The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1883-06-26
THE MURDER OF THE INNocEsrs,

nal ABORTION have never been collected. 1t
is crime that creeps stealthily beneath the
scrutiny of society, and, strangely enough,
so far without material interference from
the judiciary. Says DIR. Gaillard Thomas, of
New York, an eminent authority on such
matters:
while the law pursues with relentless
vigor the man who murders his fellow, it
allows immunity TO him who murders the
unborn child. This crime is, with us, one of
fearful frequency On my table at this mo-
ment lies one of the most popular and best
edited daily journals of New York-one
which finds its way into the first circles of
society. and into the hands of maidens and
matrons throughout the land. In its col
umns are a number of advertisements we'll
known as being those of professional abor-
tionists men and women who make bust
ness of infantile murder. 1t may be that the
editors who are esteemed among us as up
right men, it may be that the police are en-
tirely ignorant of these facts, but it is
hard to believe so when many of these
advertisements announce distinctly the
advantages of their having rooms in
which their patients can be accommodated,
and that one interview always accomplishes
the desired result without the use of means
dangerous to life or health"
DIR. Thomas characterzes abortion as
great national crime and states that ''the
practice is becoming so common in the older
portions of the United States, especially
among the more civilized and educated, that
it is by no means usual to meet with large
families of children" An eminent physician
of this city recently remarked ''that the
fashionable family nowadays consisted of
e., Fok i'll
This end attained, any further increase is re-
garded as vulgar and plebeian-an accident to
be deplored and deprecated" Physicians have
long been aware of the immensely and
enormity of this crime. Ten years ago the
American Medical Association offered prize
for short and comprehensive tract for cir
culation among females for the pur-
pose of enlightening them upon
its criminality and physical evils
There were several earnest essays written by
conscientious and eminent physicians. The
prize awarded to Prof. H. R. Storer, of
Boston, foran able essay entitled "Why Not?'
Prof William Goodell, of Philadelphia, for
years one of the most earnest opponents of
this crime, several years ago, in the Phlade-
pha Medical Times, showed the danger from
a m edical point of view of interference with
the natural course of motherhood In this,
as in all other physiological processes, the
workings of nature are too perfect to be in
terfered with materially and especially by
the clumsy methods of the professional
syao1 Tlo lie, Ia II
low such practices are far more detrimental
to the health and physical we'll being of
women, laying aside all moral considera-
tons, than those pertaining to natural mater
nifty. The facts and effects, both moral and
physical, are well known to physicians. They
are common stock in medical teaching and
literature. No honest physician abets or
countenances infanticide, either in families
or as means of covering the results of adul-
terry or lust In the case now pending in our
city courts, the charge against the physician
involved was made by reputable practi-
toner, whose only motive was to see justice
done alike to wronged womanhood, to the
medical profession and to society.
Rarely does graduate in medicine allow
himself to become the tool and servant of
this class. Usually, as in the case of Hatha-
way, they are quacks and adventures. There
is no class of professional men who see life
so nearly as it is who live SO close to the
bone, who see the skeleton in the family
closet and are intrusted with so many pro-
fessional secrets as physicians, and rarely do
they forsake the paths of professional or
Christian honor. Thrown into the closest
relations with females of all classes they al
most invariably deport themselves as honor
able men, and steer clear of those entangle-
ments and scandals which have wrecked so
many. OF course, there are rogues. There
are ignorant and dangerous men in every
profession. But there is no reason to doubt
that, as class, medical men stand equal in
skill, humanity and intelligence, and in all
that constitutes worth in man, with the
representatives of any other calling
Physicians and ministers can do much to
stamp out this social vice. They come into
the closest relation with the family and the
home. They are the physical and moral
advisers of the women who are the core
and axle of the household. Few ministers
of religion have had the requisite courage
and knowledge to cry out against this evil
One of the Episcopal bishops of the State of
New York has made it the subject of pas
toral letter to the people OF his diocese.
Robert Collyer preached openly on this sub
ject to his Chicago parishoners DR.. Morgan
Dix, OF Trinity, New York, in his recent