Cite as: 509 U. S. 389 (1993)
Opinion of Kennedy, J.
Blackstone drew no distinction between madness for purposes of pleading and madness for purposes of going to trial. An English case arising in the Crown Court in 1865 indicates that a single standard was applied to assess competency at the time of arraignment, the time of pleading, and throughout the course of trial. See Regina v. Southey, 4 Fos. & Fin. 864, 872, n. a, 176 Eng. Rep. 825, 828, n. a (N. P. 1865) ("Assuming the prisoner to be insane at the time of arraignment, he cannot be tried at all, with or without counsel, for, even assuming that he has appointed counsel at a time when he was sane, it is not fit that he should be tried, as he cannot understand the evidence, nor the proceedings, and so is unable to instruct counsel, or to withdraw his authority if he acts improperly, as a prisoner may always do"); id., at 877, n. a, 176 Eng. Rep., at 831, n. a ("[I]f [the defendant] be so insane as not to understand the nature of the proceedings, he cannot plead").
A number of 19th-century American cases also referred to insanity in a manner that suggested there was a single standard by which competency was to be assessed throughout legal proceedings. See, e. g., Underwood v. People, 32 Mich. 1, 3 (1875) ("[I]nsanity, when discovered, was held at common law to bar any further steps against a prisoner, at whatever stage of the proceedings"); Crocker v. State, 60 Wis. 553, 556, 19 N. W. 435, 436 (1884) ("At common law, if a person, after committing a crime, became insane, he was not arraigned during his insanity, but was remitted to prison until such incapacity was removed. The same was true where he became insane after his plea of not guilty and before trial"); State v. Reed, 41 La. Ann. 581, 582, 7 So. 132 (1889) ("It is elementary that a man cannot plead, or be tried, or convicted, or sentenced, while in a state of insanity"). See also 2 J. Bishop, Commentaries on Law of Criminal Procedure §§ 664, 667 (2d ed. 1872) ("[A] prisoner cannot be tried, sentenced, or punished" unless he is "mentally competent to make a rational defense").
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