John M. Galt, M.D.

Superintendent, Eastern Lunatic Asylum, Va.

Dr. Galt was director of the Eastern Lunatic Asylum and co-chair of the APA medical superintendents committee on race, lunacy, and treatment services. Dr. Galt admitted free blacks to Eastern and saw no medical reason to preclude their entry.

"The proportionate number of slaves who become deranged, is less than that of free colored persons, and less than that of the whites. From many of the causes affecting the other classes of our inhabitants, they are somewhat exempt; for example, they are removed from much of the mental excitement to which the free population of the Union is necessarily exposed in the daily routine of life; not to mention the liability of the latter to the influence of the agitating novelties in religion, the intensity of political discussion, and other elements of the excessive mental action which is the result of our republican form of government. Again, they have not the anxious cares and anxieties relative to property, which tend to depress some of our free citizens. The future, which to some of our white population may seem dark and gloomy, to them presents no cloud on the horizon. Moreover, not only are they less exposed to causative influences of a moral character, but the mode of life which they lead tends to strengthen the constitution, and enable it to resist physical agents, calculated to induce insanity" (Annual Report, 1848; 25).