## Life Before the Modern Sex Offender Statutes Life Before the Modern Sex Offender Statutes **Published:** 1998 **Source:** [[Fordham Law School]] **Author(s):** [[Deborah Denno]] **Archived URL:** <https://web.archive.org/web/20220114175642/https://ir.lawnet.fordham.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1112&context=faculty_scholarship> ### My Notes > [!info] ## Abstract > > This Article examines the social and legal developments that fueled the origins and recurring problems of sex offender laws. Part I of this Article discusses the primary precursors of the sexual psychopath statutes that encouraged the public's and politicians' acceptance of the concept of sexual psychopathy: the increasing sexualization of American society, changes in gender roles and relations, the valuation of children and the family unit, and the influx of psychiatry. Part II describes how the diagnosis of sexual psychopathy slowly developed as a result of the criminal justice system's growing tendency to explain criminal behavior in psychoanalytic terms. Part III examines three of the primary influences that scholars have pinpointed concerning how and why sexual psychopath statutes were enacted between 1937-1957--the media, citizens' groups, and law enforcement agencies. Part IV discusses the author's study of the relationships among newspaper reports, crime rates, and sexual psychopath legislation. Part V analyzes a number of the other perceived influences behind the sexual psychopath laws. Part VI notes that despite the increased funding of psychiatric studies of sex offenders and specialized facilities to treat them from 1950 to 1970, there was a dearth of treatment options available. Part V analyzes a number of the other perceived influences behind the sexual psychopath laws. The part concludes that both men and women appeared to be involved in initiating and perpetuating the legislation. Furthermore, the postwar emphasis on psychiatry, family, and children revitalized the nation's focus on the sexual psychopath. Mimicking late nineteenthand early-twentieth-century history, the following purported threats to marriage, children, and family became particular targets during the Cold War years: (1) inroads on masculinity represented by returning veterans' problems adjusting to the peacetime world and women's wartime dominance of work roles; (2) homosexuals who were among the main anticommunist targets; and (3) reports of sexual excess, nonprocreative behavior, and degeneracy, exemplified by [[Alfred Kinsey]]'s studies of how actual male and female sexual practices diverted from the prescribed norm. At the same time, several circumstances, such as public and political ambivalence, tempered the force of the sexual psychopath laws because the laws were rarely, if ever, implemented. ---- - **First Indexed:** 05-27-2023 - 4:26 pm - **Last Updated:** \<\%\+ tp.file.last_modified_date("MM-DD-YYYY - h:mm a")\%\>