Medical Jurisprudence, Forensic medicine and Toxicology. Vol. 1 by R. A. Witthaus et al.
1885. (See Toxicology.)
2073 words | Chapter 267
[136] “Yei sei honron” (Lectures on medical jurisprudence, translated
by Gento Oye), 3d ed., 2 vols., Tokio, 1880.
[137] “Saiban igaku teiko” (Medical Juris.), 3 vols., Tokio, 1882-84.
[138] “Sixteen Introductory Lectures,” etc., Phila., 1811, pp. 363-395.
[139] Amer. Med. and Phil. Reg., N. Y., 1814, iv., 614. It is to be
regretted that instruction in medical jurisprudence is not now given at
this school (1893).
[140] Beck, “Med. Jur.,” 7th ed., xix. The Index Catalogue contains the
titles of forty-nine works by Caldwell, none of which are medico-legal.
[141] Beck, _loc. cit._
[142] “Tracts on Medical Jurisprudence,” etc., Phila., 1819.
[143] “Elements of Medical Jurisprudence,” 2 vols., 8vo, Albany, 1823;
12th ed., 2 vols., 8vo, Phila., 1863. A chapter on Infanticide by John
B. Beck was added to the third edition. This and later editions are “by
T. R. and J. B. Beck.”
[144] N. Y. Med. and Phys. Jour., 1823, ii., 9-30.
[145] “An Essay on Medical Jurisprudence,” Phila., 1824.
[146] Phila. J. M. and Phys. Sc., 1825, x., 36-46.
[147] “Syllabus of Lectures.” etc., Univ. of Va., 1827.
[148] “An Introductory Address,” etc., Phila., 1829, and “Syllabus of
a Course of Lectures on ... Medical Jurisprudence in the Philadelphia
Medical Institute” [n. p., n. d.].
[149] “A Catechism of Medical Jurisprudence.” etc., Northampton, 1835.
[150] Dean (A.): “Manual of Medical Jurisprudence,” Albany, 1840; Dean
(A.): “Principles of Medical Jurisprudence,” Albany, 1854: Elwell (J.
J.): “Medico-legal Treatise on Malpractice and Evidence,” New York,
1860; 4th ed., New York, 1881.
[151] “Medical Jurisprudence.” Phila., 1855. 4th ed., edited by R.
Amory and E. S. Wood, 3 vols., Phila., 1884.
[152] “A Medico-legal Treatise on Malpractice and Medical Evidence,” N.
Y., 1860; 4th ed., N. Y., 1881.
[153] “The Jurisprudence of Medicine,” etc., Phila., 1869.
[154] In that case (Bailey _v._ Mogg), the Court says of that
statute (Laws of 1844, p. 406): “The triumph was now complete, for
the legislature had made every man a doctor, and nostrums of every
description and admixture could now be safely prescribed, and payments
therefor exacted by authority of law.”
[155] Notwithstanding these statutory enactments, it has been held that
one who undertakes to cure disease by rubbing, kneading, pressing, and
otherwise manipulating the body (massage) is not liable for having
violated the provisions of the statute against practising medicine or
surgery without a license. Smith _v._ Lane, 24 Hun (New York Supreme
Court), 32.
[156] Analysis of this decision shows that the main ground, upon
which the court of last resort sustained the right of the applicant
for admission to be admitted as a member of the society, was, that
the provisions of the by-law in question were not specifically made
applicable to a person applying for membership. The Court observed,
pp. 192 _et seq._: “The regulations embodied in the so-called code are
admirably framed, and commend themselves to every reader, as tending
to raise to a still higher elevation the character of the learned
and honorable profession to which they were submitted for approval
and adoption. They are not limited in their scope to the range of
moral obligation, but embrace express rules of conduct, in personal,
professional, and public relations. They are regulations in the
various departments of morals and manners, of courtesy and etiquette,
of delicacy and honor. They bind those who pledge themselves to their
observance, but cannot be recognized in law, as conditions precedent to
the exercise of an honorable profession, by learned, able, and upright
men, who have not agreed to abide by them. The non-observance of such
regulations _may be made_ cause for exclusion or disfranchisement; but
it must be either by the agreement of parties or by the exercise of the
law-making power.
“The applicant was not a member either of the American Medical
Association or of the Erie County Medical Society, at the time of his
alleged deviation from the formulas prescribed by these conventional
rules. He was under no legal obligation to observe them, and had
neither actual nor constructive notice of their existence. Those
who were _members_ of the society could not lawfully be expelled
for _antecedent_ deviation from the code (Fawcett _v._ Charles, 13
Wend., 477). Much less could such deviation be alleged, as cause for
exclusion, against one who had never agreed to be bound by it, and as
to whom it was not merely an inoperative but an unknown law.
“As the relator demanded admission to the enjoyment of a franchise to
which he was presumptively entitled, his exclusion could be justified
only by facts repelling the presumption that he was duly qualified for
admission, or by extraneous facts, showing that, if his application was
granted, there were then subsisting causes, making ‘a clear case’ for
immediate expulsion (_Ex parte_ Paine, 1 Hill, 665).
“The burden was upon the appellant to establish affirmatively the
existence of such present cause for expulsion. The society waived the
right of making a return and taking a formal issue on the claim of
the relator, to be determined as matter of fact by a jury, under the
direction of the court; but submitted its objections in the form of
affidavits, which failed to establish cause either for exclusion or
expulsion.
“The only _specific fact_ alleged in the opposing affidavits, as ground
of objection, was the publication by the relator of a professional
advertisement, which was inserted in one or more of the Buffalo
journals in May, 1855, and discontinued in January, 1857, more than
two years before his application was presented. It is charged that the
printing of this notice was an empiricism, and in conflict with the
code of ethics adopted by the Erie County Medical Society.
“There is nothing in the terms of the advertisement from which
any inference can justly be drawn against the relator, in respect
either to his personal character or his professional skill. There
is no suggestion, in the affidavits, that any of the statements of
fact contained in the notice are untrue, and there is nothing in
its contents inconsistent with perfect good faith on the part of
the relator. It refers to the treatment of bronchitis, asthma, and
consumption, as a special department of the profession to which he
had directed his particular attention; and it alludes to his use of
the method recently introduced, of medicated inhalation, through
an instrument appropriate to that purpose, in aid of such general
treatment as experience had proved to be beneficial in that class of
diseases. It is not denied that the relator possessed peculiar skill
in this department of the profession; and the case discloses the fact
that the method of auxiliary treatment, introduced by him in the
county of Erie, was not only successful in his own practice, but was
adopted, with beneficial results, by members of the county society
of high professional standing, and that it was accepted by a large
proportion of the physicians of Western New York. If, at the time this
remedy was introduced, he had been a member of the County Society or
of the American Medical Association, he would not have been at liberty
to direct attention, through the medium of the public journals, to
the benefits resulting from its use. This would, perhaps, have been
unfortunate for those who were suffering, in that vicinity, from this
particular class of diseases; but it is undoubtedly true that the
suppression of such an advertisement would have been more considerate
toward his professional brethren, and more in accordance with the
rules of delicacy and good taste. But an error, in this respect, by
one who had no notice of the society regulation is not cause for
disfranchisement. The act of the relator was neither immoral nor
illegal. It was no violation of the by-laws; for, as to him, they were
wholly inoperative. It was no present cause for _exclusion_; for the
publication of the objectionable notice had been discontinued for more
than two years. When he applied for admission, he proposed to become
bound by the by-laws; and this the society refused to permit, for the
sole cause that he had not observed them before they became rules of
conduct for him. ‘Where there is no law, there is no transgression.’
The relator, therefore, had been guilty of no legal wrong which could
bar his claim to the franchise.”
[157] In Macpherson _v._ Cheadell (24 Wend., N. Y., 15) the Court said,
p. 24:
“In the first place I doubt much whether the defendant below, after
retaining the plaintiff as a physician and accepting his services as
such, could call upon him in the first instance to prove a regular
license. In other like cases, the presumption is against the defendant.
It is so as between attorney and client, in a suit for services
performed under a retainer. Pearce _v._ Whale, 7 Donl. & Ryl., 512,
515, per Bayley, Judge; 5 Barn. _v_. Cress., 38, S. C. There, if the
objection sound in the fact that the plaintiff was never admitted, or
that his admission has become inoperative, it lies with the defendant
to show it. _Id._, and see Berryman _v._ Wise, 44 T. R., 566. and other
cases; 1 Phil. Ev., 227, Cowen _v._ Hill’s ed. Besides, the contrary
would be doing great violence to the presumption that no man will
transgress the command of a positive law.” See also Thompson _v._ Sayre
(1 Denio, N. Y., 75), where this principle seems to have been assumed
as correct without question upon the strength of the decision quoted
above. A similar doctrine appears to have been enunciated in the State
of Illinois in Chicago _v._ Wood, 24 Ill. App., 42; and Williams _v._
People, 20 Ill. App., 92. It may be sound, and undoubtedly the English
cases cited in Macpherson _v._ Cheadell, _supra_, tend to support it.
But in a case in which the physician’s right to practise is denied,
the safe course will be for him to have a duly authenticated copy of
his license ready to be offered in evidence. The general rule is that
the burden is on the plaintiff to show all the facts which make up his
right of recovery. See Bliss _v._ Brainard, 41 N. H., 256; Salomon _v._
Dreschler, 4 Minn., 278; Kane _v._ Johnston, 9 Bosw., N. Y. Superior
Ct., 154.
[158] That is, the burden devolves upon the defendant, and this
notwithstanding the presumption of innocence, of showing what must be
peculiarly within his own knowledge, namely, that he has been duly
licensed. People _v._ Nyce, 34 Hun, N. Y., 298, and cases cited; 1
Greenleaf on Ev., § 79, and cases cited. See, contra, State _v._ Evans,
5 Jones. N. C., 250.
[159] In Finch _v._ Gridley’s Executors (25 Wend., N. Y., 469-471),
Nelson, Ch. J., said: “I am also inclined to think the evidence which
was given competent to prove the _diploma_ from Fairfield College.
The witness identified the corporate seal, _and had himself received
a diploma from that institution subscribed by the same president and
secretary_. Though he did not actually see them subscribe the paper,
he had every means of becoming acquainted with their signatures; _the
delivery_ of it to him was an acknowledgment they had signed it.
Besides, he was familiar with diplomas from the institution under their
signature,” etc.
And see, also, Raynor _v._ State, 62 Wis., 289; Wendel _v._ State,
_id._, 300.
[160] In some of the States, persons who simply administered roots and
herbs in treating disease, have been excepted from that portion of the
statute which forbids the practice of medicine and surgery without a
license. The proper construction of such an exception is, that it is a
question of fact for the jury, whether the person accused who claims
the benefit of the exception, simply administered a concoction of roots
and herbs within the meaning of the statute, or whether, under the
guise of so doing, he really held himself out as and acted as a regular
practitioner. All such penal statutes are to be construed, like all
other penal statutes, with due regard to the rights of the individual,
and at the same time with such degree of liberality as will tend to
preserve the public safety.
[161] It has been held that the act of a physician in reporting to
a health-board in good faith that his patient is suffering from
small-pox, is not actionable. Brown _v._ Purdy, 8 N. Y. St. Rep.,
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