The Loeb-Leopold case - The Clarence Darrow Collection

The Loeb-Leopold Case
There was a projection of phantasies into the
world at large, by the search for a superman whose
will should govern his activities. He found him
eventually in Loeb.
There was the hedonistic philosophy, and the
superman idea. He had a delusion that Dick
measured up to the test of the superman, a delusion
that was serious. His letter of October lo, 1923,
just read to your Honor, shows that. You heard the
statements of the witnesses called by the defense.
He talked superman to them. He argued in the
law class that the rules of law as to torts and crimes
did not apply to him. He said superman, but of
course we all know he meant himself.
Then we find that early in life he began a de-
liberate, intentional destruction of his emotional life.
He showed a willingness to kidnap his own father.
He was conscious of setting out to lead a purely
intellectual life, going to leave emotions out of it.
He used his intellectual precocity as a weapon with
which to combat physical inferiority. His interest
in religion. Your Honor remembers the churches.
The idea his mother was a Madonna, his aunt was a
Madonna. He classified the churches. His Christ
idea. His atheism. That was confirmed by his
mother's death. And then came the tremendous
disparity between his intellectual precocity and the
appropriateness and adequacy of his emotional
responses.
His idea of grandeur and comparison of himself
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