Evening star., 1940-05-11
State Has ! function
In Medicine, A. N. A.
President ELECT SAYS
Liberal Trend Seen in
Talk to Scientists on
Gore Of lndigents
BY THoMAs.RHENRY.

Gore Of lndieents
BY THOMAssK HENRY.
An increasing trend toward lib
erahsm In the lit ,00o-member AM
ertcan Medical Association was re-.
nected today when Or. Nathan ".
van Etten Of New York City, presi-
oent-elect OF the rlatlonal society,
who takes ofnce next month, told
the American Science Congress
meeting here today that physicians
must recognize new duties of the
state in care Of the INDECENT and
take = prominent part In civic af-
fairs to organize these services.
The state, he declared, owes
its economically INDECENT citizens
warmth, food and economic neces-
stiles essential to the preservation
Of health but 1t is confronted with
the problem Of so framing its pro-
grams that people will not be
turned into parasites on the body
polite. :.
Proposals for Government -hospf-
tails recently advanced by President
Roosevelt, he said, were steps in
the right direction.
The Doctors Role.
DR.. Van Etten insisted, however,
that the professional and scientific
aspects of caring for the sick remain
In the hands of the organized prac-
titioners, and insisted that the great
American Medical Association was
. thoroughly democratic body. He
stressed, on the other hand, that the
physician no longer remains cloi-
stored in professional aloofness, but
has become an influential citizen in
his community. In the present sys-
tenn. he said, the medical man has
built up sense of personal security
which often has led him to be little
concerned with the movements 60.
ing on about him.
Physicians, he said, "must assume
social leadership If they would avoid
the role of pawns in the hands of
those who would change society"
The doctor, he said, is neither a
tradesman nor a merchant of health,
but servant of the sick" who may
receive a fee for his services, but
who is not offering them for a price.
1929 Expedition.
Turning from thoughts of the New
Worlds responsibilities as keeper of
civilization, outlined graphically for
them last night by President Roose-
welt, the congress also heard today
the long-forgotten story of the first
American scientific expedition into
the Antarctic.
Reconstructed from an old log
book found in the Library of Con-
sress, the tale was told by DR.. Law
renee Martin, chief Of the Division
Of Geography at the Library.
The expedition sailed in two ships
from Stonington, Conn, and New
York in 1929, nine years after the
mainland Of the Antarctic Continent
had been discovered by Capt. Ma
thaniel Palmer, q Yankee whaler.
The object was specifically scientific
4CoSoAN4As S0RVs xxuxloCA
commanded one Of the ships.
The party included, DR.. Martin
said, five scientists, Of whom the
most distinguished was DR.. James
Fights of Albany. DR.. Fights made
extensive natural history collec-
tions in the South Shetland Islands,
most Of which long since have dis
appeared, and anticipated, Charles
Darwin by nearly 10 years in observ-
Ing glacial boulders left by floating
tcebergs and deducing from them the
geology Of unvisited lands closer to
the South Pole.
Notebooks Lost.
BY extensive observations Of wind
directions, fog, sea ice and marine
life, DR.. Fights deduced, said DR..
Martin. that there was q long stretch
OF unseen land to the southwark. He
thought 1t was q long chain of is
lands. Not until more than q cen
tury later was it demonstrated by
Admiral Richard E. Byrd that it
was actually part of the Antarctic
mainland. It remained unknown un-
til 1t was mapped by airplane flights
taken by Admiral Byrd during the
last three months.
Reconstruction Of the route of
Pizarro from Panama to Peru was
reported by DR.. Robert Cushma1l
Murphy of the American Museum
OF Natural History. Because of the
meagerness of the records, DR.. Muir
ply said, the period between the
nrst crossing Of Panama and the
conquest Of the Incas has remained
one Of the most obscure in the his
tory OF the New World. He started
by examining critically all the rec
ords and supplemented them with
years Of personal exploration of the
1,000-mile coastline followed by the
conquistadores.
Lesson for New World.
The fate Of lands under intensive
cultivation for thousands of years
IN the Old World may serve as q
lesson for the New World, declared
DR.. w. G. Lowdermilk, assistant
chief Of the United States Soil Con-
servation Service, before the agri-
culture and conservation section of
the congress.
Western civilization EMERGED, he
said, out Of the production of surplus
food In the alluvial plains of the Nile
and Of Mesopotamia. It has moved
westward until the Americas have
become the last frontier Of new
lands.
"Ruins of great cities amid wasted
landscapes, sparsely studded with
wretched villages and black tents of
nomads are impressive today" he
said, but more significant are the
ruins of the land. The onward
march of western civilization has
fed on progressive exploitation Of
new stores of natural resources in
the land. The frontiers of new land
have been pushed ever westward to
the water of the Pacific. It is gone
forever. A new frontier now ap-
pears in the conservation Of lands