I therefore think it is perfectly obvious that to thus degrade a loyal and honorable soldier and condemn him like a felonious criminal to the long term of fifteen or twenty-five years’ imprisonment, merely for the act of refusing to have a dangerous medical operation and an inflicted disease forced upon his body against his will and consent, is clearly an “unreasonable seizure” of the person and a “cruel and unusual” and excessive and unreasonable punishment prohibited in the Constitution; and I think that no further argument is necessary to prove this point. Surely to inflict such drastic punishments as above shown--not for any really criminal, immoral, or perfidious act--not for anything that really affects the purely military duties, qualities, or services of any loyal, honorable and healthy soldier--but simply for opposing a dangerous medical dogma and defending his body against an inflicted disease and a dangerous medical operation which frequently sickens and unfits the soldier for a long time afterwards for military service and sometimes actually kills--as already clearly proved--surely, I say, such a punishment is not only legally unconstitutional, but is morally barbarous in both a true military and true medical sense, and should be abolished in both Army and Navy for the several reasons herein submitted. HARSH MILITARY PUNISHMENTS CONDEMNED BY AMERICAN BAR ASSOCIATION In the _New York Tribune_ of January 4, 1919, the President of the American Bar Association, at a meeting in New York City on January 3d, condemned harsh and unjust judgments of military courts-martial, and stated that “_our military laws and our systems of administering military justice are unworthy of the name of law or justice_.” He also said that our army was still following rules copied from England in 1774, but which were abandoned long ago as better suited “_to the armies of feudal times than to the citizen armies of a modern republic_.” He also condemned “the outrageous punishments meted out by our courts-martial for comparatively slight breaches of military discipline.” And he further stated that “Punishments are not only grossly harsh, as compared with the penalties imposed for like offences by our criminal courts, but they also differ so widely that we find the same offence punished in one court-martial by twenty-five years in the penitentiary and in another by six months in disciplinary barracks.” ... “The accused soldier has no real legal protection.” ... “The maintenance of military discipline does not require this harsh and arbitrary procedure. The French army is a model of discipline, but an accused soldier has the protection of the law thrown around him at every stage of his trial. That a soldier in our army should have less legal protection challenges the attention of the lawyers of the country. The American people never will stand for Prussian methods even in disciplining the Army.”