The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1856-1888, 1876-08-12
THE PACIFIC
Commercial A0bertlser.
ANGTST u.

HE REFUSAL OF the Assembly 10 grant any
funds for carrying out the provisions of the
- Act to Mitigate - during the coming biennial
period, viii Of course have the effect to suspend
entirely the operation Of that law. Opinions
have been and are honestly divided as to the
propriety as well as the usefulness of the law,
and in years past the dispute has often waxed
warm. We have no intention or desire to revive
II now but it is n fact that the testimony Of
medical men and the heads Of the police.-who
are likely to know whereof they speak,-is to
the effect that the law, while confessedly i'm
perfect and sometimes liable to abuse, has had q
salutary effect in mitigating and diminishing the
diseases IN question. The fact that the present
Assembly has by its present action condemned
this law by a considerable majority, we need
hardly say affords no basis for argument against
it. During the coming two years the reports of
the Queens Hospital will undoubtedly show
whether or not the law has been a ~salutary one.
The Gazette Of this week undertakes to give
" a short historical sketch of the small pox at
the islands, but as happens sometimes to the
best of historians, and quite often to the Gazette,
mistakes and omissions have crept in, and we
disinterestedly proceed to act as c~orrector.
In relating the appearance Of the disease at
the islands brought by a passenger from San
Francisco on the Nebraska, who was first taken
to the Sailors Home but afterwards to the u. S.
Marine Hospital, where he died, the Gazette says
that " the native who drove the carriage thither
took the disease and also died" This is an
error, as the native, Naioie, who drove Mr..
Fletcher in one of Mr.. Wards carriages to the
TIocpsFaI IN Aou ckb 1870 .noo 4oIo- Ill -
the Goth, and was sent to the Hospital on the
2lst. On the 9th the doctor decided that he
had the smallpox, and he was removed to the
Quarantine Hospital, from which he was dis
charged cured July LIST, and died only last year.
Now the Constitution guarantees to every one
the enjoyment of life, &C., and to say the least,
it is a most unlawful assumption of power even
in n celebrated historian like the Gazette, to kill
n man before his time has come.
The omission in our cotemporary's Overture
historic - of the smallpox, consists in making
no mention of the case of the disease which the
steamship Idaho brought here on May 20, 1868,
the circumstances of which were quite similar
to those attending the recent one per Australia.
The patient had been kept well secluded on board
the steamer, and on arrival here a small house
WIS nuEEleulJ erecleu on the reeI ana the patient
removed into it, where he recovered, and is at
present following his business on board the Cali
fornia steamers. Although at that time the
smallpox was very severe in San Francisco. the
deaths each day being from sixty to seventy, the
cabin passengers of the Idaho were permitted to
land but articles of clothing were interdicted
from being brought on shore and the steerage
passengers were placed under surveillance. All
was safe, and no resolution of want of confidence
was hurled at the Board of Health.
The Gazette concludes by recommending that
more attention be paid by parents to the law in
regard to vaccination. We would amend by
saying that more attention should be paid to it
by government, in providing q suitable persons :"
to perform this duty on each island, and in see
ing that unobjectionable virus is used. ! Heaven
protect Hawaii from a repetition of the recklessly
ind~iseriminnte yaccinating process of years past y
To that is attributable much of the leprosy which
has since prevailed.