Insanity.
Until 1840 the insane poor in the
United States were cared for almost exclusively by the township and county authorities.
It was estimated that in 1833 there were 2,500 lunatics in jails and other prisons, besides hundreds in the county poor-houses and private famfamilies.
One of the very earliest asylums for the insane was that opened in 1797 at
Bloomingdale, in the suburbs of New York City, by the New York Hospital Society.
To the labors of
Miss Dorothea L. Dix (q. v.) is largely due the establishment of State asylums.
Miss Dix devoted herself after 1837 to the investigation of the subject, and visited every State east of the
Rocky Mountains, appealing to the
State legislatures to provide for the care of the insane.
In April, 1854, a bill appropriating 10,000,000 acres of public lands to the several States for the relief of the pauper insane, passed by Congress under her appeals, was vetoed by
President Pierce.
Her efforts, however, led to the establishment of State insane asylums, and it is now recognized as the duty of each State to care for its insane.
New York State alone has fifteen corporate institutions of this class.
The following statistics show the number of insane, etc., in the
United States.
Until 1850 there were no reliable statistics:
| Year. | Population of U. S. | No. of Insane. | To each million of inhabitants. |
| 1850 | 21,191,876 | 15,610 | 673 |
| 1860 | 31,443,321 | 24,642 | 783 |
| 1870 | 38,558,371 | 37,432 | 971 |
| 1880 | 50,155,783 | 91,997 | 1,834 |
| 1890 | 62,622,250 | 106,252 | 1,697 |
| 1900 | (Census report not yet published.) |
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