Sidebilder
PDF
ePub

HISTOLOGY.

1. What is meant by endochondral formation of bone, and describe process briefly?

2. Describe formation of an artery, giving coats. Pledge.

LARYNGOLOGY, RHINOLOGY, OPHTHALMOLOGY, AND OTOLOGY. Dr. A. S. Priddy, Chairman; Drs. H. M. Nash and O. C. Williams, Examiners.

LARYNGOLOGY.

1. What are the symptoms, course, and treatment of acute laryngitis?

2. Give the diagnosis and treatment, both general and special, of laryngismus stridulus.

3 Give the symptoms, course, some common complications, and treatment of acute follicular tonsillitis.

RHINOLOGY.

1. What anatomical arrangements within the nares render the treatment of chronic rhinitis difficult?

2. Give the most generally accepted theory of predisposing and exciting causes of hay fever, and describe its symptoms.

OPHTHALMOLOGY.

1. What are the microscopical appearances of the most common forms of keratitis, and the appropriate treatment?

2. Give the causes, symptoms, and general and local treatment of trachoma.

3. Give cause, symptoms, and treatment, both prophylactic and remedial, of ophthalmia neonatorum.

OTOLOGY.

1. Define tinnitus aurium and give the causes of it.

2. Give briefly the diagnosis and treatment of acute otitis media. Pledge.

Reciprocating Medical Boards.

Colorado reciprocates with states offering equal standards of education and moral qualification.

Connecticut reciprocates with states giving an examination equivalent to its own.

Delaware reciprocates with New Jersey, Virginia, Illinois, and Maryland.

District of Columbia reciprocates with states having equivalent requirements.

Georgia reciprocates with states requiring the same standard and recognizing Georgia certificates.

Illinois reciprocates with Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, Nebraska, New Jersey, Ohio, North Dakota, South arolina, Wisconsin, and Virginia,

Indiana reciprocates with Michigan, Wisconsin, Nebraska, Nevada, Ohio, Iowa, Kansas, Illinois, Maine, Kentucky, Mary. land, and New Jersey.

Iowa reciprocates with South Dakota, Colorado, Illinois, Missouri, Wyoming, and Minnesota.

Kansas reciprocates with states whose standards of qualification for practise are equivalent to its own.

Kentucky reciprocates with District of Columbia, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Oklahoma, South Carolina, and Wisconsin. Maine reciprocates with states whose standards of education are equivalent to its own.

Maryland reciprocates with Delaware, District of Columbia, Georgia, Illinois, Iowa, Indiana, Kansas, Maine, Michigan, New Hampshire, Nebraska, Ohio, Oregon, South Carolina, Texas, Vermont, Virginia, Wyoming, and Wisconsin.

Michigan reciprocates with Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Maine, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, Nevada, New Jersey, New York, North Dakota, Ohio, South Carolina, Virginia, Wisconsin, and Wyoming.

Minnesota reciprocates with Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Michigan, Maine, Maryland, Missouri, Nevada, New Jersey, Nebraska, Ohio, South Carolina, South Dakota, Wisconsin, and Wyoming. Missouri reciprocates with states whose standard of requirements is equal to its own.

Nebraska reciprocates with Michigan, Indiana, Iowa, Maryland, Minnesota, Georgia, Wisconsin, Kansas, Illinois, Ohio, and Wyoming.

Nevada reciprocates with Indiana and Texas.

New Hampshire reciprocates with states whose standards are equal to its own.

New Jersey reciprocates with states whose educational examining and licensing requirements are equal to or higher than its own. New Mexico reciprocates with states having like requirements. New York reciprocates with New Jersey and Michigan. North Dakota reciprocates with states maintaining standards not lower than its own

Ohio reciprocates with Illinois, Indiana, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, Nebraska, New Jersey, and Wisconsin. South Carolina reciprocates with states having equal require

ments.

South Dakota reciprocates with states having equal require

ments.

Texas reciprocates with New Jersey, Indiana, Georgia, Iowa, Nevada, and Virginia.

Utah reciprocates with states having an equal standard. Vermont reciprocates with Maine, Maryland, Michigan, New Jersey, North Dakota, and Wyoming.

Virginia reciprocates with Illinois, Indiana, Nebraska, Michigan, Maryland, Delaware, and South Carolina.

Wisconsin reciprocates with District of Columbia, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Maryland, Michigan, New Mexico, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, and South Carolina. Wyoming reciprocates with states having equal requirements and issuing licenses on the same terms.-State Board Journal.

RECENT BOOKS

Surgery: Its Principles and Practise. In five volumes. By 66 eminent surgeons. Edited by W. W. Keen, M.D., LL.D., Hon. F.R.C.S., Eng. and Edin, Professor of the Principles of Surgery and of Clinical Surgery, Jefferson Medical College, Phila Vol. I: Octavo of 983 pages, with 261 text illustrations and 17 colored plates. Philadelphia and London: W. B. Saunders Company, 1906. Per volume: Cloth, $7 net; half morocco, $8 net.

The remaining volumes will be issued as fast as they can be gotten thru the press. Every surgeon will find some of his favorit authors in this galaxy of 66 bright stars, tho he may wonder at the absence of some of the names he is wont to class with the leaders in surgery. In this issue, Adami, Bland Sutton, Crile, John C. DaCosta, Frazier, Freeman, Hektoen, Martin, Mumford, Nichols, Smith, and Francis Carter Wood give us of their best. Syphilis, by Martin, takes up 60 of the pages; Physiology and Pathology of the Blood, with special Surgical Hematology, 34 pages; Infection, 19 pages; Immunity, 13 Inflammation and Treatment, 45; Suppuration, Abscess, and Fistula, 47; Wounds and Contusions, 42; Shock and Collapse, 22; etc. Especial attention has been paid to bibliography. It is truly a medical scholar's work. It is not a work made up of illustrations, yet all illustrations are well executed and elucidate the text. The plates represent the acme of perfection. No expenditure of labor on the part of authors and editor, and of funds on the part of the publishers, has been considered in the effort to put out a truly "great surgery." It is uniform in size, style, and binding with Nothnagel's Encyclopedia of Medicin, put out recently by this firm. We do not believe an outlay of the amount necessary to purchase these two sets could be better invested; they make a medical library in themselves. -A. L. R.

How to Make Tablets. By Frank Edel. A treatise on the manufacture, by retail druggists, of all kinds of com prest tablets; also many practical formulas. Publisht by "The Spatula," 12 Sudbury Building, Boston. Price, 25 cts.

The above is reply to a query appearing on page 451 of WORLD for last month, which we were then unable to answer.

Dr. Finley Ellingwood, 100 State street, Chicago, Ill., for twenty-two years editor of the Chicago Medical Times, has withdrawn from that publication, and on the first day of January will issue the first number of an entirely new medical journal entitled Ellingwood's Therapeutist. The journal will be devoted to the study of the most direct action of all drugs as applicable to exact conditions of disease. The doctor desires the co-operation of the entire medical profession in making these drug studies, and in disseminating these facts.

Dr. George Thomas Palmer, who for the past five years has edited The Chicago Clinic and Pure Water Journal, has voluntarily severed his connection with the Illinois State Board of Health, in which he held the position of assistant secretary, to devote his time and attention to the interests of his Journal. For some years the Clinic has devoted considerable attention to climatology and mineral water therapy, being the only publication in the United States dealing with the latter subject. These special departments will be especially developt during the coming year. In his connection with the Illinois State Board of Health. Dr. Palmer has been activly engaged in sanitary and public health work, and a new department of State Medicin, edited by him, will be a feature in the Clinic.

may be separated from THE WORLD by cutting this and the next leaf on this line.

Thus “ Talk” without the medical part may be passed among lay friends, or given to the editor of the local paper to copy from.

DECEMBER, 1906]

OUR MONTHLY TALK.

[ocr errors]
[ocr errors]

Our Monthly Talk

In the leading editorial of the October number of the Medical Brief, that old "chestnut" concerning the large national debt of New Zealand is brought forth and solemnly commented upon. Stand pat newspapers do this frequently, and make a sad exhibition of their ignorance. All the facts concerning the New Zealand public debt are clearly set forth in "The Story of New Zealand," beginning on page 534, and in Politics in New Zealand," beginning on page 81, to which we refer our readers, and particularly the writer of the editorial above referred to. The figures there show that New Zealand really has no national debt at all. It is this way: The national debts of the other nations of the world were created almost entirely by war, and the money has gone up in smoke. On the other hand, the national debt of New Zealand was created almost entirely by the construction of public improvements, as railroads, telegrafs, telefones, etc., all of which are paying properties, constantly in use for the service of the people, worth much more than they cost, besides increasing the value of land and other property all over that country. Instead of the debt there being a deadweight debt, like a war debt, it represents assets; and the figures (from official sources) given in the books above referred to show that these assets, at a nominal rating, are worth more than the debt, thus showing that New Zealand has really no national debt at all, but a credit instead. Examin the figures for yourself, and be able to meet this lie that has been so often publisht concerning New Zealand. We see it crop up now and then, in various parts of this capital- and corporation-ridden country, because it is the only plausible-appearing statement that they can make against New Zealand. But if they should go to the bottom of the matter (which they carefully refrain from doing, thru either ignorance or a purpose to deceive), it would prove to be the best thing they could say about New Zealand. What a glorious thing it would be if our national bonds represented railroads and other constructed, constructiv, and productiv property instead of the waste of war!

A New Era in Magazine-dom.

Many of the popular magazines, during the last few years, have been devoting themselves to living, practical questions concerning every day affairs of importance, instead of indulging in literary dilettanteism, as was the universal custom of magazines up to a few years ago, and some magazines still continue in the old line. Live, fearless editors and publishers realize that public policies touch the lives of all; and so they argue that political questions should be considered in popular magazines; and the rapid growth in circulation of the magazines that take up public questions fearlessly proves the practical wisdom of this course. Notable among this class of magazines is Everybody's. In the November Everybody's, Mr. Charles Edward Russell, one of the best staff writers on the magazine, writes from New Zealand. Every voter in this country should read that article. I will here present parts of it:

ADVENT OF A GOVERNMENT THAT CARES MOST FOR THE LEAST FORTUNATE.

While all the rest of the world resounds with the clamor of conflict, New Zealand is the one country that has achieved peace. Elsewhere society is disturbed from time to time with strikes, lockouts, labor wars, long and costly interruptions of industry, street riots, and sinister outbreaks of violence. Here is a country without strikes, without labor disturbances, without walking delegates, pickets, Pinkertons, riots, dead lines, injunctions, strike breakers, armed guards, special strike deputies, or militia called out to shoot citizens and defend property

Elsewhere class lines become more sharply drawn, the bitterness grows between employer and employed, thoughtful men have the gloomiest forebodings of struggle between class and class. In this country alone the antagonism between labor and capital has become chiefly a reminiscence, and employer and workmen begin to look upon their interests as essentially one. Elsewhere poverty increases, the slums spread, millic naires Everybody's Magazine, Union Square, New York City; $1.50 per year; 15 cts. per single copy.

505

multiply, accumulation becomes an imminent threat, wealth and power gravitate into the hands of a few, greed preys upon need, feudalism in a new guise seems to gain upon free institutions. In this country alone men look upon these things as upon passed problems not again to bar the way of progress.

In New Zealand is no threat of accumulating millions, no trusts, no money mania, no corrupted legislatures, no extremes of condition, no surfeit, no poverty (as elsewhere we understand poverty), no destitution, no palaces, no slums, no unemployed, no epidemics, no overcrowding, no pest holes, no noisome back streets, no heaps of unsanitary dwellings, no spots where people live without light, fresh air, and sunshine, no physical degenera tion, no Hooligans, no tramps, no idlers, no trained monkey nor horseback dinners, no life insurance scandals, no tax-dodging corporations, no boodling, no free-pass bribery, no watered stock, no fraudulent bonds, no rebates, no discriminations, no railroad combinations, no private graft for railroad presidents and man agers, no refrigerator car swindles, no immunity baths, no Beef Trusts, no pirate crews, no Morgans, no Rockefellers, no Armours, no smug Cassatts and Depews, no "Systems," and no government afraid to enforce the law upon the rich and the powerful.

In New Zealand slum conditions are so utterly unknown that the death-rate is the smallest among all the nations; the cause of the Common Good has been carried so far that the distribution of wealth is the most even and the average state of the inhabitants the best.

In New Zealand is no evidence anywhere that some men are gathering too much of the fruits of the earth while others can win too little.

In New Zealand, therefore, most of the questions we began by asking seem to have been answered; and judging by results, not by theories, here is the utmost present achievement of modern constructiv statesmanship.

Yet it was not always so. Sixteen years ago New Zealand was striding manfully along the old path with the rest of us, ready to create paupers and starve them, ready to create millionaires and adore them, doing the things that generate misery, privation, riots, and splendor in the approved fashion of our own wisdom, following faithfully England's way to the same pit of horrors. Sixteen years ago nothing indicated that New Zealand would not have as many strikes, riots, slums, paupers, idiots, deformed children, starving men and women, teeming subcellars, hideous diseases, trusts, millionaires tenements, and palaces as the remainder of the civilized circuit has. Few of the young countries gave a more reasonable promise of a harvest, in the fullness of time, of all the sweet fruits of our own precious methods. Yet the promise has been brought to naught, the most hostile critics admit that it has been brought to naught, and nothing observable in the present world outlook ought to equal in interest for the rest of us the story of the saving of that one brand from the burning.

*

The men that thus came to power were not like men that had ever ruled in any English colony in the world. They were not of that governing class that has so long dominated England; they were not even educated men in the narrow sense of the scholiast. As a rule, they had earned their bread with the toil of their hands; they had known what labor means, the sweet and the sour of it. They were of the men that think while they push the plane and read while other men sleep; working men like that broad-faced, big-hearted Alexander McLeod that blessed Woolwich with co operation, thoughtful men like the Rochdale Pioneers. Out of their reading and thinking they had evolved a certain creed, and gradually they began to put it to the practical test of experience. To them it seemed clear that modern conditions and developments had made useless the old ideals of government. To open the door to the unrestrained operations of capital was merely to make certain that in a few years a few men would usurp the means of life and the majority would be in want; and wherever this happened the power of accumulated wealth practically abolisht free government. They concluded from their reading that in reality the struggle against the forces that oppress mankind was not ended, but only begun, when the claws of monarchy were clipt. Monarchy seemed to them only one form and one name of a power that around the world operated to keep down the many and to elevate the few, a power no less activ because it was subtle. They believed that the first question worth considering was whether capital and the money mania were to be allowed to enslave the majority of the race, and they felt certain that mankind could not follow far its present road without reverting to purely medieval conditions It did not seem to them that these tendencies are necessary. They did not quite believe in the gospel of palaces and slums, surfeit and starvation, too much and too little. The notion that three-fourths of humanity must live in want and misery and onetenth of it dwell in atrophying luxury seemed to them monstrous. They did not admit that because a condition has existed for centuries it is necessarily sacred or of divine origin or incapable of improvement. They thought it might be possible to erect in one corner of the earth a country where the fortunate should not prey upon the unfortunate, nor absorb the public resources; where slums need not flourish, labor need not be a badge of disgrace, the public service need not be corrupted, and life might be decent and clean and safe.

To them it seemed that the kind of government that would bring about better conditions would reverse immemorial custom and

be esse

give more of its attention to the poor, the obscure, and the unfortunate than it gave to the eminent and the rich. They thought it was of more practical importance to the race to prevent epidemics and to alleviate misery than to adorn society or to collect campaign subscriptions, and they resolved that when the government of New Zealand should pass into their hands they would see if they could not do something to obliterate poverty and restrain the predations of wealth. To this task they went without the assistance of the blessed science of political economy, but they had something that seems almost as good. They had plain common sense, high courage, and sincerity of purpose.

Many of the ideas that they have since put into practise were very vague with them when they began; but one thing seemed clear enuf. They believed that most of the evils of the world resulted from the uneven distribution of wealth, and that they ought to do something to help the men that were getting too little to get more. A primitiv way to help was to keep them in good physical condition; so the campaign of the new government opened with bills to improve health. Wherever two or more persons were employed, was the sweeping declaration of these measures, there must be adequate light, fresh air, approved sanitation, and ample fire escapes. If meals were eaten upon the premises employers must provide dining rooms with tables, chairs, and facilities for heating water, so that there should be no more eating of cold luncheons from tin buckets, while seated upon workbenches. Inspectors were provided to see that these regulations were strictly enforced, and heavy penalties were laid upon employers that neglected them. Working men were protected in other ways For the first time in New Zealand they were allowed to file mechanics' liens upon an owner's property in default of payment by a contractor, and the laws about employers' liability for accidents were amended so as to give an injured workman a chance to recover damages. Previously such laws had been devised, as they generally are with us, to enable the employer to dodge his responsibility.

All these changes merely paved the way to greater matters. The new government next took in hand the crying evil known to us as the "Company Store," and abolisht it. Did you ever consider the company store? It is a beautiful thing for highway robbery, safe, efficient, and immensely profitable. A good reliable company store is better any day than a sand-bag or brass knuckles-never leaves a mark and the police don't bother about it. Once New Zealand had many company stores, and, as with us, one of their sweet results had been that some of the families enslaved to these delectable institutions never saw any money from one year's end to another's. They were continually in debt at the company store; whatever they needed they must get from the company store; the only inheritance they could leave to their children was this lifelong and hopeless account at the company store. Even when the purchases were made at reasonably fair prices the thing was a swindle. The employer owned the store. He therefore in effect paid the men in goods at retail prices that he had bought at wholesale prices. But the cases where the prices were reasonable were few, and where the employer made diligent use of his opportunity the game was burglary. Some years ago, when I was investigating the anthracite coal mines of Pennsylvania, I found that the run of prices at the company stores averaged thirty percent higher than they should have been, and the miners were compelled to buy at those prices or be discharged. At the same time the law of the State absolutely prohibited company stores, and almost every coal-mine had one. Well? What would you expect? It was Pennsylvania, you know, and names were so easy!

In New Zealand when they pluck up an old villainy they fetch away roots and all. They didn't namby-pamby with negligible laws prohibiting company stores, but made company stores impossible by providing that all wages must be paid in cash, and nothing but cash, and without deductions for indebtedness. Thus, if a workman's wages were $30 a month and he owed $16, it was not possible to give him $14 and a receipt for the amount he owed. He must be paid in full $30, even if he returned $16 of it the next moment. Also, wages must be paid within twenty-four hours of a demand for them, and wages of less than $10 a week were exempt from attachment from any source, a provision that practically abolisht the loan shark.

Upon these changes as seeming to indicate a sentimental philanthropy, the conservativ element looked with mild disfavor; but when the reformers undertook to carry out their ideas of the distribution of wealth by a radical and unprecedented interference with private affairs, there was a howl of dismay and a reasonable protest. Political economy says you must not attempt to regufate the number of hours that a man may work. It cites instances where governments have tried to do this and have failed, and it demonstrates clearly that these matters must be left to the mutual consent of employer and employed. Moreover, there is the terrible freedom of contract; any attempt to limit the working day is a violation of that holy of holies; no less a body than the Supreme Court of the United States has said so and sternly rebuked audacious heretics that thought otherwise. But the New Zealanders had another kind of a Supreme Court, and they said that if freedom of contract compelled men to work too long hours for too little pay, then it would be better for the poor blind world to try to stumble along bereft of the precious boon of that freedom. So they broke into the shrine and rioted about in it in the most shocking manner. They passed a law so emphatically constituting eight hours and no more a day's work in all industries that neither ingenuity nor hardihood could evade it. Some exceptions were made in the necessary cases of men engaged in emergency

work, as sometimes in the railroad train service, and salesmen and saleswomen were specially provided for in another act; but for all other workers eight hours became the working day. For all labor in excess of eight hours and for all labor on holidays, workers must be paid at the rate of one and a half times their usual compensation. All employers were obliged to keep records of all overtime work, the names of the men so employed, overtime they worked, their regular wage rate, the amounts paid to them for overtime; and copies of all these records must be filed with the colonial department of labor.

the

In all trades, industries, and businesses, a weekly half holiday was decreed for the round year. Choice of the day was made locally optional, but in each of the labor districts into which the colony had been divided all stores, shops, and factories must close for one day in the week at one o'clock and not be open until the next morning. For retail stores the length of the day was fixed at nine hours including an hour for luncheon for each employee. All overtime and holiday work in all stores, retail and wholesale, was ordered to be paid for at one and one-half times the regular scale.

All employed women and children were placed under strict legal protection. No child could be employed anywhere in any way at an earlier age than fourteen years. From fourteen to eighteen years all employed persons must be provided with a certifi cate of age and of having passed the fourth standard examination in the public schools. And here was something else to make our eyes bulge. No woman of any age and no boy between fourteen and eighteen years of age could work overtime in their employment except on twenty-eight days in the year and then for not more than three hours in each of the twenty-eight days. In order to obtain even this overtime the employer must on each occasion file at the nearest office of the labor department an application and secure a permit. The application must state the name and age of each person of whom overtime work was desired and the amount of overtime expected. These names were ordered to be kept on file in the labor offices. Before the permit could be issued the records must be examined. If any person in the submitted list had within twelve months worked overtime on twentyeight occasions the application for that person must be rejected. And for all the overtime work allowed the employer must pay a price and a half.

In our own happy land, where the freedom of contract is inviolable, we proceed in quite a different way. Imagine the salesgirls in a great department store restricted by law to three hours' daily overtime in the Christmas season, paid for that at one and a half times their regular wage, and provided with supper money or car fare to go home! But in the New Zealand stores you do not see those pale, thin, exhausted young women, struggling on with overtaxed frames and weary feet, that brighten for us the merry Yule-tide.

One morning when I was in the Pennsylvania anthracite region arose early to see the men (and others) go into the mines. It was a great sight because there were about fifty boys whose employment was a crime against humanity and the state law, and sowed the certain seeds of disease, ignorance, vice, and misery for all society to reap. I saw one man trudging off to labor with his three children. One walkt on each side grasping his father's hand, and the third, being too little to walk at the required pace, was astride the father's neck. The oldest of these boys was eleven and the youngest seven. I was told that the two elder boys drove mules in the mines. And the boy astride his father's neck? Oh, he pickt slate.

You shall see no such sight as that in New Zealand, glory be. "In music," said Schumann, "nothing is wrong that sounds right." The advance movement in New Zealand has been founded upon a similarly revolutionary doctrin. To the plain men that now controlled affairs nothing in legislation was bad if it furthered the welfare, health, liberty, happiness, or opportunities of the masses of the people. While they were radically changing conditions for the workingmen they were also busily knocking to pieces a land system that had all the bulwarks of old custom and all the sanctity of formula.

*

They did more than this, for they have never rested with any achievement, nor thought it represented the ultimate state of man. They lifted the 'blight of the mortgages. How? In the most radical, direct, and scientific way imaginable. The colony pledged its credit, issued obligations, borrowed upon them $7,500,000, and lent the sum at 4 percent to distrest farmers, taking security on the farmers' lands. This, too, was in total violation of the laws of political economy in such cases made and provided; but it cured the mortgage evil, which was probably more important. Relieved of the old deadly burden of extortionate interest, the small farmers of New Zealand began to prosper. They have prospered ever since. So far the government has lent to the farmers about $20,000,000, but it has saved them $40,000,000 in interest, because as soon as it came into the field with its cheap loans, interest rates dropt everywhere. You see Shylock has filed from these shores and will not return. The government has never lost a cent in these loans. Reform proceeded next, with a land tax graduated to an ascending scale, to discourage land-grabbing and land speculation, so that the more land a man owns the higher is the tax rate upon it. Thus for farms of ordinary size the rate is two cents in every $5 of assessed valuation; but on estates of more than $25,000 the rate increases in regular ratio to the maximum of six cents for every $5.

Except for absentee owners. They must pay 50 percent more than residents. You can see that in New Zealand the chance for fine old families and landed gentry is slim.

No doubt the theory of these things is extremely reprehensible, but the practise is excellent. What with seizing the big estates and what with the graduated land tax the size of holdings has been so reduced that of 115,713 landowners in 1905 only 22,778 came under the operations of the augmented land tax. The others, having small properties, paid the smallest rate. Under the land purchase act the government has seized 691,594 acres, mostly hunting fields and uncultivated family inheritances. These have been partitioned into small farms and are occupied by actual settlers. der the operation of all the new land laws together, the produce of New Zealand has trebled and the New Zealand farmer has be come the most prosperous in the world.

Un

There is another chapter in this story, which I add both because it has a certain grim touch of humor and because it contrasts so sharply with our own ways. We suffer so much from the performances of the tax dodger that certainly every state, and I suppose every community, could increase its revenue at least threefold if the taxes were honestly levied and paid. Once they had tax dodgers in New Zealand, but they have them no more. The reformers got rid of them by enacting a law that the government could buy any property at the value the owner placed upon it for taxation purposes. That is to say, if a gentleman declaimed that the assessors had done him infamous wrong, and that the estate they had valued at $100,000 was not worth more than $80,000, the government could draw a check for $80,000, and the gentleman was obliged to accept it. When this law had been sprung three or four times tax-dodging ceast to be an attractiv amusement, gentlemen no longer complained of their assessments, and the revenues underwent a notable increase.

Do but imagin to yourself what would happen in Chicago, let us say, if the government had the right to purchase at the owners' valuation certain rich railroad, brewery, and other corporation properties, that now bear one-tenth of their proper tax burdens. Think of it! Chicago would find herself with enuf revenue to have a police force and keep her citizens from being sandbagged and murdered. And what a change that would be!

It will pay you to get the magazine and read the entire article. If the above small type is too small for your eyes, get a younger person to read it to you. It will be a good thing for the younger person as well as yourself.

A Prediction.

I am writing this on election day, Nov. 6. While the battle of the ballots is going on, and the result as yet undetermined, let me make this prediction: The awakening of the country during the past two years will not stop. There may be a set-back here and there, but it will be only local and temporary. A new spirit pervades us, and it will urge us on to new and better achievements. We see a new goal, and we will not stop until we reach it. The Dollar will tempt us less than formerly, and Humanity and the Country's Good will be the objects of our endeavors more than ever before. The millionaire will not have so easy a time as heretofore. His lot will scarcely be envied, for he will be expected to do according to his ability; it will become more and more difficult for him to dodge just taxes while he lives, and when he dies his estate will be taxt for the benefit of the government and the people. The specially privileged classes will be shorn of their privileges, and the rest of the people will have a chance. We will do substantially what New Zealand has done, but we will not do it in the same way, because of the differences in conditions. We will make and execute laws to suit our conditions and needs, just as New Zealand did. We should study New Zealand's achievements, not with the expectation of copying, but in order to get a wholesome lesson in real democracy, and thus approach our own problems with all the light that New Zealand's experience can shed upon them.

When a disease is treated in any part of the world more successfully than has ever been known before, the doctors in other parts of the world will not rest until they have learned the new lesson and applied it in their own country. So with social experiments and political cures. They cannot be fenced in. The news of them will spread, and their benefits will be carried to wherever there is sufficient intelligence and courage to apply them. We have been too slow in learning our lesson from New Zealand, but our very deliberation will make the application of the remedies all the more thoro when we really get at it-and we are getting at it. The readers of THE MEDICAL WORLD have had a special advantage in this. At great expense and labor I caused to be produced primarily for

them a magnificent presentation of this political experiment ("The Story of New Zealand"), like a clinic showing a new treatment of disease and its results. Later, for the convenience and economy of my readers, I condenst the story ("Politics in New Zealand"). Now our country is going to march right along in the path of democracy and progress until possibly more brilliant results are achieved than have percht upon the proud banners of New Zealand. The leaven is working; a brighter day is breaking; the forces are beginning to move, and nothing can stop them. Let us make no mistake. Every voter, and particularly every man with influence in his community, should study the problems, so as to be able to aid in their proper solution. Do it now. Don't be caught unprepared, for the problems are coming your way; you must study and think for yourself, and perhaps for your community.

Election Results.

Well, the elections are over, and there are many disappointed hearts-there always are. I was disappointed in many particulars, but I am not discouraged; for I can see much encouragement_in the results. And, remember, the object of these "Talks" is not to carry elections, but to carry pregnant truths to thinking doctors of every party and political affiliation. The defeat of any party at any particular time is of little importance compared to the instilling of progressiv ideas into the ranks of every political party. In this state, Stuart, candidate of the organization republicans ("the gang," as they are popularly called here), defeated Emery, independent republican and fusion, for governor; but by a majority reduced by 80 percent compared with the Roosevelt majority of two years ago. The good side is that Stuart is an exceptionally clean and high grade man-the gang had to select that kind of a man in order to have any hope of winning-and he made numerous pledges during the campaign to favor many progressiv measures that the people want. A regrettable feature is that Roosevelt, that curious mixture of partizan and patriot, sent members of his cabinet into the state to stump for the republican party. I need not discuss the partizan results in other states. Suffice it to say that, as a rule, the bosses and corporationists are rapidly disappearing from official power, either in nominating conventions or at the polls. Hughes, republican, defeated Hearst, democrat, in New York for governor; but Hughes made his reputation last winter by conducting the remarkable insurance investigations. If he will put other offending corporations similarly on the rack, he will do all that the most ardent democrat could wish. The republican party is not going to allow the democrats to have all the glory of bringing corporations to justice. Witness the present vigorous and earnest move against the Standard Oil Co. by the Administration. True, the republican party should have done that years ago. Now that further delay would seriously threaten its supremacy, the President, a far-seeing political leader, pushes the prosecution, and his party will get the credit for it; just as the popularity of himself and party was and will be enhanced among the masses, by the rate bill (last winter), and by other democratic measures that are on the President's program. Taking the wind out of an opponent's sails by stealing his issues is an old political game. The political history of this country and England is full of it. But what do we, the people, care, just so we get what we want?

After years of toadying to the railroads in this state by the republican party, and while the present governor and the governor-elect are republicans, and both branches of the legislature strongly republican, it is announced that the fight for 2 cent fare on railroads, and a trolley freight law, are virtually won. The State Board of Trade succeeded in pledging most of the candidates for these bills, and they will be pusht to accomplishment. The railroad opposition has thus far been in vain (they can't bribe with passes as they did before the rate law), but they can be expected to work hard against these bills until the end. Bills limiting the passenger rate to two cents per mile will be introduced, and probably passed, in at least five other states: Indiana, Illinois, Iowa, Missouri, and Wisconsin.

This is progress. Michigan, Ohio, and New York already have this kind of a law, and it has been abundantly proved that the railroads can thrive at this rate. So don't be a pessimist. Things are moving our (the people's) way. But on the other hand, don't fold your hands and go to sleep. These things were not won by drones. All things come to those who work for them. Work in your own party for the people's interests if there is any hope. If there is no hope in your own party, pull out (even tho it be your dad's party), and join a party nearer the people's interests.

Don't let anybody discourage you with dark and gloomy forebodings. Our country is getting better, the world is getting better-humanity is getting better. During the past ten or twelve years I have frequently heard predictions of revolutions-bloody ones, in the not distant future; and I have heard these sometimes from able men of good education and' sound judgment. But I have always scouted and discouraged such ideas, and redoubled my efforts toward economic and sociologic education of the people, which always leads to the amelioration of wrongs and abuses, pointing always to New Zealand as giving an example of the best kind of a revolution. Recently, Rev. Charles H. Parkhurst, of New York City, predicted a revolution in the following words. Speaking of Mr. Bryan's ideas concerning Government ownership of railroads, he said:

"We are bound to have a revolution, altho not a bloody one. I expect the principles underlying it will come to their expression in 1908, and, if not successful in that campaign, will again be fought on in 1912, and win. Whether along Bryan's lines, no one but God knows; but there is to be a recognition of the present mass of the working people, if not of the principle Bryan represents, at least akin thereto, which shall shift the burden of public administration from the shoulders of the more wealthy to those of the less wealthy. This will afford to the less wealthy a larger share in the determination of public policy."

This is the right kind of a revolution, and a safe and intelligent prediction. This is exactly what New Zealand has done.

Pushing the Referendum.

A very effectiv way to get political results is to question candidates before election and put them on record. That is one of New Zealand's methods. In this connection, the following newspaper clipping will be of interest:

THEIR STAND ON REFERENDUM. PENNSYLVANIA CONGRESSIONAL CANDIDATES ON RECORD EVENLY DIVIDED.

WASHINGTON, Oct. 5.-The National Federation for People's Rule, which has been interrogating the congressional candidates of all parties in their attitude toward the referendum, which the federation is endeavoring to make a national issue, has received replies from the opposing candidates in five Pennsylvania districts.

All of the demo ratic candidates are for a direct-vote system for national issues and all the republicans are opposed. The following are the names and districts.

[blocks in formation]

endum are certainly steps in the right direction toward giving the people a more direct and controlling voice in national legislation. This principle I would advocate and would lend my influence and my vote to re-establish,

Whenever the will of my constituents is made known to me thru any present constitutional means, or thru any other recog nized medium of registering their will respecting national legislation, I shall cheerfully obey their instructions.'

Is this an index as to how the two parties stand on the question? If so, it shows which party is nearest the people and the interests of the people. But when the democrats and various kinds of "reformers" and "cranks" educate the people concerning the referendum and its value to them, creating a popular demand for it, look out for the republicans scooping it, claiming it as their own, adopting it, and claiming all the credit. Well, it is a matter of little importance who gets the credit, just so we get the Referendum. Organized Labor in Politics.

The election just past is the first general election in this country in which organized labor took an activ and avowed part. The results are commonly thought to be disappointing; but remember that this was just a beginning. In England, organized labor workt long and hard in politics with meager results; but in their last general election 51 "Laborites" were elected to Parliament, and one (John Burns) is in the cabinet. Labor is going. to make itself felt, politically, in this country, also, in spite of the apparently discouraging results of the election just past. However, a notable labor victory was won in Penna., apparently the only one of importance in the country (unless the socialist candidate in the stock yards district of Chicago was elected of this I am not entirely certain at this writing). The following tells the story of the labor victory above referred to:

WASHINGTON, Nov. 8.-Completed returns of the Congressional elections added a surprise today when it developed that Representative Mial E. Lilley, of the Fourteenth District of Pennsylvania, had been defeated by George W. Kipp, democrat and Lincoln republican, by 738 majority. The Pennsylvania delegation now stands: Twenty five republicans and seven democrats, a gain of six for the democrats.

The defeat of Mr. Lilley is a further demonstration of the power of the labor vote in the state when it can be rallied to a single standard. He had been blacklisted by President Gompers, of the American Federation of Labor, and the miners of Bradford, Susquehanna, Wayne, and Wyoming counties were called on to defeat him. The result is the overturning of a republican majority of nearly 7000 in 1904 and the election of the candidate supported by the labor organizations, who is a wealthy business

man.

John Brown was hung; but "his soul went marching on." Labor is very much alive; and its body as well as its soul will go "marching on" until it be comes an important factor in determining our public policies. The shortening of the hours of labor, and the laws restricting woman labor and child labor, have been secured chiefly by the efforts of labor organizations. There is much yet to be done on these lines, and labor will continue its efforts, along with others of our people who are awakening to the great importance of these subjects. There is talk of the Federation of Labor putting out a platform as its next political move. I predict that it will consist of principles and issues worthy of the support of all good citizens.

Word comes from France that workingmen's pensions and a progressiv income tax are on the program. Thus democracy progresses. Tax the incomes of the rich to pay a pension to the worthy workingman in his declining years. Disabled soldiers get pensions for military service; why should not disabled and superannuated workingmen get pensions for industrial ser vice? New Zealand is more proud of its old-age pension system than of any other one of its progressiv measures. It demonstrates that the nation has a heart as well as a head.

A Suggestiv Idea.

You don't have to own a paper in order to give expression and circulation to your ideas-if you have ideas worth circulating. W. V. Marshall, of Berlin, Pa. (he may be a carpenter or blacksmith for all I know), has an idea concerning the graduated taxation

« ForrigeFortsett »