Excerpt from The Institution Quarterly, Vol. 10: March 31, 1919

In 1850, with a population of Illinois contained, according to the U. S. Census, 238 insane persons, or one lunatic to every 4-10 persons. The State census of 1855 makes the total population of Illinois and the estimated population for 1856 may be set down at Upon the basis of the census report of 1850, the number of insane now in the State is 443, with public accommodation for 200, leaving 243 lunatics to be provided for in their own families, or in poor-houses, or at private expense in the institutions of other states. Upon this estimate no enlightened and humane statesman can fail to see the necessity for at once doubling the State provision for this unfortunate class.

There is good cause to believe, however, that this estimate, upon the basis of the census, is far below the truth. For illustration, the census of 1850 gave Massachusetts a population of with insane, or one in 592. A commission appointed by the legislature of Massachusetts, con sisting of Dr. Edward Jarvis, Hon. Levi Lincoln and Hon. Increase Sumner, made an elaborate report of the number and condition of the insane and idiotic of that state, in 1854. Their means of investigation were such as to reach every family in the state, and get the precise number of these two classes, in spite of the false pride of sensitive friends, who often withhold the truth from the officer appointed to take the census.' They state the population of Massachusetts in 1854 to be and the total number of lunatics to be or one in every 427 inhabitants, instead of one in 592, as shown by the census.

Upon the basis of the census of 1850, the insane of Massachusetts in 1854, should be while Jarvis' report makes the number exceed ing the census estimate of 731, in that single state, containing a population nearly the same in number as that of Illinois. The enormous discrepancy between the numbers of insane given by the census for the two states in 1850 - for the one, and for 'the other, 238, or for the one, one lunatic for every 592 inhabitants, and for the other, one for every - may be in part accounted for by the difference in the habits and occupations of the inhabitants of the two states. It is known that insanity is far more pre valent in commercial and manufacturing communities than in communi ties devoted chiefly to agriculture. The mental tension, with the attendant alternations of successes and failures, of commercial and manufacturing life, brings out hidden tendencies to mental disorders, or produces them anew, much oftener than the quiet and uniform life of the farmer.

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