The Relations of the State and the Medical Profession. BY CHARLES J. LUNDY, A. M., M. D., President of the Medical Alumni Association, University of Michigan, President of the Detroit Medical and Library Association, Pro fessor of Diseases of the Eye, Ear, and Throat in the Detroit College of Med- While Michigan is noted for her mineral wealth, her lumber products, her agricultural interests, and her extensive manufactures, yet it is her grand system of public instruction which entitles Michigan to rank first among all the states. No state surpasses Michigan in the completeness of her educational system, and every Michigan man points with pride to her institutions of learning. Her public schools are not surpassed in any land. Her high schools are models of their kind. Her normal school fills an important place in her educational system, and prepares for us many of the teachers of our children. The State Agricultural College affords ample opportunity to make scientific farmers of our sons. And finally, our State University, of which we all feel justly proud, makes a fitting climax to this grand array of educational institutions, and furnishes the facilities for completing our children's education, whether in the arts, sciences, engineering, law, pharmacy, or medicine. What a beautiful picture to contemplate! What opportunities are offered to those who wish to profit by them! Compare, if comparison can be made, the present opportunities for acquiring an education with what they were in our fathers' time, fifty or sixty years ago, and you will wonder why so many fail to embrace the opportunities offered them. Compare, if you will, the present status of the medical department of this University, your alma mater, with what it was even a quarter of a century ago, and the comparison will surprise you. Consider the opportunities which are offered in our own state for acquiring a medical education, and you will be surprised to learn that fully one-third of those who call themselves physicians have no just claim to such a title. See to-day the laboratories-chemical, physiological, hystological, anatomical, pathological, and microscopical-which here surround us, and yet not one of these was here even later than a quarter of a century ago. What an era of progress is here indicated! But mark you that with this progress, and with this improvement in the facilities for acquiring an education in medicine, your alma mater, acting in the interests of humanity and of the state, has year by year required a higher standard of education in the applicant for the degree of doctor of medicine. In years gone by she required attendance upon two courses of lectures, each of 26 weeks duration. At first three or four professors did all the work, and did not find it difficult either. Year by year, the curriculum lengthened, and the subjects taught became more numerous. More time was required for the completion of the medical course, and more labor, more study was required of the applicant for the degree of medical doctor. Young even as I am, I have watched the medical department-and all departments of this University for that matter-grow, and expand, and broaden, and develop, as in yonder campus the saplings of my day have now grown to large, vigorous, and beautiful trees, whose shades and spreading branches welcome us when occasionally we return to visit alma mater. As the medical department has expanded and extended its course, it has become correspondingly difficult to obtain a degree, and now the procuring of the degree of medical doctor from the State University is no easy matter. The State through the University says to the applicant to-day: You must possess a good education or you will not be allowed to enter. You will be obliged to spend here three years of the choicest portion of your life. You must study late and early. You must work in laboratories and dissecting room, no matter how disagreeable it may be, till you have mastered the subjects taught therein. You must cultivate thoroughly the broad field of medicine and sur gery. You must bear the expense incident upon a three years' college course, and away from home and family. And finally, you must pass a satisfactory examination on all branches taught during your three years' stay in college. Now, ladies and gentlemen, the State, through her University, has demanded all this of you-and those, who have recently passed through the trying ordeals of such a course as I have just described, will agree with me in saying that the State has demanded a good deal-before granting you a diploma, without which you will not be allowed to practice your profession in many of the neighboring States. But why, let me ask, should the State demand so much of you, when men and women, without any preparation, or training, or qualification whatever, are allowed to practice the profession which you have so fully prepared yourselves to practice? If the State of Michigan has demanded of you three years of hard mental work, three years of preparation for the practice of your profession, three years of absence from home and fireside, as well as the outlay of the large amount of money necessary to maintain you here for that time; why, I again ask, does the State permit the ignorant charlatan, who has spent neither time nor money in preparation, to set himself up as a doctor, and as your equal? By act of congress, no man is allowed to act in the capacity of marine engineer until he has passed a satisfactory examination, showing his qualification for such position. In the City of Detroit no man can take charge of an engine in one of our factories until he has obtained a license to do so. Indeed, the corporation employing an incompetent person as an engineer, leaves itself liable to damages in case of accident; and the man who, without a license attempts to act in such capacity leaves himself liable to the penalties of the law. And yet, any man, no matter how ignorant, no matter how illiterate, no matter how unskillful he may be, any man, I say, may undertake, without let or hindrance, to cure all ills to which human flesh is heir; may undertake to treat any disease, or to correct any deformity of the human body, that beautiful piece of mechanism, that noblest work of God. In every State there is a law against obtaining money under false pretences. To obtain either goods or money under false pretences is to subject the offender to the severest penalties of the law. But the charlatan may pretend he is a doctor, and in this guise he may swindle and rob the people of this commonwealth to his heart's content, and there is no law to prevent him. Indeed, the State of Michigan sets a premium upon swindling, a premium upon false pretences, and exempts from punishment the charlatan who swindles her citizens. If these are not the facts in the case, why does our State offer an asylum to these traffickers in human flesh and blood, who have been obliged to flee from other States? Why does she invite here the horde of vampires whom the strong arm of the law has driven from the States round about us? Why does she permit these unscrupulous quacks to fill our papers with their obscene advertisements? Why does this great State of Michigan, with her boasted intelligence, permit these fellows to beguile and rob the unwary. When Shakespeare wrote the passage: "Who steals my purse, steals trash," etc., he did not have any experience with the quack doctors of Michigan, else the remainder of the quotation would probably read as follows: But he that robs me of health and happiness takes that which not enriches him, but makes me poor indeed. An important stock in trade with the genus quack is making people believe they are afflicted with all manner of ills, and that he, and he alone is able to cure them. By dishonest dealings, by false promises, and by all manner of deceit, these wily quacks succeed in swindling the citizens of Michigan out of several million dollars annually. Perhaps some one will doubt the correctness of these assertions. Perhaps some one may maintain that they cannot be proven. I can show you that these statements are correct, and that they can be proven by mathematical demonstration. Within the past few years laws have been enacted against quackery in several states, especially in Illinois, Iowa, Wisconsin, California, Mississippi, Alabama, North Carolina, Virginia and New York. From these States thousands of quacks have been driven, and under a rigid law several thousand more would be obliged to follow. No doubt these fellows cried out against what they were pleased to call "oppression." No doubt they said, as our Michigan quacks say whenever an attempt is made to pass a bill against quackery: "This interferes with our rights as American citizens." Notwithstanding the great opposition which the charlatans made against it, the Legislature of Illinois passed a law against quackery nine years ago. This is known as the Illinois Medical Practice Act, regarding which Ex-Governor John M. Hamilton is quoted as saying: "The Medical Practice Act was primarily a police regulation. Incidentally it was educational. Primarily the purpose of the law was to rid the State of incompetent, ignorant and dangerous mountebanks and quacks, who were carrying on a fraudulent and nefarious business by all manner of deceit in a pretended practice of medicine among the people. was to protect the lives, the health, the morals and the property of the people of the State from the shameless depredations of swindlers and adventurers who, by all manner of false representations and deceptive promises, were taking advantage of the misfortunes of the people in sickness and ailments of all kinds, to still further 'injure their health, endanger their lives and rob them of their money." It |