Compulsory Vaccination: Report of a Public Meeting, held in the Marylebone Vestry Hall, London, on Wednesday evening, October 19, 1870.Marylebone Anti-Compulsory Vaccination League
History
Compulsory Vaccination: Report of a Public Meeting, held in the Marylebone Vestry Hall, London, on Wednesday evening, October 19, 1870.
Marylebone Anti-Compulsory Vaccination League
Smallpox -- Prevention; Vaccination
I unhesitatingly affirm that vaccination from whatever source, whether
from the heifer direct or from arm to arm, or even the heel of the greasy
horse, which Jenner defined to be the _true source of protective matter_,
is not only a failure—it is a delusion, an imposture, and the law which
enforces it at the bidding of the medical department of the Privy
Council, is a disgrace to the Statute Book of England, and ought to be
repealed. For the reasons I have given, after nearly twenty years of
attention to this important subject, I support the resolution.
Mr. Glidden made a few observations in support of the medical men who had
spoken in advocacy of vaccination, expressing his surprise at the want of
modesty in the last speaker, who, as a member of a learned profession,
spoke disparagingly of his medical brethren, and applied the term
“cooked” to statistics on the other side, while he produced a multitude
of statistics of his own.
The chairman here interposed stating that Dr. Pearce head only produced
the official statistics of the Registrar General. The resolution was
then put and carried with only four dissentients.
Mr. R. B. Gibbs, Hon. Sec. to the Anti-Compulsory Vaccination League,
moved “that a memorial be presented to the Lords of Her Majesty’s Privy
Council, praying them to suspend the vaccination laws until the inquiry,
promised by the Government, had been made,” and said, that similar
requests had been made several times, and that so far back as 1856, the
government had promised a committee of the House of Commons, which
promise was evaded. Instead of a committee an _exparte_ investigation
was made by sending a string of questions to a number of interested
doctors, who, of course upheld the system. This course was much the same
as if the late Royal Commission on Trades Unions had written to the
secretaries of the various unions, to enquire how they worked. If a
question had been asked of Broadhead, respecting the Saw-Grinders’ Union,
of course, he would have reported that it was working satisfactorily.
Mr. Gibbs said, that the League would be satisfied with nothing less than
a full investigation of the Medical Trades Unions. He then adverted to
the case of the Rev. H. J. Allen, who had appealed to the Court of
Queen’s Bench against a second conviction, which conviction had been
upheld by the Court, and Mr. Allen left to pay a lawyer’s bill of over
£30. He trusted that the lovers of freedom would assist him in his
difficulties. Mr. Gibbs then referred to the important testimony, lately
adduced by medical gentlemen in Manchester and elsewhere, that the evil
results of vaccination were often apparent after “successful” operations
with “pure lymph,” and reminded the audience that it was from the effects
of such an operation, that Sir Culling Eardley, and many others had died.
In view of such uncertainties, Mr. Gibbs argued that it was cruel to
enforce the prisoning of the community.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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