Article October 19, 1912 Issue

In the Health and Hygiene Department in a recent issue...

Howard C. Van Meter

Eugene (Ore.) Register

In the Health and Hygiene Department in a recent issue there is reference to the bill before Congress establishing a bureau of health. Since you mention Christian Scientists as included in the opposition to this measure, and as I am in a position to know the attitude of Christian Scientists in the matter, I will ask space to explain briefly the reason for it.

The proper provision for safeguarding the people with respect to sanitation and quarantine is something every one is interested in and desirous of having made as effective as possible. Competent sanitary engineers (not physicians) have done unquestionable good in the Panama Canal Zone, and Christian Scientists as well as others appreciate their success in reducing the mortality rate there and everywhere else. If there were nothing else contemplated in the proposition of a national health bureau than this, there would be nothing but support for it. Irrespective of the statements against favoritism in the conduct of such a bureau, it is so well known that the allopathic school of healing dominates exclusively the governmental supervision in health matters, that any increase in power in this direction would amount practically to governmental endorsement of that system, and would provide an increased use of governmental agencies for the exploitation of the opinions of that school. This would tend to fasten upon the people by degrees the necessity of relying upon that system, through the unusual opportunities given, as government officials with the United States government back of them, and through the literature they would be permitted to circulate as government documents. This all tends toward state medicine, which is as un-American as state religion. Any step in this direction should be opposed by all who believe that choice of a healing system should be made on the basis of experience and observation, on the part of those who desire help.

The health of mankind means to the Christian Scientist more than mere animal cleanliness or fitness. It means mental purification, since it is being proven conclusively, through the healing of all kinds of diseases by Christian Science, that the cause of sickness is mental. Consequently the Christian Scientist does not regard with favor any extension of privilege to any school of healing, directly or indirectly, whereby the opinions of that school, based upon material causation and consequently the use of material drugs as the remedy, would be given increased circulation. Government health officials whose business it is to show a reasonable activity by way of justification of their appointment, will be perniciously busy in keeping constantly before the people the importance of their office and what they are doing. This tends to concentrate thought upon disease as a necessary experience, instead of away from it. Increased governmental supervision in the direction of health, as contemplated by the bureau referred to, simply means a step toward a tax-supported medical class of doctors. This is what the American Medical Association is working for, and it is no more justifiable than for Christian Scientists to ask the government to give them charge of the health of the people of this country.

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