This open access book attempts to answer the question, "Why are so many severely mentally ill people homeless or incarcerated?" Updated since it's original 1988 release, this book tracks the history of this question in the United States. The answer begins in 1955, when the United States deinstitutionalized the 559,000 patients who were in state mental hospitals. Today, only 35,000 remain. In 1963, Congress funded President Kennedy's proposed federally funded Community Mental Health Centers ...