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In terms of specific causation of delinquent activity, prevailing studies seem to show that we have as wide a gamut of motivation in the defective or retarded delinquent as in the intellectually average delinquent. In the case of the retarded, the painfully obvious lack or inadequacy of facilities in school, home and community often points up sharply the circumstances leading to delinquent activity.

So far, my comments have followed the usual pattern of thinking on the relationship between mental retardation and delinquent behavior in terms of aggressive behavior, of antisocial activity, if you please. However, I hope your Commission will highlight the reverse side of this picture, as well The presence of inadequately provided for, poorly trained and supervised retardates in the community is a distinct social liability, and a very specific factor in delinquent activity of non-retarded children and adults.

I would summarize my comments as follows:

While there is evidence that the incidence of delinquency is higher among the total group of retardates as compared to the general population, the handicap of inferior intellectual endowment does constitute a specific causative factor in delinquent behavior, particularly in the upper ranges of mental defect.

Since mental defect is the lasting condition and delinquency merely a behavioral episode, no matter how often repeated, the primary guiding principle in dealing with these individuals should be the mental defect.

The unsupervised presence of retardates in the community easily makes such individuals the victims of delinquent conduct on the part of a non-retarded child or adult. The retardate is no less a victim when, through lack of judgment, he is made a dupe or pawn by the non-retarded criminal or delinquent.

Your second question asks; "What are the strengths and weaknesses of educational, vocational and treatment programs for helping mentally retarded children adjust in school and in the community?" May I start out by quoting an English writer. In the American Journal on Mental Deficiency (July 1952, p. 118) she states: "The surest road to the patient does not lead through the broad highway of diagnostic classification but through the narrow trail of individual personality study. " In mental retardation perhaps more than in any other field, we need to make this simple, almost naive statement our daily motto, our constant adminishment -sic-. I say so because I know of no other field where individuals have been judged and so frequently victimized by broad pronouncements and generalizations. We have been all too ready to hang on our retarded children and youth ready-made classification labels. We have prejudged what such an individual could or could not do and then "processed" him accordingly.

If we have to venture into broad generalization, let it be this -- that the strengths and weaknesses of educational, vocational and treatment programs for helping mentally retarded children are first and foremost dependent on the quality (and that, of necessity, includes the factor of quantity) of available, individualized diagnostic facilities. You will have others before you, among them my good friend and former colleague in delinquency work some 20 years ago, Dr. Merrill Hollingshead, who are far better equipped than I am to detail the specific requirements in setting up these diagnostic facilities. Let me limit myself to this emphatic stress on the need for a vast increase in diagnostic facilities, not just a few hours of additional psychological and medical consultation here and there.

My second major point in answer to your question would be that our usual starting point of concern for the mentally retarded child -- and I mean here "official" concern -- which comes during the early school years, is much too late. There is little logic in spending money liberally for the best possible special education and training programs in school (and we surely are far, far away from that millenium) if we allow the child's condition unnecessarily to deteriorate beyond his original handicap, simply because we neglect to aid him and his parents during his early preschool years. Parent guidance and counseling, aid in home care, nurseries for part-time day care under proper educational guidance even for the youngest, and of course diagnostic clinics equipped to give continuing guidance where indicated -- these are the obvious priorities in any well-developed, long-range plan for community services, backed of course by the availability of residential care of whatever type and duration is needed.

To a very considerable extent, the strengths and weaknesses of educational, vocational and treatment programs for retarded children will rest on prevailing community attitudes. There is little use in training a retarded child with painstaking effort to become socially adept and responsive, if misinformed, fearful neighbors will have their children shun him and make him the outcast of the neighborhood. There is little use in teaching a retarded youth work habits, independence in getting about and occupational skills, if misguided townspeople, haunted by old wives tales and superstitions, refuse even to consider that a mental handicap, too, can be partially overcome. I hope your Commission will give close study to the need for educating the public regarding mental retardation and that you will see fit to come forth with specific recommendations in that area.