We have been accustomed to call this great document a “Declaration of Independence,” but it should more properly be called a “Declaration of Rights” because “Independence,” or self-government, is only one of the several “unalienable” rights declared in this great charter. It is in fact our great “Bill of Rights,” being our first Charter and Declaration of those essential, natural, inherent and ineffaceable rights of mankind, which all governments must respect, defend and enforce, and which cannot be ignored or invaded by any authority, organization or government whatever. It is indeed our American “Magna Charta” of fundamental rights and our first or Pre-Constitution preceding our formal Constitution, and, of course, equal to it as a basis for all law and government, and particularly expressing what may be termed our Pre-Constitutional Rights—that is, those rights which always existed by “Natural” and “Divine” endowment before any human laws, charters or constitutions were ever written; and it, of course, antedates, and therefore takes precedence even over our State and National laws and Constitutions, which, to be valid, must be based on the fundamental principles of inherent human and natural rights which are naturally and divinely and equally conferred upon all mankind. It must be remembered at this point that the official title of this great document is “The Unanimous Declaration of the Thirteen United States of America,” which shows that it is the official statement or code of the foundation governing principles of the New Nation issued by its first Congress and has, therefore, the full effect of a “Constitution,” “Pre-Constitution” or “Bill of Rights.”

THE CODE AND BASIS OF AMERICANISM

This great primary Code of Rights, which is adapted for the just and beneficent rule of mankind in all their relations, has not been half well enough understood or appreciated by our American people heretofore, and it has been usually looked upon as chiefly a political document, whereas, it is essentially much more than that, being in fact a great code of basic ethics and civic religion, in addition to a code of democratic government, with a wide scope and character, which fits it equally to individual, national, or international relations; and this makes it truly our American Bible and Creed and our basis for a great American and Universal “Religion” both ethical and political, which can and should be now adopted by the “League of Nations” as a standard code or basis for the moral and political government of mankind the world over, and should be taught in all our schools as the basis of Americanism.

It is time, therefore, that Americans clearly understood and appreciated the full ethical, legal and political scope and sense of this wonderful code of one paragraph, and it is time also that this great and simple Code of Essential Americanism was plainly emblazoned on our public walls, spaces and monuments like the inscription “Holiness to the Lord” displayed on the forefront of the high priests, as directed in Exodus, Chapter 28, so that all our people can get fully acquainted and inspired with the broad and simple principles of Right and Justice in this sublime Code of Americanism.

This great paragraph of basic Americanism should, therefore, be conspicuously posted on every public building, school, and church in the land, over the Judge’s bench in every Court, over the rostrum in every Legislature and over the desk of every public officer, and particularly over the desk of every public doctor, Medical Board and Board of Health in the land, which have been heretofore some of the worst violators of this code of unalienable human rights in their various barbarous practices of medical domination, dictation and compulsion, and forced infliction of disease.

Now I do not intend, in this article, to show just how the Declaration of Independence can be seriously considered as a clear and sure basis for rational ethics and civic religion for the legal and moral government of mankind, in all relations, having reserved that important subject for full treatment in a separate article, but I do intend to show here how the evil of compulsory vaccination and all other forms of compulsory medicine are gross violations of the Declaration and its principles of basic Americanism and inherent human rights so clearly defined therein.

THE FIVE ARTICLES OF THE DECLARATION OF RIGHTS, JULY 4, 1776

Let us now take up the first article of the Declaration—“All men are created equal”—and see what it means, and what it does not mean. It surely does not mean that all men are created equal in worldly possessions or natural advantages, in physical strength, personal beauty, moral sense or mental power, as it is notorious that mankind differ unavoidably and universally in all these conditions. But it clearly does mean that all men are created equal in a moral, legal and governmental sense, equal as members of society or citizens of the State, no matter how much they may differ in inherent or acquired advantages. It means that one man shall count no more than any other man before the law or in the State by reason of worldly possessions or personal advantages, but that each man shall count alike and equal, no matter how rich or poor, strong or weak, smart or dull, handsome or plain he may be. It means also that the “Creator” has not arbitrarily picked out any particular person, group, family, or race, as His special favorites, to rule or lord it over any other person or mass of persons; and, particularly, that the Creator has not specially “ordained” any favorite person to rule over any part of mankind without their selection and consent. It does mean that the Creator has no “favorites,” but that all men are “equal” before Him, and, hence, that barbarous and oppressive fallacy of “Divine-Right-Monarchism” is emphatically repudiated in this first Article. It means that all “one-man-rule” or “one-race-rule,” and all vile Germanism of the “Gott-Mit-Uns” or “Germans-Over-All” type, is flatly condemned. But, per contra, this Article does plainly mean that the Creator has divinely ordained each and every human individual to be an equal “sovereign” in his own right and that all government depends on the selection and consent of these individual and equal sovereigns who are “endowed” with the “divine right” of collectively forming their own government and selecting their own rulers, instead of having a rule and a ruler forced on them by alleged “divine” command, and without their selection or consent. In other words, this Article obviously means, pure and simple, “government of the people, by the people, for the people.”

Now if each individual American is divinely ordained as an equalized sovereign in his own right—and this is surely a grand distinction of the American Institution and the American citizen—he obviously has a sovereign right to his own body and all his natural possessions; and the most sacred and essential of these rights and possessions is, obviously, the right to his own physical body, the sanctity of his own person, and the right to decide how it shall be treated or taken care of in health or disease; and if he has not this sacred and sovereign right to his own body he has practically no right at all and might as well be wiped out and would be better dead. Therefore, if any doctor or other person claims the right to possess the body of any man, to experiment or operate upon it, to medicate, cut, inoculate, or treat his body as he might see fit, without the free choice, consent or approval of that man, it is obvious that the man is no longer a sovereign or the owner of his own body, but is a mere “slave” or domestic animal and that the doctor really owns his body and is his “master” as much as if he were a pig or dog; so that, therefore, all “equality” and “sovereignty” of the individual is destroyed by this medical “hoggery” and we have not a “government of the people, by the people, for the people,” but a government of the doctors, by the doctors, for the doctors,—which in fact we now have to a very dangerous extent. And, indeed, medical organization, compulsion, dictation and domination have now got to such a stage that it is one of the most dangerous powers in our body politic and must be curbed, as I will show later on.

It therefore follows that all compulsory or dictatorial medicine is an absolute violation of the first or basic principle of Americanism as expressed in our great Declaration of Rights, and our first or Pre-Constitution, and therefore must be abolished if we would be true to basic human right and fundamental American principles.

We will now take up the second Article of the Declaration and study its meaning. This Article, with a slight variation of the official words, is as follows:

Now the great keynote-words in this clause, “unalienable rights,” mean “inseparable rights,” rights which the citizen cannot be separated from, rights which cannot be removed or taken away from the people or denied or invaded by any government or power whatever, but which all governments must respect and defend.

This second article from the Declaration of Rights is, I think, the wisest, most important and significant statement in a political, legal and moral sense that was ever written by human hand or human mind, because it is the essence of the essential paragraph of the Declaration and clearly expresses the basis of Democratic Government, Rational Ethics, and Civic Religion, in one simple clause or sentence! This basis is simply the inherent and “unalienable” rights of our fellow men necessary for human life, liberty and happiness, which are naturally or divinely conferred upon all men, equally, and cannot be ignored or violated by individuals or governments. And it is obvious that the honest and general recognition of these rights will at once establish true justice and righteousness among men and nations, and the disregard and violation of these rights is now, and ever has been, the cause of all wrongdoing, war, and other evils between men and nations the world over.

This simple and potent statement of basic human rights is therefore equal in ethical and legal force to the bulk of the Decalogue itself and to the Golden Rule of Humanity, Honesty and Justice in its three best versions from the world’s greatest moral teachers, Confucius, Plato and Christ; so that in this simple sentence from the essential paragraph of our first great national document we have a code of Democratic Government and of Human Ethics in one sentence, which, as before suggested, should be taught in all our schools as the basis of Americanism.

THE GOLDEN RULE AND THE DECLARATION OF RIGHTS COMPARED

It may be worth while to consider here for a moment what is perhaps the best version of the “Golden Rule,” viz., the version of Plato in Plato’s Laws, Book XI, Prof. Jowett’s translation, which is in these words, dated about 360 B.C.:

This is surely a most righteous ethical code, clear, broad and simple, and in moral and logical effect it is nearer like our American Declaration of Rights than any other formula, particularly as regards the recognition of the sacred personal rights of the individual which is equivalent to the principle of “unalienable rights” in the Declaration. The phrase, “Thou shalt not touch that which is mine or remove the least thing which belongs to me without my consent,” is certainly a most righteous rule of human honesty, sanctity, justice and security which surely condemns everything like compulsory medicine which touches and violates the body with inflicted disease, without consent of the patient, and removes and destroys the most sacred possession of the individual, viz., bodily sanctity, health and life.

UNALIENABLE RIGHTS ANALYZED AND DEFINED

It will be noted that the significant words of the second article of the Declaration state that “all men” are endowed by their Creator with “certain” “unalienable rights,” among which are “life,” “liberty” and the “pursuit of happiness.” By the word “certain” is, therefore, clearly meant various, many or several rights, most of which are left unspecified or not categorically stated except where it refers to the chief or general rights of “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” And it is obvious that by these expressions are clearly meant all essential natural or “unalienable” rights which are necessary to life, safety, liberty and happiness of the individual and which do not interfere with, invade or endanger the life, liberty or happiness of any other individual. The right to “life” of course stands first, and is stated first, because without life we have nothing; and the right to “liberty” is stated second, because without reasonable liberty life itself would be useless, and without ample liberty to pursue our ideas of happiness in our own ways, without infringing on the liberty or happiness of others, the right to nominal liberty might itself be useless and meaningless.

Let me now remind you, Mr. President, at this point, that all the reform we ask for in this whole matter is the very important and essential right of Medical Freedom, viz., the free right of every person to accept or reject any medical operation whatever as the citizen or patient sees fit, which is obviously an “unalienable right,” and, as I will soon show, is as clearly covered in the Constitution by direct implication as the right to religious freedom is covered by specific guarantee. And of the two it is obvious that the right to medical freedom is even more important than the right to religious freedom, and that medical compulsion is to-day a far more dangerous evil than religious compulsion ever was.

Medical compulsion is therefore not only immoral, illegal and unconstitutional, but is also contrary to all true medical ethics, which call for the absolute medical freedom and right of the patient to decide what operation is or is not to be performed on his own body and blood; and, if any doctor, or any government behind the doctor, has any sovereign right whatever to force any medication or operation on any patient, however humble, against his will, consent or desire, will some one please tell us where the doctor, or the government, got this right morally, medically or legally?

ALL POWER COMES FROM THE PEOPLE TO THE GOVERNMENT—NOT VICE VERSA

Every true American and Democrat knows, that according to our immortal Declaration of Rights and our great Constitution our Government has no rights or powers whatever except what the People have given to it and that the source of all power is in the People and comes from the People to the Government, and not vice versa, as in the Monarchic systems which we have been fighting in the Great War. Under our democratic system, government does not give any rights to the people, as in monarchic systems, but the people are endowed originally and inherently with all necessary or unalienable rights for life, liberty and happiness, and their government exists simply or chiefly for the purpose of protecting and enforcing these rights, not for granting or denying rights which exist unalienably in the people themselves.

It will therefore be found that our wonderful Constitution, as well as the Declaration, covers these fundamental points most distinctly as to inherent, unalienable rights retained by and dwelling in the people, where it states in Articles IX and X as follows:

Here we plainly see that the Constitution, as well as the Declaration which preceded it, show that the People have a whole series of “certain” “unalienable” “reserved” and “retained” rights, and that these several rights, both specified and unspecified, are divinely conferred and naturally inherent and cannot be invaded or taken away by any government, but must be respected, defended and enforced by all governments, and that governments exist for the chief purpose of defending and enforcing these rights.

Now we might ask just here: Where and when have the People ever given up their most sacred, obvious and essential right to their choice of medical treatment and to the freedom and sanctity of their own bodies and abandoned their bodies to the doctors to seize when they see fit to inject with disease as in vaccination, to experiment on as they might wish or to operate or medicate as they might choose, without any regard to the free will, consent or desire of the patient?

As government therefore derives its “just powers” only from the “consent of the governed,” so it is obvious that doctors can derive their “just powers” to operate only from the consent of the patient; and surely the unanswerable question in the preceding paragraph shows clearly the utter barbarity and illegality of all medical compulsion not only in a basic moral, constitutional and legal sense but also from the basis of true medical ethics, which surely no true medical doctor can attempt to deny for one moment.

MEDICAL FREEDOM AN UNALIENABLE RIGHT

In conclusion, it therefore follows that the right to Medical Freedom is the clearest and most essential of the “unalienable” “retained” and “reserved” rights possessed by the People under the Declaration and the Constitution; and as these rights cannot be legally invaded or denied by any Government, it follows, therefore, that all compulsory vaccination is clearly un-American, illegal, unconstitutional, and medically barbarous and unworthy of a place on any American, military, medical, or legislative Code, and should be absolutely abolished as fit only for some Code of Prussianism—from which, as before said, it has been, in fact, copied.

COMPULSORY VACCINATION CONDEMNED BY OUR COURTS AS UNCONSTITUTIONAL

In illustration of the principles stated in preceding paragraphs, I might here cite a few decisions from our higher courts showing the outrageous illegal and unconstitutional nature of all forcible or compulsory vaccination.

Judge Bartlett, of the New York Supreme Court, in the case of Walters in 1894, decided that:

Judge Gaynor, of the same Court, in the case of Smith against Health Commissioner Emery of Brooklyn in 1894, gave the following important decision which was afterwards fully sustained by the New York Court of Appeals:

Judge Woodward, of the New York Appellate Court, in the Viemeister case in 1903, declared that:

The Supreme Court of the State of Massachusetts, in the case of Jacobson in 1904, said:

Judge Fitts, of the Supreme Court in Columbia County, New York, in the case of Bollinger in February, 1909, charged the jury as follows:

At the second trial of this case in February, 1910, Judge LeBœuf charged the jury in these words:

THE SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES ON THE PREËMINENT RIGHTS OF THE INDIVIDUAL

In conclusion on this most vital point, let me call your special attention, Mr. President, to a most significant and important decision of the U. S. Supreme Court in the vaccination case of Jacobson v. Massachusetts, rendered in 1905, on appeal from the Supreme Court of Massachusetts. In this long and interesting decision, one of its most clear and conclusive paragraphs emphatically declares the preëminent rights of the individual in certain spheres, as follows:

Now, what is this “sphere” within which this highest court in our land tells us so clearly and emphatically that “the individual may assert the supremacy of his own will and rightfully dispute the authority of any human government, especially of any free government, existing under a written constitution, to interfere with the exercise of that will”?

The context both before and after this paragraph shows clearly that this “sphere” of individual right and freedom exists wherever any unalienable or inherent natural right secured by our constitution is invaded or violated, or where any act or practice forced upon the individual is potentially or actually dangerous to the health or life of that individual, such as I have shown every act of vaccination to be, in its very nature being an act of septicemic infection or blood poisoning pure and simple, which sometimes causes wide-spread epidemics and frequently causes serious injuries and many deaths, even more deaths than smallpox itself, as has been demonstrated beyond question.

Surely, therefore, there is no individual or personal right more inherent and natural and more sacred and obvious or more surely guaranteed in Declaration and Constitution than the right to medical freedom of the body, the right to health and life and the right of the individual to select and decide freely for himself the medical treatment of his own body, and the right to guard it against any medical treatment or operation which in his own judgment and conscience may be unnecessary or undesirable or may involve great risk or suffering to himself or may seriously endanger his health or life. This right is, I think, so obvious, so fundamental and necessary and so unquestionable under the letter and spirit of our basic laws and constitution, and by the decisions of our courts as well as by all common sense, logic and ethics, that I do not think another word of argument is necessary to establish this right in the conscientious conviction of every rational mind.

DECISION OF U. S. SUPREME COURT FURTHER ANALYZED

In further consideration of the meaning and significance of this important decision of the U. S. Supreme Court it may be now explained that the law of Massachusetts here considered was a Statute passed by the Legislature requiring the vaccination of all persons, child or adult, under penalty of fine of $5 for refusing vaccination. This law made an exception for children or minors in delicate health or such physical condition as would be injured by vaccination, but made no such exception for adults like the defendant Jacobson.

The Supreme Court of the State of Massachusetts in its decision, from which this appeal was taken, had already decided, as I have shown, that the State could not enforce actual compulsory vaccination upon any person, but could only enforce the fine of $5 if vaccination was not voluntarily adopted.

The U. S. Supreme Court concluded its decision in these words:

From this conclusion Justices Brewer and Peckham dissented, thus evidently holding that the law of Massachusetts, which inflicts a fine of $5 for refusing vaccination, was unconstitutional, whereas the majority of the Court seem to hold that this State law, which can enforce the fine but cannot compel the vaccination, was legal and constitutional, but that nevertheless this fine could not be enforced against any persons who could show that vaccination was dangerous to their health and life, and that the Courts would interfere to prevent its enforcement in all such cases and thus protect the constitutional rights of the individual within that “sphere” of preëminent individual right as already quoted.

Now it seems that the defendant Jacobson did not properly plead that vaccination was dangerous to health and life, in his own case, or offer to prove this, in his own case, and hence the decision was technically given against him, but really, in principle, for him; which decision, as we have shown, was rendered by a divided Court with two judges dissenting who evidently held that compulsory vaccination by fine, as called for in the law of Massachusetts, was unconstitutional.

We therefore believe that this decision, when properly applied, will invalidate all forms of coercive vaccination, whether by inflicted fine, or by denial of some civic right, such as public education, whenever the prosecuted case is properly tried on the correct legal pleas and issues and carried up through our highest Courts on the principles laid down in this great decision and outlined in this analysis.

UNALIENABLE RIGHTS OF THE INDIVIDUAL VERSUS RIGHTS OF MAJORITIES. FALSE IDEA OF THE SUPREMACY OF MAJORITIES SCORED

We often hear it stated that this is a government essentially of majorities and that any majority can legally and properly force its opinion or will upon any minority, no matter how objectionable to the minority this law or will of the majority might be; and that it is the clear right of the majority thus to oppress itself upon the minority and the loyal duty of the minority to yield to this oppression, however odious.

This rank idea of the supremacy of majorities is, I believe, a great legal and moral and cowardly mistake and a gross misconception of our Democratic American Government, because it entirely loses sight of the great basic principle of inherent and unalienable human rights which seems to have been first, or best, expressed in our immortal Declaration of Rights. Therefore, under this basic principle of “unalienable” right, no majorities, however powerful, can legally or morally invade or set aside any of the “unalienable” or inseparable rights of the People, as this is obviously the clear significance and meaning of the terms “unalienable rights,” as I have already shown. Hence this fundamental American principle of “unalienable rights” calls in trumpet tones from the lines of the Declaration and Constitution and gives this warning to all majorities, however powerful: “Thus far shalt thou go but no farther, and here must thy power be stayed”—that is, stayed at the approach to every sacred inherent and unalienable right of the individual necessary to the life, liberty, health and happiness of the individual.

We have often heard the phrase quoted, “This is a government of laws and not of men,” which is only another way of stating what I am here contending for, viz., that this Government of Americanism is not based essentially on mere numbers or majorities of “men,” but chiefly on naturally or divinely ordained principles or “laws” of eternal human right and justice, and, more particularly and essentially, on the great basic American law or principle of “Unalienable Rights” of the People, which is the great American “Sanctuary” of Liberty and Right that no majority or minority can invade or profane.

Majorities can, of course, properly prevail over minorities in all matters that are purely selective or elective or which can be determined only by preponderating vote, but cannot prevail over any defined or established inherent, unalienable or constitutional right of the individual, and it has often been well said that Constitutions are made especially to protect minorities, and not majorities, who already have the preponderant political and legislative power in their hands and do not need such protection.

MEDICAL FREEDOM AND ALIMENTARY FREEDOM ARE EQUALLY UNALIENABLE RIGHTS OF THE PEOPLE AND NECESSARY FOR HUMAN LIFE, LIBERTY AND HAPPINESS

We have already seen how compulsory medicine is a gross violation of the American principle of Unalienable Rights and need say nothing further on that point here; but, as the exposure and condemnation of one evil may show us the way to suppress another and similar evil, so it may be excusable for us to digress here for a moment from our main subject and call attention to the fact that the same moral, legal and logical principles against Compulsory Medicine apply equally to that latest dangerous invasion of the unalienable rights of the people involved in the extraordinary scheme of National Prohibition or Compulsory Abstinence in certain foods and drinks recently forced upon the people by what is alleged to be a majority of the voters of this country. Now, I do not believe that any majority of our voters have ever approved either compulsory medicine or compulsory abstinence, but, on the contrary, that these errors have been forced upon the people by audacious, well organized and arrogant minorities who have temporarily gotten control of political and legislative power and have deceived the public mind with the alleged necessity, utility and righteousness of these oppressive errors. But even if it can be shown that a majority of our voters approve either of these errors, such alleged majorities would be morally and legally unjustified in overriding any inherent right of the people under our basic American doctrine and law of Unalienable Rights.

I intend to treat, in a separate article, this important subject of Alimentary Freedom, in certain fermented foods and drinks, as an unalienable right of the people, established by world-wide and age-long usage and by the highest civic, moral, legal and religious sanctions, and need give no further attention to that special subject here.3

MEDICAL DESPOTISM WORSE THAN RELIGIOUS DESPOTISM. THE OLD RELIGIOUS HERESY, “LET US SIN THAT GRACE MAY ABOUND,” COMPARED WITH THE MODERN VACCINATION FANATICISM, “LET US FORCE AND SPREAD DISEASE UPON THE PEOPLE SO THAT HEALTH MAY ABOUND!”

In the past centuries, before our great American Institutions of Civil and Religious Liberty were established, it was the Doctors of Divinity who were wholly responsible for inventing and maintaining that great evil of Compulsory Religion, where one type of religion or one conception of Deity was forced on the whole population under penalty of torture, disfigurement, mutilation, or death; and these misguided men seem to have actually had the absurd and diabolical idea—incredible to us to-day—that by this mutilation and murder they could increase the sum total of morality in the whole community!

In a similar way, our modern doctors of medicine and our medical societies are wholly responsible for inventing and enforcing the horrible medical scheme of compulsory disease, and with a similar logic that, by thus forcing these vaccine operations and diseases on the whole population, they can greatly increase the sum total of health in the whole community!

This dogma of compulsory disease is, of course, just as false and evil as the dogma of compulsory religion; but, of the two evils, compulsory disease is far more dangerous to human right and safety, health and life, and it would probably not be difficult to prove that where one person was mutilated or murdered by compulsory religion in the barbarous past, ten are now injured or killed by the modern medical barbarism of compulsory disease.

There was an old sect of heretics about the time of the Reformation which seemed to have a poor idea of the value of personal virtue and good works in salvation as compared with mere dogma, “grace,” and “faith,” and whose motto seemed to be: “The more sin, the more grace,” or “Let us sin that grace may abound.” Now, this seems to be very similar to the doctrine of the coercive vaccinators of to-day, which appears to be simply and literally this: “The more disease we inflict, the more health we create,” or “Let us inflict and spread disease widely upon the people so that health may correspondingly abound.”

A striking example of the evil effects of this dangerous vaccine doctrine in recent times is found in the case of Japan, whose awful record in vaccination and smallpox and in epidemic disease transmitted by vaccine virus is exposed in the next paragraphs.

AWFUL RECORD OF JAPAN IN VACCINATION AND SMALLPOX AND IN EPIDEMIC DISEASE CAUSED BY VACCINE VIRUS, AS GIVEN IN U. S. GOVERNMENT REPORTS

Japan has been perhaps the most extensively vaccinated country in recent times, with most rigid compulsory laws, copied from Germany, which require re-vaccination at different periods of infant and adult life. Now vaccination, as I have already shown, is simply one of the varied forms of smallpox, being an artificially propagated or cultivated form of the disease involving human smallpox and cowpox combined, and is often more dangerous and deadly than the natural disease. This being the fact, what therefore should we expect to result from the dangerous practice of impregnating the blood of a whole population with repeated inoculations of the virus of human smallpox and cow disease? Should we logically expect anything else but that epidemics of smallpox and cow disease should break out in due time in such a generally vaccinated and infected population, and that vaccine or cow disease should be extended to other populations wherever the virus made from human and cow diseases should be carried and used?

This logical expectation is what seems to have actually happened in the case of much-vaccinated Japan, and instead of being made immune from smallpox epidemics by general vaccination and re-vaccination—which is one of the positive claims made by vaccinators—Japan, on the contrary, seems to have suffered from the worst epidemics of smallpox known in modern times, not only worse than in poorly vaccinated countries like England and the United States, but worse than experienced in old times before the days of vaccination!

This conclusion seems to be fully proved from the U. S. Public Health Reports for September 2, 1910, which give this frightful record of smallpox epidemics in Japan for several years past. The population of Japan at that time, 1910, was about 48 millions, and the high waves in the epidemics in the preceding ten years were as follows: In 1898 there were 149,012 smallpox cases with 40,971 deaths, mortality 27½ per cent.; in 1905 there were 10,704 cases with 3,388 deaths, mortality 31½ per cent., and in 1908 there were 18,075 cases with 5,835 deaths, mortality 32½ per cent.

These figures, considering the vaccinal conditions existing in Japan, under most rigid compulsory laws, are surely terribly significant, to say the least, and fully shatter the fallacious vaccine doctrine that vaccination is the only effective remedy against smallpox and that it always lowers the mortality in epidemics! Per contra, here we see from these official U. S. Health Reports that in this much-vaccinated population there was not only a series of severe epidemics with a very high mortality, but a constantly ascending mortality from 27½ per cent. in 1898 to 31½ per cent. in 1905 and 32½ per cent. in 1908! Whereas the usual mortality given by good authorities in old times before the days of vaccination was only 15 to 20 per cent.! See “History of Smallpox” by Dr. James Moore, Jenner’s chief assistant, London, 1815, page 243.

Now I believe that there is no country in modern times, whether vaccinated or unvaccinated, which has shown worse epidemics of smallpox than much-vaccinated Japan, as above shown from official data, whereas the epidemics within the same period in the poorly vaccinated countries of England and the United States have been small in comparison. Surely, therefore, our “Yankees of the Orient” seem to have copied some of our antique medical barbarisms even more fully than they have copied our real modern improvements. And, surely, poorly vaccinated England is much better off with less vaccination and more sanitation when its Minister of Health, Hon. John Burns, can publicly declare in Parliament on April 12, 1911, that, “Just in proportion as, in recent years, exemptions from vaccination have gone up from 4 per cent. to 30 per cent., so deaths from smallpox have declined.” This also is the experience of Leicester, the sanitary English city, unvaccinated for the past 30 years, as previously shown at page 22; and such, I believe, will be the result wherever that irrational system of inflicting disease to produce health is abandoned and the rational system of sanitation and hygiene is adopted in its place.

JAPANESE VIRUS CAUSES EPIDEMICS OF CATTLE PLAGUE IN MANKIND AND ANIMALS

Not only, therefore, has general compulsory vaccination failed to protect Japan from some of the worst smallpox epidemics known in modern or olden times, as just shown, but, what is perhaps still more damning, it is proved by U. S. Government Reports, quoted on pages 95 and 99, that Japanese vaccination was the source of the deadly epidemics of Cattle Plague, known as “Foot and Mouth Disease,” which afflicted both animals and mankind in the United States in 1902 and 1908, this dangerous infection being imported in vaccine virus from Japan and used by two of the largest makers of virus in the United States. See Year Book, U. S. Dept. of Agriculture, 1914, page 21. See also page 99 in Supplement. These epidemics raged in several of our States, as previously shown, and caused the slaughter of hundreds of thousands of animals, an unknown amount of human mortality, and a loss of millions of dollars to the Government and people of this country. Surely such awful results from Japanese vaccination are a shocking mockery and a stinging rebuke to all vaccination as an alleged “health” remedy and call loudly for the abolishment of all compulsory vaccination as a most dangerous public evil and a flagrant violation of vital human rights to Medical Freedom, Sanity and Safety.

MEDICAL FREEDOM NECESSARY FOR MEDICAL PROGRESS, MEDICAL TRUTH AND HUMAN SAFETY

As we now enjoy the great Democratic Institution of a Free Church in a Free State, with all church control of government and all compulsory or forced religion prohibited, so, in the near future, we must bring about an equally important reform for human welfare in preventing all medical control of our departments of government, in securing true medical freedom and prohibiting all compulsory medicine as effectually as all compulsory religion and church control of government is now prohibited. And as full freedom for all religious sects, in religious matters, has surely brought about an undoubted advance in religious progress and in true religion and morality throughout the world, so it is sure that full medical freedom will bring about a similar increase in true medical progress and efficiency throughout the world.

Now in this most important reform of Medical Freedom I want to say at this point that I hold no brief for any school of medicine or religion, but what I contend for, as an American citizen, is something broader, more inclusive, more American, and more important for public right, health and safety than any one religious or medical doctrine, and that is a full Medical Freedom for all the people to adopt any honest or sincere doctrine or system of medicine which they may prefer, and a free public field for the exercise of this doctrine or system without any harassment or oppression from any other system of medicine which may falsely and foolishly think itself specially ordained to control the whole field of medicine. And just as we now enjoy a full constitutional guarantee for Religious Freedom, which prevents any one sect from infringing on the conscientious liberty of another, so we must have a full Medical Freedom with an equal guarantee which will give all honest or reasonable medical doctrines free scope and prevent any medical doctrine or practice whatever from being forced on any person against free will and consent, and which will recognize the full right of the individual to adopt any preferred system of medical treatment, whether with or without prayer and faith, with or without drugs and medicines, or with or without vaccines or serums.

This broad medical freedom for all systems of medicine is absolutely necessary for true medical progress itself, for only by testing these different medical theories and practices side by side freely in every-day experience and on a wide scale can the real truth and virtue of any particular doctrine or practice be determined. A great modern doctor uttered a most important truth on this head when he said that “He is the best doctor who knows the uselessness and dangers of the greatest number of remedies.” And the best way of finding out the uselessness, danger or virtue of any remedies is to try them carefully and freely side by side. And this free use and disuse of alleged remedies side by side in contrast or competition will ultimately sift out and condemn whatever is really evil or useless more effectually and justly than any drastic compulsion or dogmatic suppression could possibly do, thus making the best and surest contribution to true medical progress, safety and efficiency.

On the same principle, if all compulsory vaccination is abolished and each person left free to adopt or refuse vaccination, as he sees fit—which is his positive legal right—a true test of the virtue and safety or uselessness and danger of general vaccination will soon be arrived at. And if it can be shown in such a large and free test that the unvaccinated part of the population or the unvaccinated part of the Army and Navy is no more liable, on the average, to catch smallpox or typhoid fever than the vaccinated part, and is entirely free from the grave dangers of vaccination itself, surely a great lesson in medical sanity and progress will be learned. As a matter of fact, this test has already proved in the case of the U. S. Army in France that typhoid vaccination is useless as a preventive where sanitation is grossly neglected. See pages 207 and 210. It has also proved in the case of poorly vaccinated but sanitary England and particularly in the unvaccinated and very sanitary City of Leicester, as compared with much vaccinated Japan, Germany and Berlin, that good sanitation, isolation and hygiene without vaccination give the best result in reducing and preventing smallpox in the population and also in greatly reducing the general death-rate and infant death-rate as compared to the same rates in the heavily vaccinated communities named. On this point see one of the latest medical works on this subject by a pro-vaccinator, “The Vaccination Question,” by Dr. Millard, London, 1914.

Now, as medical freedom is absolutely necessary for true medical progress, as just shown, so it is equally necessary for medical truth and human safety. At this point I am sure it will be readily admitted that even if an alleged medical remedy were absolutely effective and sure, and absolutely safe, harmless, and beneficial, it would not be ethically or legally proper to force it upon any patient against free will and consent. But when an alleged remedy is very uncertain, doubtful or irregular in its action, or very dangerous and frequently fatal in its effects, such as vaccination has been proved to be, surely the forcing of such a doubtful and dangerous remedy on any person under pretense of its necessity and harmlessness is not only unethical but it is a question whether this is not also a gross act of sheer criminal malpractice.

When, therefore, any doctor forces such a doubtful and dangerous remedy as vaccination upon any patient under the pretense that it is necessary for public health and is perfectly safe and harmless, the doctor is obviously under a most vicious moral and professional bias and interest to conceal, deny or falsify any unfavorable facts that may arise in the case, such as the failure of the alleged remedy or its injurious or possibly fatal effects on the patient, which bias and falsification is of course the greatest enemy to medical truth, safety and progress. And it is obvious that this concealment and denial of the injurious or fatal effects of medical remedies forced on the people by doctors is not only against true public policy but is a gross violation of true medical ethics and a crime upon the people in the falsification of this most important point of vital statistics, viz., the nature and effects of alleged medical remedies on human health and life, which facts should surely be fully disclosed to the public, not only for the sake of medical truth and progress but for the greater reason of human right and safety.

And it must be here remembered that our vaccinating doctors and our dominant vaccinating medical sect have now such full control of our death certificates, our departments of health and vital statistics that they can deny or conceal the effect of their medical operations with the greatest ease and safety, which is obviously a very sinister fact, against the most vital interest of the people, in public health, medical truth and safety and accurate vital statistics, and this evil surely calls for an immediate reform.

On the other hand, where medical practice is perfectly free and voluntary, the practitioner has no bias or interest whatever to make false claims of alleged efficiency or to conceal facts as to failures, dangers and fatalities, so that it is therefore obvious that for both medical truth and progress and human right and safety, Medical Freedom is an absolute public necessity, and that, per contra, Medical Compulsion is a most dangerous public evil which must be abolished as completely as the less dangerous evil of religious compulsion has been abolished.

MEDICAL DOMINATION AND COMPULSION MOST DANGEROUS POWER IN BODY POLITIC AND MUST BE SUPPRESSED

The most dangerous power in the body politic of the past age was formed by the organized intolerant and oppressive Doctors of Divinity, who had a great State Church and political organization behind them through which they dominated and coerced the people and by which they were enabled legally to force upon them the horrible, but now obsolete, evil of compulsory religion, as well illustrated in some of our early New England Colonies and in many other places throughout the Old and New Worlds, during the past centuries. And so, in a similar way, it is the Doctors of Medicine and the Medical Societies of one great dominating school or sect, the vaccine sect, which form the most dangerous power in the body politic to-day, and are almost wholly responsible for originating and forcing upon the people the barbarous evil of compulsory medicine and compulsory disease, in violation of the most fundamental, inherent, natural, and constitutional rights of the people.

President Lincoln—who was one of our greatest Americans—has told us that no man, however good, is fit to govern another man without the latter’s consent, and I think it will be generally admitted, as a sound Democratic and American doctrine, that no one class or profession of men—not even the great clerical or medical profession—is quite perfect enough to be trusted with exclusive, unlimited or dangerous power over our fellow men. Nevertheless it is a fact that the medical profession, as now organized and possessed of political and official power, and in control of some of our most important departments of government, such as Public Health, Vital Statistics and Medical Legislation, has already a most dangerous power over the people, perhaps more dangerous and unlimited than any other class of men, and this dangerous power must be curbed as soon and as much as possible in the interest of true Medical Freedom and Progress and public right and safety.

My late esteemed friend and neighbor, the illustrious Judge Gaynor, New York’s greatest mayor, uttered one of his best sayings, which we may well note and apply here, when he said: “Beware of the men or the class who are too anxious to exert power.” And this warning we can now apply most pertinently to our dominating medical societies and vaccine companies, which together form a most gigantic medical interest which is the chief influence that has forced compulsory medicine and inflicted disease upon the people and controls our Departments of Health, and which should be fully investigated by the Executive and Legislative Departments of our State and National governments, which should adopt some radical reforms to curb this dangerous medical power and safeguard the rights of the people, as suggested in the next paragraph.

THE GIGANTIC MEDICAL AND VACCINE INTEREST SUPPORTING COMPULSORY VACCINATION A MENACE TO PUBLIC RIGHT AND SAFETY WHICH SHOULD BE CURBED

The latest official reports show that there are now ninety-nine concerns licensed by the U. S. Government to manufacture vaccines and serums for both human and animal uses! These ninety-nine concerns have a capitalization of about fifty millions or more. One of the largest of these manufacturers, located in Detroit, has a capital of ten millions, while another large concern located in Philadelphia has a capital of two millions.

The two great epidemics of Foot and Mouth Disease, or virulent cowpox, in this country in 1902 and 1908 were caused by the vaccine virus of two of these ninety-nine vaccine manufacturers; and these epidemics resulted in great mortality to animals and mankind, as already shown, with a loss of millions of dollars to the Government and people of the United States; but no recompense has ever yet been made, so far as I know, to the Government or People by these vaccine companies for this great damage, and I ask your particular attention, Mr. President, to this important point.

Now, to give a list of all the medical societies in the United States and their membership figures would take too much space here, as their names and numbers are “legion”; but I can give some figures which will include the chief National Society and the chief State societies in the leading State of New York, as follows:

This table, while including only a partial list of medical societies in the United States, comprises some of the largest and most influential societies of the dominant or allopathic school, active in the national field and in our own local field of New York State. Now each State in the Union has a similar group of local or State societies and these several State societies combined with the big National societies and with the ninety-nine vaccine companies form, obviously, a most gigantic medical, political and commercial interest behind the medical evil of compulsory vaccination. Of course, a great many doctors of this dominant school are advanced and progressive enough to oppose all compulsory vaccination; but doctors of this type unfortunately seem to be a minority, at present, in the dominant vaccine school of medicine. On the other hand, a large majority in almost all of the other schools of medicine are strongly opposed to vaccination, particularly to all forms of compulsion.

A glance at this list of medical societies already given, with its startling membership figures, combined with the ninety-nine vaccine companies, must convince any thoughtful man of the dangerous size and organization of these medical and vaccine interests, which obviously have more or less of a joint interest to force their vaccine operations and products upon the people as much as possible by compulsory laws, and otherwise, and whose joint profits are obviously in direct proportion to this use.

Now, no other profession has anything like the large and well organized membership and corresponding political power and influence of the medical profession in the body politic. Indeed, few, if any, trade or business organizations can compare with the medical profession in this respect, and this medical power is further greatly increased beyond that of any other profession, trade or business in being in practical control of our most important Departments of Public Health and Vital Statistics all over the country, so that in advocating and practising the dangerous barbarism of compulsory medicine this medical power can easily deny and conceal the actual effects of this dangerous medication on human health and life in our vital statistics. This is surely too much power and a power too dangerous to be left in the hands of one class or profession of men, and it would surely be an act of public wisdom to take this control of our Departments of Health and Vital Statistics out of the hands of this one medical class and entrust it to doctors of various schools or to some other professions, such as sanitary engineers, expert lay statisticians, life insurance actuaries, or even to able laymen, who would have no professional bias or interest to deny or conceal any medical mistakes or disasters, but who would honestly give to the public the true record, not only of deaths from natural diseases, but—what is even more important for public information, public health, and medical progress—the true record of disease and death from all artificial or inflicted diseases and medical operations in general.

REFORMED SYSTEM LONG USED IN ENGLAND

As a matter of fact, the reformed system here suggested has long been in use in England, where the Minister of Health and the Registrar General have been both eminent laymen, and not doctors, but with honest doctors under them, and where the record for sanitation and public health is one of the highest and the death-rate one of the lowest in the world, while vaccination is constantly declining. Under this system the English vital statistics are also known to be the most full and reliable in the world, and deaths from vaccination and other medical practices are not denied and concealed, as in our doctor-controlled Departments, but are reported honestly and regularly every year, showing in many years a greater mortality from vaccination than from smallpox.

This medical and statistical reform should be immediately adopted in this country to abolish the dangerous medical domination and monopoly which now controls our Departments and which has long been an abuse of public power by one medical sect, a great enemy to Medical Truth, Freedom and Progress and an arbitrary power in our body politic which should be no longer tolerated under our American institutions.4

PROPOSED NATIONAL BOARD OF PUBLIC HEALTH, CONTROLLED BY ONE SCHOOL OF DOCTORS, CONDEMNED

A typical instance of the dangerous tendency of the medical profession to extend its power over the people is shown in the recent scheme of the proposed National Department of Public Health, to be composed chiefly of doctors of one sect, with a head doctor having a seat in the President’s Cabinet.

Now, a National Department of Public Health, properly organized and conducted, may be a very good thing for the public welfare, but such a Department should by no means be controlled by doctors of one dominating sect or by the big vaccine interests in alliance with it, but all schools of medicine should be properly and fairly represented in such a Department, and its head member, having a seat in the Cabinet, should be an able and eminent layman and not a medical doctor, so that the head of the Department would thus represent the interests of the whole people and not chiefly the professional ideas and interests of one school of medicine.

MEDICAL ETHICS OF THE VACCINE AND OTHER SCHOOLS COMPARED AND CRITICIZED. THE “BEAM” VERSUS THE “MOTE”

What would be thought of the “medical ethics” of an imaginary or hypothetical doctor who might invent some medical remedy and then have laws passed to force this alleged remedy upon his patients against free will and consent, but to his own profit, and who might at the same time get control of the Departments of Health and Vital Statistics so that he could safely and successfully deny and conceal the failures, dangers and fatalities of his alleged remedy or invention? Could there be conceived a medical policy or practice of greater professional effrontery, impudence and wicked presumption than this? Could there be a medical practice of greater danger to human right and safety and more shocking and destructive to all true medical ethics and progress? Could there be any practice more violative of the inalienable rights of the American citizen? And yet this hypothetical picture illustrates, substantially, the medical policy which the people now suffer from in every community oppressed with the evil of compulsory vaccination, and which would be greatly aggravated if we were to have a National Department of Health controlled by vaccinating doctors.

We have heard a good deal from the medical societies as to the evils of the “Quack” doctor, the “Patent Medicine” man and the Christian Scientist, who are severely frowned upon by the regular doctor and pro-vaccinator; but these men, much abused by their alleged superiors, have never been guilty of anything so violative of true medical ethics and of public right and safety as the practice of forcing medical remedies and operations upon their patients against free will and consent, or the practice of representing remedies as absolutely necessary and perfectly safe and harmless which are in fact not necessary and are highly dangerous, and not only frequently kill the patient but actually cause great epidemics of fatal diseases in animals and mankind, such as the deadly epidemics of foot and mouth disease in 1902 and 1908, already described, which were caused by inoculations with the vaccine virus from two of the biggest vaccine factories in the United States.

Now I have never heard that any “Quacks” or “Patent Medicine” doctors or Christian Scientists or any other school of medicine, good, bad or indifferent, have ever been guilty of any damage to health and life comparable to this awful record of the vaccine school, which school seems to arrogate to itself such superiority and dominance over its fellow men. So far as the average “patent” medicines are concerned, they may be said to be of three classes: First, harmless or agreeable mixtures having no actual effect on disease, good or bad, except in the fancy or faith of the patient. Second, mixtures of ordinary drugs substantially such as the regular doctors prescribe. Third, at the worst, nothing worse than mixtures of medicated “booze” or doctored “dope.” Per contra, I never heard of any “Patent” or “Quack” medicine which was an actual blood poison or the actual virus of some dangerous or deadly infection capable of infecting the patient with some fatal disease and of killing him in a few minutes, hours, days or weeks, as frequently happens with different forms of vaccination, as I have already demonstrated beyond doubt in these pages.

To this dangerously dominating vaccine sect of medicine, which sees the faults of other men but not its own great errors, we may therefore now apply the crushing words of Christ in His great parable of the beam and the mote, as follows: