Mental Health - The Right to Treatment for Mentally Retarded Citizens: An Evolving Legal and Scientific Interface
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Authors
Mason, Bruce G.
Menolascino, Frank J.
Galvin, Lorin
Issue Date
1977
Volume
10
Issue
Type
Journal Article
Language
Keywords
Alternative Title
Abstract
INTRODUCTION|The first half of the decade of the 1970's has seen an assault upon a citadel of 19th Century thought in America: state institutions for the mentally retarded.|A rapidly developing scientific understanding, both of the nature of mental retardation and the vast developmental potential of mentally retarded citizens, has challenged the raison d'etre for massive residential institutions. The conceptual elements of this current understanding, casting off stereotypes regarding the mentally retarded, emphasize the habilitation of mentally retarded citizens in integrative community programs and services. The aftershocks of this understanding are now reverberating through the legal superstructure of the institution, as federal courts, in growing numbers, recognize the constitutional rights of mentally retarded citizens. This interface of the developing scientific understanding and legal activism merits an examination. To understand one and not the other is to understand neither...
Description
Citation
10 Creighton L. Rev. 124 (1976-1977)
Publisher
Creighton University School of Law