572 
Possibility  of  Unification 
[Am.  Jour.  Pharm. 
^    December,  191 7. 
at  Lititz,  Lancaster  Co.,  Pa.,  is  believed  to  be  the  first  American 
attempt  at  such  a  standardization.  The  first  edition  of  the  United 
States  Pharmacopoeia  was  published  in  December,  1820.  This  was 
the  result  of  discussions  of  the  subject  extending  over  a  period  of 
some  fifteen  years  or  more  which  was  finally  directed  into  definite 
action  by  a  paper  submitted  in  January,  181 7,  by  Dr.  Lyman  Spald- 
ing to  the  Medical  Society  of  the  County  of  New  York  in  which 
he  outlined  a  project  for  the  formation  of  a  national  pharmacopoeia. 
His  plan  called  for  a  convention  of  delegates  from  the  medical  socie-  x 
ties  and  schools  of  the  United  States  to  be  held  in  the  city  of 
Washington.  The  convention  was  convened  in  1820  and  their  de- 
liberations were  consummated  in  the  first  edition  of  the  Pharma- 
copoeia of  the  United  States. 
Fortunately,  before  adjourning  this  general  convention  of  1820 
arranged  for  the  future  revisions  of  the  book  by  providing  that  the 
subsequent  pharmacopceial  convention  should  be  called  together  in 
the  same  city  in  1830.  This  plan  for  the  regularly  convening  of 
delegates  in  a  national  pharmacopceial  convention  in  the  decimal 
year  has  been  continued  and  by  this  method  we  have  so  far  had 
prepared  nine  decennial  revisions  of  the  U.  S.  P. 
The  Pharmacopoeia  of  the  United  States  is  prepared  on  a  truly 
democratic  plan,  differing  entirely  from  the  methods  in  vogue  in 
other  countries  in  which  usually  a  commission  is  appointed  by  the 
government  to  discharge  this  national  duty.  The  United  States 
Pharmacopoeia  is  the  peer  of  any  of  these  national  authorities  and 
abroad  it  has  been  spoken  of  as  "  the  autocrat  of  the  pharma- 
copoeias." That  the  American  plan  of  revision  is  fundamentally 
sound  has  been  demonstrated  by  its  withstanding  the  criticisms  of 
nearly  a  century  and  likewise  by  the  success  that  has  attended  the 
plan  and  the  acknowledged  standing  of  the  resulting  work. 
The  desire  for  international  as  well  as  national  harmony  of 
pharmacopceial  standards  has  been  a  topic  receiving  the  merited 
consideration  of  prominent  authorities  in  many  countries.  The  Con- 
ference held  in  Brussels  in  1902  and  entitled  Conference  Inter- 
nationale pour  rUnification  de  la  Formule  des  Medicaments 
Hero'iques  was  an  important  movement  with  that  end  in  view.  The 
conclusions  of  this  convention  as  set  forth  in  an  international  proto- 
col have  been  very  largely  adopted  in  the  revisions  of  the  various 
national  pharmacopoeias  that  have  appeared  since  that  date.  A  few 
of  the  recommendations  made  therein  have  not  been  universally  ac- 
