DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA. 1. Establishment of government asylum. 2. Superintendent, appointment, qualifications, powers and duties. 3. Board of visitors. 4. President of board of visitors. 5. Inspection of asylum. 6. Who may be admitted. 7. Admission confined to whom. 8. Marine hospital-service, entitled to admission, charges. 9. Naval insane supported at discretion of secretary. 10. Inmates of the National Home admitted; support of. 11. Admission of indigent insane of the 12. Requisites for admission. 14. Applications by board of visitors. U. S., 1878, 1. There shall be in the District of Columbia a government hospital for the insane, and its objects shall be the Rev. Stat. of most humane care and enlightened curative treatment of the insane of the army and navy of the ment of the United States and of the District of Columbia. Establish government hospital for the insane. by actors, The superin as amended ch. 132, $1. tendent. 2. The chief executive officer of the hospital for the insane shall be a superintendent, who shall be appointed $439, by the secretary of the interior, and shall be entitled to a salary of four thousand dollars a year, and shall give bond for the faithful performance of his duties, in such sum and with such securities as may be required by the secretary of the interior. The superintendent shall be a well-educated physician, possessing competent experience in the care and treatment of the insane; he shall reside on the premises, and devote his whole time to the welfare of the institution; he shall, subject to the approval of the visitors, engage and discharge all needful and usual employes in the care of the insane, and all laborers on the farm, and determine their wages and duties; he shall be the responsible disbursing agent of the institution, and shall be ex-officio secretary of the board of visitors. § 4840. Board of 3. Nine citizens of the District of Columbia, to be appointed by the president, shall constitute a board of visitors visitors. of the hospital for the insane. The term of office of three visitors shall expire biennially on the thirtieth day of June in every alternate year, dating from the thirtieth day of June, eighteen hundred and fifty-seven. Should any vacancy occur by death, resignation, or otherwise, it shall be filled by appointment for the unexpired term of such visitor. The office of visitor shall be honorary and without compensation. 4841. 4. The board of visitors shall select from their number a President of president, to preside at their meetings for one year, or until a successor is elected. the board of visitors. § 4842. Powers and duties of the board of visitors. 5. The board of visitors, subject to the approval of the secretary of the interior, may make any needful by-laws for the government of themselves, and of the superintendent and his employes, and of the patients, not inconsistent with law; they shall visit the hospital at stated periods, and exercise so careful a supervision over its expenditures and general operations that the government and community may have confidence in the correctness of its management; they shall make annually to the secretary of the interior a report for the preceding fiscal year setting forth the condition and wants of the institution. § 4843. Admission of insane perSons of the army, navy, marine corps, 6. The superintendent, upon the order of the secretary of war, of the secretary of the navy, and of the secretary of the treasury, respectively, shall receive and keep in custody until they are cured, or removed by the same authority which ordered their reception, insane persons of the following descriptions: (1) Insane persons belonging to the army, navy, marine corps, and revenue cutter service. etc. (2) Civilians employed in the quartermaster's and subsistence departments of the army who may be, or may hereafter become, insane while in such employment. (3) Men who, while in the service of the United States, in the army, navy, or marine corps, have been admitted to the hospital, and have been thereafter discharged from it on the supposition that they have recovered their reason, and have, within three years after such discharge, become again insane from causes existing at the time of such discharge, and have no adequate means of support. (4) Indigent insane persons who have been in either of the said services, and been discharged therefrom on account of disability arising from such insanity. (5) Indigent insane persons who have become insane within three years after their discharge from such service, from causes which arose during and were produced by said service. pro R. S. Supl., Laws of 1880, Who may be the admitted to sane in Dis hospital for in 7. Hereafter the admissions to the government hospital for the insane, shall be limited to such persons as are entitled to treatment therein under the visions of title fifty-nine, chapter four, of Revised Statutes of the United States, and under the act approved March third, eighteen hundred lumbia. and seventy-five, chapter one hundred and fifty-six, second session, forty-third congress. [§§ 4843-4854.] trict of Co Laws of 1875, amendment In marine hos 8. Insane patients of said service (marine hospital-service) shall be admitted into the government hospital for R. S. Supl. the insane upon the order of the secretary of the ch. 156, § 5, treasury, and shall be cared for therein until cured to § 4543 or until removed by the same authority; and the pital-service charge for each such patient shall not exceed four be admitted to dollars and fifty cents a week, which charge shall Hospital for be paid out of the marine hospital fund. patients may Government Insane; charge therefor. 9. The secretary of the navy may cause persons in the naval service or marine corps, who become insane while ane of the § in the service, to be placed in such hospital for the navy. insane as, in his opinion, will be most convenient and best calculated to promise a restoration of reason. And he may pay to any such hospital, other than the government hospital for the insane in the District of Columbia, the pay which may from time to time be due to such insane person, and he may, in addition thereto, pay to such institution, from the annual appropriation for the naval service, under the head of contingent enumerated, any deficiency of a reasonable expense, not exceeding one hundred dollars per annum. Act of 1882, ch. 433, amendment to § 4843. 10. * * * In addition to the persons now entitled to admission to said hospital [government hospital for the sess. 1, p. 330, insane], any inmate of the National Home for Disabled Volunteer Soldiers, who is now or may hereafter become insane shall, upon an order of the president of the board of managers of the said National Home, be admitted to said hospital and treated therein; and if any inmate so admitted from said National Home is or thereafter becomes a pensioner, and has neither wife, minor child, nor parent dependent on him, in whole or in part, for support, his arrears of pension and his pension money accruing during the period he shall remain in said hospital shall be applied to his support in said hospital, and be paid over to the proper officer of said institution for the general uses thereof. 8 4844. the indigent District of 11. All indigent insane persons residing in the District of Columbia at the time they became insane shall be Admission of entitled to the benefits of the hospital for the insane insane of the and shall be admitted on the authority of the secColumbia. retary of the interior, which he may grant after due process of law showing the person to be insane and unable to support himself and family, or himself, if he has no family, under the visitation of insanity. § 4845. 12. The secretary of the interior may grant an order for the admission into the hospital of any insane person not mission. charged with a breach of the peace, when he shall receive the certificate, as provided in the next section, of any judge of the supreme court for the District of Columbia, or of any justice of the peace of the district, and an application in writing, as provided in the next section, by a member of the board of visitors, requesting that such order may be issued. 13. It must appear by the certificate aforesaid that two respectable physicians, residents of the district, apjudge or jus. peared before said judge or justice and deposed, in writing sworn to and subscribed by them, that they knew the person alleged to be insane; that, from personal examination, they believed such person to be in fact insane, and a fit subject for treatment in said hospital, and that said person was a resident of the district at the time he or she was seized with the mental disorder under which he or she then labored. And it must further appear, by such certificate, § 4846. Certificate of tice. that two respectable householders, residents of the district, appeared before said judge or justice and deposed, in writing sworn to and subscribed by them, that they knew the person alleged to be insane, and that, from a personal examination of his or her affairs, they believed said person to be unable, under the visitation of insanity, to support himself, or herself, and family, in case such person have a family, or to support himself or herself alone, in case such person have no family, and unable to pay his or her board and other expenses in the hospital. The affidavits of said physicians and householders shall accompany the certificate of said judge or justice of the peace. 14. The application by a member of the board of visitors must be made within five days after the date of the $4847. affidavits aforesaid, and it must appear therein that by visitor. the visitor made the application after an inspection of the affidavits and certificate. It shall be the duty of such visitor to withhold his application, if he has reason to doubt the indigence of the party in whose behalf the application is desired, until his doubt is removed by satisfactory testimony. Application Conveyance 15. The order of the secretary of the interior, granted upon the certificate of a judge or justice and the applica- §4848. tion of a member of the board of visitors, shall author- to hospital. ize any police officer or constable to assist in carrying such indigent insane person to the hospital, whenever such assistance is represented to be necessary by the person holding the order; but all the expenses of witnesses before the judge or justice of the peace, and of carrying such patient to the hospital, shall be borne by his friends, or by the local authorities of the district. Admission of insane perproperty. sons having 16. Whenever it appears in the case of any insane person whose insanity commenced while he was a resident $4849. of the District of Columbia that he is able to defray a portion, but not the whole of the expenses of his support and treatment in the government hospital for the insane, the board of visitors of the hospital is authorized to inquire into the facts of the case; and if it appears to the board, upon such an inquiry, that such insane person has property and no family, or has more property than is required for the support of his family, then, as a condition upon which such insane person, admitted or to be admitted upon the |