THE PHYSICIAN AS A CITIZEN

That physicians as a class neglect or evade the ordinary duties of citizenship, and do not measure up to their opportunities and obligations in the large questions of public welfare, is a statement that is often made. While we do not admit that this is true to any great extent, yet it cannot be denied that there are grounds for this impeachment. An editorial in the February number of the Southern Medical Journal on “The Physician as a Citizen” discusses this in an interesting way. It states that there is no sufficient reason why the physician should consider himself in a separate class from other men regarding the obligations of every-day life, but that this is a course which he has long pursued, and which is coming more and more to be criticized and condemned. In defense of this attitude, the Journal says that the word “duty” is as sacred to the physician as to any other man, but to the physician the most important problems of duty may seem those relating to his patients and not to society in general; and perhaps from the viewpoint of the patients it is well that it should be so. But the medical man, no less than other men, has solemn obligations to nation, state and municipality, and it is his attitude of evasion and inertia which has contributed to the perversion of law and the demoralization of politics. The editorial further says that it is no excuse for the physician to plead the exactions of his practice as a reason for failure to exercise his suffrage or to manifest a becoming concern in the proper administration of public affairs. The lawyer, the clergyman and the merchant, though absorbed in their several callings, cannot be charged with habitually ignoring the call of civic duty and the opportunities of enlightened citizenship.

This would seem to be putting the case too strongly. We are hardly willing to admit that the physician so completely neglects his civic or political duties as is here indicated. Physicians are found taking part in every branch of governmental affairs, in local offices, in state legislatures, in Congress, and in the diplomatic service. A closer investigation would, it is believed, reveal the fact that perhaps as large a proportion of physicians vote and attend to the ordinary duties of citizenship as of any other business or profession. Indeed, it is one of the present-day complaints that business men of the better class do not sufficiently interest themselves in politics. Besides, as stated in the editorial, on account of the peculiar relationship of the physician to the people, a critical public soon learns to look with distrust on the physician who concerns himself to any extent with politics, sport or any other extraneous pursuit.

The Southern Medical Journal concludes its editorial by suggesting the sphere in which the real opportunity lies and in which the obligation of the physician as a citizen may find its largest and most useful expression. It says that an awakening public is beginning to realize that the fundamental condition of all social and material prosperity is the health and vigor of the people. The present agitation in health matters is most remarkable. To insure the results which should follow a movement so widespread and so earnest, the forces at work must be wisely directed, else they will be wasted in fruitless effort. This guidance the medical profession must furnish or fall short of the full measure of its usefulness. This defines clearly the field in which the physician can best fulfil his duty as a citizen, and it is to be deplored that in the active public movement against tuberculosis, for instance, so many laymen rather than physicians have been the leaders. Other problems almost equally important press for solution, and the physician should take his proper place as leader and guide in the work. For, as stated in the editorial from which we have largely quoted, the broad-minded physician of the twentieth century, his talents dedicated to a life of service, cannot refuse to recognize the larger obligations of his calling, and should cheerfully and gladly assume his portion of the burden they entail.

JAMA. 1910;54(11):879-880