PROSPECTUS OF VOLUME 29. OF THE MEDICO-LEGAL JOURNAL. The volume opens with the most strenuous labors before it that has occurred in its history. The unfinished work of the Medico-Legal Society will no doubt occupy a large part of the columns of the current volume. The American International Congress of 1910 will greatly interest the Medico-Legal Society. Its session in the fall of 1911 as announced is adjourned to the fall of 1912. The relation of bovine to human tuberculosis has asumed very great prominence and must be regarded as depending on research and experimentation now progressing. The Washington International Congress which discussed this question with great earnestness, reached no definite action or scientific result. Professor Koch, who took part in the discussion, made no modification of the views he had previously expressed at Stockholm, that his researches did not justify him in asserting that it could be positively demonstrated as a scientific fact, that Pulmonary Tuberculosis (of which he had previously discovered the bacillus) was communicable to man from the bovine bacilli. While this doubt and view was stoutly opposed by almost every prominent American student competent to speak from actual research and more careful, cautious and competent investigators (unfortunately so few in this country) by many of the foreign delagates who were competent to speak, the doubt of Koch dominated the Washington Congress, and it adjourned without taking definite action and although many of the foreign authorities combatted Professor Koch's view, the silence of some very high authorities abroad and those of the American International Congress on Tuberculosis who sympathized with Professor Koch's view; who as a rule did not take part in the discussion at Washington; the generally understood sympathy of certain prominent foreign observers sympathizing with Professor Koch's attitude, it is an undeniable fact that at the close of the Washington Congress, the crucial question was left in abeyance, undecided, to be determined in the future by farther research and more careful, cautious and competent investigators. The death of Professor Koch leaves the question still in the realm of uncertainty to-day. Professor Von Schroen of Naples, whose latest contribution is as yet the last authoritative word that has been spoken, and that relates to the Phthisiogeneous Microbe of Phthisis of the Lungs. The question of preventive legislation has assumed a still greater significance, and it is by far the highest question in forensic medicine that agitates the ablest medico-legal jurists of our Century and the world of scientific endeavor. The symposiums before the Medico-Legal Society to-day on which so much labor has been already expended will continue during the volume just opening into the year of 1912. More attention will be given to the medical jurisprudence of Insanity and the work of the great State hospitals of our own and other states will be continued if sufficient interest is manifested by the state officials and the professions. "Psvcho-Therapeutics" will be an especial feature of the coming volume which now excites such interest, and the various cults and special claims considered. "Longevity and the Relation of Age to Useful Work" will be continued in the columns, and the "Prolongation and Study of Human Life" will receive more attention than hitherto. A prominent feature of the work will be a continuation of the "Stud ies of the History of the Supreme Court of the States, Territories and Provinces of North America." The aim has been to embrace in the work a portrait and biographical sketch of every judge of the Supreme Court from its organization, and the original Thirteen Colonies of its colonial judicial and pre-Revolutionary histories as well. This has been compiled for New York, Pennsylvania, Connecticut, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Delaware, Georgia and New Jersey of the original colonies, all but Maine, Massachusetts and Vermont of the New England States, Maryland, Virginia and both Carolinas. Each of the States of Ohio, Minnesota, Oregon, Kansas and Texas has been substantially completed. The work is now progressing on the new State of Oklahoma and of the territorial and Ind ian judicial history of the Indian Territory, which commenced in Volume 26, continued in Volumes 27 and 28, Arkansas, Wyoming, Louisiana and Missouri, both the Dakotas, California and Washington are now progressing. It has been continued in Nebraska, in the Dominion of Canada, and in Cuba. Unavoidable delay is due to the difficulty in obtaining portraits of both dead and living judges. The progress of the science of medical jurisprudence in foreign countries, and in our own country will be within the province of the coming volume, and the JOURNAL, as the organ of the Medico-Legal Society and of the American International Congress on Tuberculosis, which has been postponed until 1912, with the same officers, by reason of the death of Professor Koch, and the doubt in those most competent to determine as to the true relation between Human and Bovine, will endeavor to keep pace with the onward march of civilization and of progress in the departments of science that are now arresting the attention of the world of science in every department of forensic medicine. The Editor of this journal will give especial attention to the Standard Literature of the Science. The leading works of prominent authors in every department of medical jurisprudence. Especial attention will be given to reviews and criticisms on the leading writers. A list of the more important and reliable works will be brought to the attention of the profession and the Editor of this Journal has made arrangements with leading publishers by which he can supply the 1800 names on the various lists and rolls of the Society and its sections. Members desiring works will find it to their advantage and interest to address the Editor personally. The Case of Albert T. Patrick has been taken up with great energy in charge of a select committee under the chairmanship of Clark Bell Esq., composed of, Prof. H. S. Eckels, of Philadelphia; Dr. George B. Miller, of Philadelphia, Pa., Chemist of the Society; Charles F. Moadinger, Jr., of Brooklyn, a member of the New York State Board of Embalmers, who are proceeding before Governor Dix for an unconditional commutation of the sentence and the liberation of Mr. Albert T. Patrick. CLARK BELL, Editor. |