VOICE OF THE COMMANDER-IN-CHIEF TO OUR SOLDIERS, “YOU HAVE COMMANDERS, BUT YOU HAVE NO MASTERS.” RIGHTS AND DIGNITIES OF SOLDIERS ASSERTED. MILITARY AND MEDICAL DESPOTISM CONDEMNED
At this point, Mr. President, I want to remind you of the rich American thought you expressed in your address to the American soldiers on the battle-field in France, at Chaumont, on Christmas Day, 1918. You were reported to have there said:
“... this is not a war in which the soldiers of the free nations have obeyed masters. You have commanders, but you have no masters. Your very commanders represent you in representing the nation of which you constitute so distinguished a part.”
Now, the true American thought in this quotation, as I take it, is that, as American soldiers and citizens, they are free men and members of a free state, with American rights and dignities that cannot be invaded, and are not “slaves,” “chattels,” or “subjects” to any one, and, therefore, are not to be treated by any form of military despotism or arbitrary medical dictation, as slaves, hogs, or cattle might be so treated. And as the hog or cattle doctor might properly force any medicine down the throat of the helpless beast without being required to say “by your leave” to his humble patient, or might perform on the body of the helpless animal any operation that he or the owner might decide upon, yet I think that neither of us would admit that any man calling himself a human doctor could, with any decency, propriety, or legality, follow this crude but necessary code of ethics of the animal doctor on the human subject by attempting to perform any medical service on the human body by any intimidation or force or without full approval and consent of the patient. Yet what have we seen? We have seen men, calling themselves doctors, claiming the right to force dangerous medical operations on school children and soldiers without their free will and consent, and with some form of barbarous intimidation or coercion, as they might do with dangerous beasts. We have seen loyal soldiers, conscientiously objecting to unnecessary and dangerous operations on their bodies against their approval or consent, who were tried by court-martial and condemned to imprisonment at hard labor for twenty-five years! And this outrageous sentence was inflicted for nothing more than for asserting one of the most obvious and unalienable rights of every American—the right to the medical sanctity of his own body, the right to medical freedom, choice, and consent in any medical treatment of that body!
Is it not time, therefore, Mr. President, that this clear American principle expressed in your address just quoted should now be applied in this matter, and that this Medical Hoggery of compulsory vaccination should be abolished in our Army and Navy? And is it not time also that the members of that “Divine” profession of Human Healing, in all its schools and sects, should now take action at the earliest possible day to purge their great profession from the deep disgrace of this Medical Hoggery, which they have originated and too long practiced, and which is involved in all forms of dictatorial and compulsory medicine on the human subject?
Of course, in anything I say here I make no reflection on the veterinary doctors whose work, in its own sphere, I regard just as honorable as the work of any other doctors in their sphere.