which is universally supposed to happen. The
old man died because he married me.” Such ideas may easily seduce an
uneducated woman and determine her conduct. Of course, they are not
subject to observation, but they are not beyond control, if the popular
views concerning certain matters are known as the views which determine
standards. Therefore their introduction into the plot of the suspect may
help us in drawing some useful inference.[276]
With regard to child-murder the consideration of psychopathic conditions
need not absolutely be undertaken. Whether they are present must, of
course, be determined, and therefore it is first of all necessary to
learn the character of the suspect’s conduct. The opportunity for this
is given in any text-book on legal medicine, forensic psychopathology,
and criminal psychology. There are a good many older authors.[277] Most
of the cases cited by authorities show that women in the best of
circumstances have behaved innumerable times in such a way that if they
had been poor girls child-murder would immediately have been assumed.
Again, they have shown that the sweetest and most harmless creatures
become real beasts at the time of accouchement, or shortly after it
develop an unbelievable hatred toward child and husband. Many a
child-murder may possibly be explained by the habit of some animals of
consuming their young immediately after giving birth to them. Such cases
bind us in every trial for child-murder to have the mental state of the
mother thoroughly examined by a psychiatrist, and to interpret
everything connected with the matter as psychologist and humanitarian.
At the same time it must not be forgotten that one of the most dangerous
results is due to this attitude. Law-makers have without further
consideration kept in mind the mental condition of the mother and have
made child-murder much less punishable than ordinary murder. It is
inferred, therefore, that it is unnecessary to study the conditions
which cause it. This is dangerous, because it implies the belief that
the case is settled by giving a minimum sentence, where really an
infinity of grades and differences may enter. The situation that the
law-maker has studied is one among many, the majority of which we have
yet to apprehend and to examine.