Am.  Jour.  Pharm. 
June,  1915. 
Modem  Medicine. 
281 
any  class  or  sect  try  to  force  him  to  do  anything  for  his  own  good 
unless  he  is  convinced  that  it  is  necessary  and  desirable.  Even  then 
he  wants  to  be  shown  that  the  inconvenience  of  conforming  to  the 
restriction  will  bring  him  benefit  greater  than  the  inconvenience 
brought  about  by  not  conforming  to  it.  If  you  have  any  doubt  as 
to  the  universality  of  this  feeling,  or  think  that  it  is  held  only  by  lay- 
men, wait  until  some  bill  is  introduced  into  your  legislature  that  im- 
poses some  kind  of  restrictions  on  physicians  themselves  and  then 
notice  the  result.  You  will  generally  hear  a  roar  of  protest  that  can 
be  heard  throughout  the  State.  Yet  the  average  layman  has  just  as 
much  objection  to  being  regulated  as  the  physician  has.  The  gen- 
eral conclusions  to  be  drawn  from  this  situation  are  that  all  proposed 
public  health  legislation  should  be  plainly  necessary  and  justifiable; 
that  interference  with  personal  liberty  should  be  the  least  possible 
amount  necessary  to  produce  the  desired  result,  and  that  in  every 
case  where  such  interference  is  necessary  it  should  be  done  in  the 
least  disagreeable  way  possible,  and  the  reasons  for  the  necessary 
restrictions  should  be  carefully  and  clearly  explained  to  the  public 
before  their  enactment  in  the  form  of  legislation  is  sought.  Any 
subject  which  cannot  be  explained  to  the  satisfaction  of  the  average 
citizen  had  generally  best  be  left  out  of  legislative  plans.  Science  is 
simply  systematized  knowledge.  If  we  know  a  thing  we  can  convince 
any  reasonable  person  of  the  truth  of  our  proposition. 
The  use  of  so-called  "  practical  political  methods  "  to  secure  the 
passage  of  public  health  measures  has  already  been  mentioned.  The 
last  twenty-five  years  has  been  a  period  of  special  privileges  and  of 
many  legislative  abuses.  Instead  of  legislation  being  determined  by 
considerations  of  public  interest,  it  has  been  too  often  a  matter  of 
barter  and  sale  or  of  cooperation  between  representatives  of  special 
interests.  A  legislator  representing  one  interest  has  voted  for 
measures  on  condition  that  the  friends  of  these  measures  would  in 
turn  vote  for  his  measures.  Log-rolling,  wire-pulling  and  ring-rule 
have,  at  times  at  least,  characterized  many  of  our  State  legislative 
bodies.  The  appeal  to  physicians,  sometimes  from  our  own  ranks, 
has  been  the  enticing  one  to  be  "  practical  politicians  and  play  the 
game."  The  statement  has  been  made  repeatedly  in  medical  or- 
ganizations that  the  only  way  to  secure  desired  legislation  was  to 
follow  the  tactics  used  by  all  so-called  "  successful  "  politicians  and 
exercise  such  influence  as  could  be  exerted,  regardless  of  the  manner 
in  which  it  was  secured.   This  argument  has  been  particularly  attrac- 
