are the solace and the spiritual support of hundreds of thousands of their own brethren?

Permit me, in conclusion, as a Catholic, to deny that my faith is, as charged, an enemy to education, to liberty and to true piety: and to question the Christian charity of an individual who could send forth so offensive and sweeping an accusation against millions of his fellow-citizens.

FRANK MCGLOIN.

(One of the Judges Court of Appeals, Parish of Orleans, and Editor Holy Family Journal.)

MISSISSIPPI having called together a constitutional convention for the purpose of restraining the negro vote, it is not uninteresting to read a portion of the argument of Mr. Gilpin, before the Supreme Court of the United States, in the case of Groves v. Slaughter, in 1841, where the negro was also the subject of constitutional provisions.

"The first Constitution of the State of Mississippi was adopted on the 15th of August, 1817, and solemnly approved by Congress, and by the President on the 10th of December of the same year. In its article entitled Slaves, was this provision: The General Assembly shall have no power to prevent emigrants to this State from bringing with them such persons as are deemed slaves by the laws of any one of the United States, so long as any person of the same age or description shall be continued in slavery by the laws of this State; provided that such person or slave be the bona fide property of such emigrants.' And afterwards the same article continues, They shall have full power to prevent slaves from being brought into this State as merchandise.'

"On the second Monday of September, 1832, a convention met at Jackson, to amend the State Constitution. The very first amendment proposed by the committee was to alter the article on Slaves, by striking out the words that the Legislature 'shall have power to prevent slaves being brought into this State as merchandise,' and to insert in lieu of them 'The introduction of slaves into this State, as merchandise, shall be prohibited after theday of 18-.'

"As soon as it came up for discussion, it was proposed to date the prohibition from May, 1833. It was moved to make it 1899. The former was adopted.

"It was then proposed to add, that 'no law shall be passed before

1850 to prevent any citizen of the State from purchasing and bringing in slaves for his individual use.' This also passed.

"In the subsequent stages of the proceedings of the convention, the subject became matter of long debate, and was finally referred to a committee, of which Judge Trotter was a member, who reported the clause as it stood before; leaving to the Legislature the power to prevent the importation of slaves as merchandise. To this a clause was moved as an amendment, in the words now forming a part of the Constitution, and adopted by a vote of 26 to 17, Judge Trotter and Governor Lynch both voting against it. That clause, thus adopted in lieu of that which was in the Constitution of 1817, is in the following words: Section 2. The introduction of slaves into this State, as merchandise, or for sale, shall be prohibited, from and after the first day of May, 1833; provided that the actual settler or settlers shall not be prohibited from purchasing slaves in any State of this Union, and bringing them into this State for their own individual use, until the year 1845.'

"On the 2d of March, 1883, the Legislature being in session, passed a law to submit to the people an amendment of the new Constitution, to restore to the Legislature power to regulate this subject, without the restraint of a constitutional provision. *** To make this law effectual to change the Constitution, it was necessary that it should be approved by a majority of the citizens of the State qualified to vote for members of the Legislature. This was not done, and the clause of the Constitution therefore remained as it was adopted in 1832."

THE DUBLIN (Ga.), People has no use for the term National; it knows only State and Federal.

THE RICHEST thing out is the letter of a railroad president, saying that he knows nothing whatever about his own railroad.

JUSTICE WOODBURY (in the Passenger Cases, 1849, 7 How. 535) showed an uncommon ignorance by holding that a man could not be compared to an original package of merchandise because he could not be broken up.

HEROLD DES GLAUBENS sagt dazu (CURRENT COMMENT), in leicht verständlicher sprache geschrieben ist, so dürfte sie auch dem Nicht-advokaten, besonders manchem Priester, hochwillkommen sein.

THE PRESENT MEDICO-LEGAL STATUS OF THE

ABDOMINAL SURGEON.

Abdominal surgery must deal with all or most of the organs having to do with the nutritive functions of the body-intestines, liver, kidneys, stomach, spleen, and pancreas. While interference or complications with some of these is more or less rare, still they enter into an estimation of the question as possible factors, and are not to be lost sight of in formulating the claims of this branch of surgery to a specialty. In dealing with these several organs for traumatic or pathologically diseased conditions, it must always be remembered that they are hidden from the eye of the patient, their functions not generally understood by the laity, and the necessity of interfering with this or that diseased condition is, therefore, not properly understood. Herein arises the urgent reason for a more or less careful explanation of the propriety or necessity of an operation. This will, in many cases, eliminate the after-possibility of recrimination on the part of the patient, and save the surgeon a deal of trouble and the opprobrium of misrepresentation. In doubtful cases professional evidence of the surgeon's advice and opinion is to be urgently counselled.

Closely allied to the foregoing is the question of the consent of a patient or friends to an operation. A patient has the undoubted right to refuse operative treatment, however urgent or imperative the need. Moreover, since the friends of a patient are more likely to cavil than even the patient, it were well to explain all to them likewise.

It is admitted generally by abdominal surgeons that, in order to insure success in abdominal work, a special preparation of the patient is necessary; this is, at least, so in all its essentials. An ignorance of the particulars of this preparation, no matter what the operator's skill in other respects, should bar him the right of attempting any abdominal operation. These details need not be entered into here; it is enough merely to refer to the important bearing they have on the mental equipment of the abdominal surgeon.

Having prepared the patient, the next step is the operation itself. Once into the abdomen the work is to be done speedily and carefully, having in view always the best interests of the patient, not the glorification of the operator-not to operate merely for the sake of doing something, and not to unnecessarily prolong the operation, lest the narcosis itself does harm. The anesthetic

should be administered by an experienced and trustworthy anesthetizer. It may sometimes be-nay, often is-necessary to carry the operation beyond the lines marked out prior to opening the abdomen, as I have previously hinted. Such being the case, it is especially to be urged that the operator hold this fact always in mind, and have provisional permission to extend the operation as far as, in his judgment, the best interests of the patient are subserved. The law may say that suicide is improper when attempted by violence, yet it will not interpose and compel the consent of a patient to an operation to save life. Even if it should or could do so, no surgeon would be willing to operate under circumstances where such a contributing influence to the success of the operation as the cheerful assent of the patient would be lost. But if voluntary suicide is wrong, enforced suicide is much more so. A woman may be urgent in her demands for relief, while her husband perversely refuses his consent to surgical interference. Though the wife may possess the legal right to insist upon an operation, the husband's perverseness is among the most serious obstacles to contend with. Here, if anywhere, the law should interfere and compel the consent of the husband to permit his wife to exercise her own judgment in deciding, under expert advice, upon steps necessary to save her life. A man may, with as much reason, be justified in preventing assistance to his wife in rescuing her from his burning house, as to interfere with her personal prerogative in deciding any other question in which her life is involved. A similar set of questions are to be considered with reference to minors and guardians, and parents and children.

With the operation completed, the after-treatment next claims consideration. If special training is required to prepare the patient properly as well as to do the operation, it is equally necessary to enforce a special technique in the after-treatment. It is not sufficient that a trustworthy nurse who has had special training be left in charge; the surgeon himself must not only know what is to be done, but he must also do much of the work with his own hands. Herein consists the danger of grafting new methods on to old ideas. To illustrate: Opium was the fundamental, next to the knife, of all ancient surgery. A surgeon would quite as soon have thought of doing an operation with his finger-nails as to have omitted, in the after-management, the use of morphia or an opium suppository. Now, if any one thing has been shown to be on the average dangerous in this branch of surgery, it is the use of opium in any form. That the older men, as a rule, find it difficult to

bring themselves to an understanding of this fact, is not strange; but in so far as they are unable to resist the temptation to administer opium, by just that much is their incompetency to manage these cases to be measured.

The like is true of the intra-abdominal application of chemical solutions, which are, under the misnomer "antiseptics," but too generally merely irritants. The idea of Listerism must not be carried chemically into the abdomen, if we would escape complications otherwise to be eliminated. Over-refinement is as dangerous in its way as too little refinement.

So, after the operation, it is to be insisted upon that unless the surgeon is accorded absolute control of the patient, even to the point of making the family physician merely an agent in accomplishing what, in his judgment, is required from an operative standpoint for the patient's welfare, no responsibility as to results can be assumed. Indeed, it is best to have such understanding previous to an operation, and if there is demurring, operation should be refused. When a surgeon is chosen to do an abdominal operation of any kind whatever, it should be done with a full confidence in his ability to manage the case from its inception to its completion, and interference with his wishes or directions should not for a moment be thought of or tolerated. If the results then are not satisfactory, from bad behavior on the part of the patient, the friends, or the attending physician, the operator is not responsible.

An ethical question may arise in this relation in case, after the operation, the patient desires to discharge the attending physician and retain the services of the surgeon who has been called to do the operation. This would place the surgeon in the position of being accused of sacrificing the patient to the "code" if he should refuse to attend, and at the same time subjects him to the criticism of professional thievery if he continues in charge of the case. Since these refinements would scarcely serve one in a court of law, this point should be thoroughly explained to the patient previous to the operation, and the understanding reached that the surgeon for the time being accepts charge of the case simply as the pilot who steers the vessels through dangerous waters, to resign as soon as she has reached and safely passed the danger line. On the other hand, operations for incompetent men who refuse after-assistance, although incompetent to take intelligent care of the patients themselves, should be avoided; as should likewise operations in which a man, with no experience whatever, seeks the assistance of a competent operator in order to have the name of operating. In these