An interdisciplinary approach will be used to interpret the nature of criminal law. Is sanity or insanity a political question? Each state and presumably each nation around the world will have a definitive view of what the fine line between sanity and insanity. We hear the exclamation but “that’s insane why in the world would he do that’? Is an individual obviously insane or not?
Politics by nature is relational: man to man, nation to nation, etc. and in my view is interdisciplinary by nature. By this statement I mean that an understanding of the social sciences, literature, religion, etc., must be examined to completely understand human nature to understand politics. The creative tension moves boundaries and changes laws.
From my own experience I have understood history and have been motivated to study history when history has be taught through stories. Jonathan Spence a Yale Professor in Chinese history teaches and writes some of history in the form of stories. I find my students enjoying history through stories as well as other information.
Teaching history through stories is a method that will encourage recall and comprehension. In this unit I will use novels, film, and the case studies It is for this reason I am using the books Lisa Bright and Dark, and Don’t Blame the Children., Compulsion. I will use the cases Francis Pollard and Joy Baker as text.
Lisa Bright and Dark
Overview
Lisa Bright and Dark is a novel whose main character is Lisa. Lisa suffers from schizophrenia. Lisa is a high school student who struggles to maintain touch with reality. Her friends are committed to making sure Lisa’s family and school seek help for her. The novel intimates that the family Lisa grows up in is emotionally cold and she is not valued for herself. Lisa does everything to try to tell her family that she is sick and like typical dysfunctional families they deny this reality for Lisa and keep pretending that nothing is wrong, she is just a teenager. Lisa does commit violent acts against herself and others at school.
Lisa Bright and Dark is easy to read with vocabulary that is not overwhelming, demanding allot of explanation. Students seem to have a gut response when reading the novel.
-
Before reading the novel, from the dictionary definition of schizophrenia, develop the character of Lisa. Describe what they expect her to be like. Write one page of description. Write their own story about Lisa. After reading the novel make a comparison between the students description and the authors description.
-
Before each chapter students will be required to write three questions about what they expect to happen in each chapter. They will review these questions to see if the questions they raised were answered. They will then write what they know.
-
Students will be required keep a journal of events, in chronological order. Students will record the events in a graphically organized journal recording the cause, the result, the effect of each event. Students will be asked to draw conclusions from each event.
-
If they had been Lisa’s friend what would they have done to help Lisa and to inform the school community of Lisa needs?
-
What kind of frustrations if any do they encounter at school finding help preventing fights they know might happen at school?
-
Do students at high school fight because they cannot plan rational ways of solving problems?
-
Make a list of resources for Lisa in the high school community. That includes outside helping agencies in New Haven.
-
Visit one soup kitchen in New Haven and help prepare one meal.
-
Make a presentation to the class about their experience. This can be in writing, photographs, art work, or a person they invite and introduce to the class.
Don’t Blame the Children
Overview
Don’t Blame the Children is also a novel that is quick to read and can be read independently. Their is some new vocabulary for students. There is a murder that occurs in the novel, but the murder was an accident. The novel ends with the confession of guilt by the guilty student. The crime was an impulsive act. After much searching for the murderer a student confesses. An innocent teacher was almost arrested. The characters provide insight into the criminal mind. The act of murder was an irrational response to the bullying of another student.
-
Students will bring in an article of their choice about a crime recently committed in New Haven. They will answer the questions who, what, when where, and how.
-
Students will write an article as a journalist would write for the New Haven Register. Students will answer the questions who, what, when, where, and how.
-
In small groups students will develop a chart or graph that will be a continuum for mens rea.. Students will decide at what point the boundary has been crossed.
-
Students will decide the plea that the defendant should enter when he goes to court.
-
Students will each write two paragraphs to justify the position they take for the punishment they feel fits the crime.
-
Students will answer the question “What could the defendant have done to have solved his problem other than taking the violent approach of murder”. Students must list as many possibilities as they can. The winning team will receive a reward.
-
Rewrite the ending of the book.
-
Students will participate in a discussion on blaming, responsibility, and how not to be a bully and to handle bullying.
-
Students will answer the question of what would happen if the guilty student had not confessed.
-
What were the facts of the case? What are the options about the case.
-
In conclusion; was the book appropriately titled? Make another list of appropriate titles for the book.
Compulsion
Overview
The Leopold-Loeb case took place in 1924. The crime was so shocking that several movies and a novel has been written about the case. The infamous Clarence Darrow was obtained to defend the two boys.
Compulsion by Levin is a historical novel copyrighted in the 1950’s. The novel is based on facts from the Leopold-Loeb case. Compulsion is about two males age eighteen who are extremely intelligent, white, and from very wealthy homes in Chicago. The two youths were Jewish from fine families with great reputations. The two boys on their way to Harvard the boys decide to experience everything in life just to see what it is like. This existential quest leads them to murder a boy in their own neighborhood just to see what it is like to kill someone. The “game” was to see if they would get caught.
The actual case did occur but Compulsion is fiction because Levin is placing feeling on to the two characters in the historical novel. The crime of murder took place in the 1920’s when the Nietzschean God is Dead philosophy was seriously being considered and novel. This philosophy ultimately lead the two boys to believe that they are each gods and are superman/superhuman themselves. Obviously because of the self view they were narcissistic and felt above the law, and that they alone were the decoders of right and wrong. It is in this arrogance that the boys wanted to have as many experiences in life that they could. Nothing and no one could stop them they were superior to all, out smarting everyone.
Compulsion is a novel that reads like a mystery with one event leading to another rapidly. The reader is engaged to predict what will happen next. The book is divided into two sections. The first section is the description of The Crime of the Century , murder. The second section is The Trial of the Century. The second book is astonishingly brilliant in arguing the insanity plea as will as being a spring board for the debate of punishment especially capital punishment. Compulsion examines the crime from a psychoanalytical view. Psychiatry provides insight into the criminal mind.
The case ends in a guilty verdict but the sentence was reduced to life imprison in stead of hanging if the insanity plea had not been used. Compulsion presents a opportunity to discuss the ethic of capital punishment as a deterrent to crime. Other discussions center on retribution and punishment.
Compulsion hints toward what happens in a gang by asking the question “could the boys have murdered the boy on their own” or “was there something within the two boys that gave them the courage to do murder because they were acting together”? The answer was that they formed an alliance that cause the two boys to commit the crime because individually they would have never committed murder. This is a great discussion on alliances with friends in school that encourage wrongful deeds. (Levin, 360)
-
Students will answer the question about the effects of gangs and peers to commit crime. How do some individual gain support for criminal behavior?
The novel Compulsion is to lengthy for most of the students to read, and it consist of four hundred pages. Students will be asked to read the film instead. The Best video store Public Library has a copy.
-
Prior to “reading the film” students will use their pre-reading prediction skills to write questions about the film. They will use the question words who, where, what when, why and how.
-
Before viewing the film we will find the dictionary definition of compulsion.
-
Students will review the M’Nagten control test, to understand and discover the driven nature of these defendants.
-
Before the film students will write a description of what they believe the two young men are like.
-
As students review the film they will look for evidence of the two books planning and calculating.
-
We will attempt to answer the question “Did the two young men know right from wrong. Students will give evidence based on fact not option as to whether the two boys knew what they were doing.
-
Could the two boys control what they were doing using the control inquiry?
-
What was there so thrilling in planning such a crime?
-
Is it thrilling to get away with walking the halls at school when a student should be in class?
-
Where did the thrill come from?
-
Students will answer the question “Was justice served through the final sentence?
-
Students will consider the political nature of the crime. Money was used to obtain the best defense.
-
How necessary is it to have a really good attorney?
-
What criteria would the students use to obtain an attorney if they ever found it necessary?
The following soliloquy from Compulsion provides material for reading, responding and making connections. There are many statements that can be debated. What were the motives of the two boys. Accountability and responsibility is the theme. What should their punishment be? (Issues of capital punishment could be presented).
-
“No one knows what will be the fate of the child he gets or the child she bears; the fate of the child is the last thing they consider. The wary old world goes on begetting, with birth and with living and with death; and all of it is blind from the beginning to the end. I do not know what it was that made these boys do this mad act, but I do know they did not beget themselves. I know that any one of an infinite number of causes reaching back to the beginning might be working out in these boys’ minds, whom you are asked to hang in malice and in hatred and injustice, because someone in the past has sinned against them.” (Levin, 360)
-
“I am sorry for the fathers as well as the mothers, for the fathers who give their strength and their lives for educating and protecting and creating a fortune for the boys that they love; for the mothers who go down in the shadow of death for their children, who watch them with tenderness and fondness and longing, and who go down into dishonor and disgrace for the children that they love.” (Levin, 360)
“All of these are helpless. We are all helpless. When you are pitying the father and the mother for poor Paulie Kessler, what about the fathers and mothers of these two unfortunate boys, and the boys themselves, and all the fathers and all the mothers and all the boys and girls who tread a dangerous maze of darkness from ninth to death?” (Levin, 360)
-
“Do you think you can cure it by hanging these two? Do you think you can cure the hatreds and the maladjustment’s of the world by hanging them? Do you think you can cure the hatreds and the maladjustment’s of the world by hanging them?” (Levin, 360)
-
Applying the M’Nagten control test are these two boys of mental defect/disease?
-
How could the product test be applied to the two main characters?
-
What political decisions were made to obtain the attorney for the two boys?
-
How was the product test used in the sentencing of the two boys?
-
List all of the considerations given to the sentencing of the two boys?
-
What sentence do you believe should have been rendered in this case?