Article March 13, 1920 Issue

Signs of the Times

with contributions from Coolidge

[Rocky Mountain News, Denver, Colo.]

If you are an American your birthright is freedom, — mental, moral, and physical. Under the Constitution you are guaranteed freedom of thought, freedom of speech, and freedom of religious belief. It seems obvious that physical freedom is intended, though it is not specifically mentioned. As a result of this omission your mind is free, but your body is not. Under present conditions you are physically under the control of the medical authorities.

No one will deny that sanitary regulations and inspection of foods and drugs are of the greatest importance and benefit to the community. The health authorities should be supported in rigidly enforcing such regulations. But when a board of health, composed almost entirely of members of one school of medicine, attempts to compel the public to submit to a form of treatment advocated only by that school, it is encroaching upon the constitutional rights, implied though not expressed, of the people. It has been argued that compulsory vaccination is just as right and proper as prohibition. The cases are not parallel, however, but opposite. Prohibition prevents a person from taking a poison into his system, whereas compulsory vaccination compels a person to permit a poison to be injected into his system. Moreover, all scientists and schools of medicine agree that alcohol is a poison, whereas only one school of medicine advocates vaccination, and there are abundant statistics to show that it is frequently harmful and doubtfully effective.

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