In the efforts which have been made by the American Medical Association to elevate the standards of medical education since the creation of the Council on Medical Education in 1904 and the establishment of its annual conferences, great advances have been made in our medical schools, in our teaching hospitals and dispensaries, in our preliminary requirements in the medical curriculum, in the hospital year and in our postgraduate work.
One important field has not, however, been given sufficient attention: medical ethics. With the great advances of modern medicine and the greater range of application of medical and surgical therapy, there has developed a greater opportunity of misusing the sacred privileges of the physician and surgeon. The time has arrived when the organized profession, i. e., the American Medical Association, should take steps to do everything in its power to correct such evils as exist and to educate medical students and