THE  AMERICAN 
JOURNAL  OF  PHARMACY. 
MAY,  1877. 
THE  PHARMACOPOEIA  of  the  UNITED  STATES  and  the 
AMERICAN  MEDICAL  ASSOCIATION. 
By  Alfred  B.  Taylor. 
[Read  at  a  special  meeting  of  the  Philadelphia  College  of  Pharmacy,  held  April  g7  1S77.) 
The  approach  of  the  usual  time  for  the  decennial  revision  of  the 
"  United  States  Pharmacopoeia, "  calls  for  an  early  consideration  from 
all  practically  interested  in  this  important  work,  of  any  suggestions 
which  may  be  presented,  having  in  view  improvements  in  its  matter 
or  its  method. 
A  project  contemplating  very  radical  changes  in  the  conduct  of  this 
revision  has  recently  been  promulgated  and  advocated  with  great  ability 
and  earnestness  by  Dr.  E.  R.  Squibb,  of  Brooklyn,  and  has  already 
been  presented  with  characteristic  energy  to  the  American  Medical. 
Association  in  June  last,  to  the  American  Pharmaceutical  Association 
in  September  last,  to  the  King's  County  Medical  Society  of  New  York 
in  October  last,  and  to  the  New  York  College  of  Pharmacy  in  Decem- 
ber last.  Collected  and  published  in  a  pamphlet  form,  the  position 
and  arguments  advanced  by  Dr.  Squibb  have  been  widely  disseminated 
through  the  medical  and  pharmaceutical  professions,  and  will  doubtless 
receive  the  attention  due  to  the  importance  of  the  subject  discussed. 
The  project  referred  to  comprises  two  entirely  distinct  and  independ- 
ent topics,  although  they  have  constantly  been  treated  by  their  author 
as  the  mere  details  of  a  single  system.  The  first  topic  is  a  proposal 
to  abolish  the  function  and  jurisdiction  of  the  well-known  and  long 
established  "  National  Convention  for  revising  the  U.  S.  Pharmaco- 
poeia," by  a  formal  resolution  of  the  American  Medical  Association 
that  it  "does  now  and  hereby  assume  the  ownership  of  the  c  Pharma- 
copoeia of  the  United  States  of  America,'  and  as  the  superior  repre- 
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