“There is perhaps not a single legal question that opens up such a wide field for the compilation of the most controversial theories as the question of political crimes. Suffice it to recall that many well-known penalists, such as Lucas, Frebel and Carrara, come to doubt the existence of the latter, as if they were not a bright social phenomenon, repeated at all times and under any form of government. It is true that political crimes have never been studied as such; despotism, whether from the palace or from the street, has always succeeded in deflecting scientific criticism from them by usurping their monopoly or turning them into weapons against its opponents. Lombroso Translation: K. Tolstoi