THE CONQUEST OF DISEASE 



ordinary laws which provide punishment for 

 the infliction upon animals of ''unjustifiable 

 physical pain, suffering, or death;" but has 

 striven to have enacted class legislation, put- 

 ting scientific workers under special surveil- 

 lance and restrictions, and allowing farmers, 

 drivers, butchers and animal trainers to come 

 under the general law. One of the most strik- 

 ing absurdities to which the spirit of unenlight- 

 enment has driven legislators has been this 

 special legislation, hampering the work of edu- 

 cated men who are devoted to the relief of 

 human suffering. 



Such legislation often requires that an anes- 

 thetic shall be given to every animal experi- 

 mented upon. One law made it necessary to 

 give an anesthetic to an oyster. In most in- 

 stances the anesthetic would do the animal 

 more harm than the experiment. On the other 

 hand the physician has no restrictions imposed 

 by law as to whether he shall give an anesthetic 

 to a human being or not. Under the ordinary 

 criminal laws the unjustifiable withholding of 

 anesthetics from animals is a punishable of- 



welfare of the efforts which are being made in the medical 

 laboratories, with the help of lower animals, to penetrate the 

 mysteries of disease and death that confront mankind on every 

 side. ' ' 



152 



