Act of Parliament | |
Citation | 49 & 50 Vict. c. 25 |
---|---|
Other legislation | |
Repealed by | Mental Deficiency Act 1913 |
Status: Repealed |
The Idiots Act 1886 (49 & 50 Vict. c. 25) was an act of Parliament of the United Kingdom. It was intended to give "... facilities for the care, education, and training of Idiots and Imbeciles". [1]
The Act made, for the first time, the distinction between "lunatics" [n 1] , "idiots", and "imbeciles" for the purpose of making entry into education establishments easier and for defining the ways they were cared for.
Before the Act, learning institutions for idiots and imbeciles were seen as either "licensed houses" or "registered hospitals" for lunatics, for which the parents of children hoping to enter would have to complete a form stating that they were "a lunatic, an idiot, or a person of unsound mind". Additionally, they were required to answer irrelevant questions and present two medical certificates. [2]
The Act was repealed by the Mental Deficiency Act 1913, by which time two further classifications had been introduced: "feeble-minded people" and "moral defectives". [3]
An idiot, in modern use, is a stupid or foolish person.
Lunatic is a term referring to a person who is seen as mentally ill, dangerous, foolish, or crazy—conditions once attributed to "lunacy". The word derives from lunaticus meaning "of the moon" or "moonstruck".
Psychiatric hospitals, also known as mental health hospitals or behavioral health hospitals, are hospitals or wards specializing in the treatment of severe mental disorders, including schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, eating disorders, dissociative identity disorder, major depressive disorder, and others.
The Lunacy Act 1845 or the Lunatics Act 1845 and the County Asylums Act 1845 formed mental health law in England and Wales from 1845 to 1890. The Lunacy Act's most important provision was a change in the status of mentally ill people to patients.
The Mental Health Act 1983 is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. It covers the reception, care and treatment of mentally disordered people, the management of their property and other related matters, forming part of the mental health law for the people in England and Wales. In particular, it provides the legislation by which people diagnosed with a mental disorder can be detained in a hospital or police custody and have their disorder assessed or treated against their wishes, informally known as "sectioning". Its use is reviewed and regulated by the Care Quality Commission. The Act was significantly amended by the Mental Health Act 2007. A white paper proposing changes to the act was published in 2021 following an independent review of the act by Simon Wessely.
The Court of Protection in English law is a superior court of record created under the Mental Capacity Act 2005. It has jurisdiction over the property, financial affairs and personal welfare of people who lack mental capacity to make decisions for themselves.
Kew Lunatic Asylum is a decommissioned psychiatric hospital located between Princess Street and Yarra Boulevard in Kew, a suburb of Melbourne, Australia. Operational from 1871 to 1988, Kew was one of the largest asylums ever built in Australia. Later known as Willsmere, the complex of buildings were constructed between 1864 and 1872 to the design of architects G.W. Vivian and Frederick Kawerau of the Victorian Public Works Office to house the growing number of "lunatics", "inebriates", and "idiots" in the Colony of Victoria.
The Lunacy Act 1886 was an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. It provided a mechanism for a Member of Parliament who was judged to be of unsound mind to be removed from his seat.
The lunatic asylum, insane asylum or mental asylum was an early precursor of the modern psychiatric hospital.
St. Brendan's Hospital was a psychiatric facility located in the north Dublin suburb of Grangegorman. It formed part of the mental health services of Dublin North East with its catchment area being North West Dublin. It is now the site of a modern mental health facility known as the "Phoenix Care Centre". Since the official opening of the Richmond Lunatic Asylum in 1815 the Grangegorman site has continuously provided institutional facilities for the reception of the mentally ill until the present day. As such the Phoenix Care Centre represents the continuation of the oldest public psychiatric facility in Ireland.
The Royal Albert Hospital was a hospital in Lancaster, Lancashire, England. It opened in 1870 as an institution for the care and education of children with learning problems. By 1909 there were 662 children in residence. Following new legislation in 1913, adults were also admitted. By the time of the introduction of the National Health Service in 1948 the hospital had 886 patients, and by the 1960s there were over 1,000 patients. Following legislation in the 1980s, the patients were relocated in the community, and the hospital closed in 1996. The building was acquired by Jamea Al Kauthar Islamic College to provide Islamic education for girls. The main part of the hospital is recorded in the National Heritage List for England as a designated Grade II* listed building, and its west lodge is listed at Grade II.
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to psychiatry:
This disability rights timeline lists events outside the United States relating to the civil rights of people with disabilities, including court decisions, the passage of legislation, activists' actions, significant abuses of people with disabilities, and the founding of various organizations. Although the disability rights movement itself began in the 1960s, advocacy for the rights of people with disabilities started much earlier and continues to the present.
The Mental Deficiency Act 1913 was an act of Parliament of the United Kingdom creating provisions for the institutional treatment of people deemed to be "feeble-minded" and "moral defectives". "It proposed an institutional separation so that mental defectives should be taken out of Poor Law institutions and prisons into newly established colonies."
The Immigration Act of 1907 was a piece of federal United States immigration legislation passed by the 59th Congress and signed into law by President Theodore Roosevelt on February 20, 1907. The Act was part of a series of reforms aimed at restricting the increasing number and groups of immigrants coming into the U.S. before World War I. The law introduced and reformed a number of restrictions on immigrants who could be admitted into the United States, most notably ones regarding disability and disease.
The County Asylums Act 1808 formed mental health law in England and Wales from 1808 to 1845. Notably, the Asylums Act established public mental asylums in Britain that could be operated by the county government. It permitted, but did not compel, justices of the peace to provide establishments for the care of pauper lunatics, so that they could be removed from workhouses and prisons.
Mental health in the United Kingdom involves state, private and community sector intervention in mental health issues. One of the first countries to build asylums, the United Kingdom was also one of the first countries to turn away from them as the primary mode of treatment for the mentally ill. The 1960s onwards saw a shift towards Care in the Community, which is a form of deinstitutionalisation. The majority of mental health care is now provided by the National Health Service (NHS), assisted by the private and the voluntary sectors.
The Tyrone and Fermanagh Hospital is a mental health facility in Omagh, County Tyrone, Northern Ireland. It is managed by the Western Health and Social Care Trust.
The Commissioners in Lunacy for Scotland or Lunacy Commission for Scotland were a public body established by the Lunacy (Scotland) Act 1857 to oversee asylums and the welfare of mentally ill people in Scotland.