Medical Jurisprudence, Volume 1 (of 3)Paris, John Ayrton
Science
Medical Jurisprudence, Volume 1 (of 3)
Paris, John Ayrton
Medical laws and legislation -- Great Britain
“_Holt_ Ch. J. said, it seemed to him that the Censors may tender an
oath as a necessary consequence of their judicial power; but said he
would give no positive opinion.” _Dr. Grenville_ v _Coll. of Phys._ 12
_Mod._ 392. 16 _Vin. Ab._ 345. the general rule is, that where a statute
confers a power, the law supplies all necessary incidents required for
its execution.
By the 10th _Geo._ 1. _cap._ 20. _s._ 7. Where any person is condemned
by the Censors for not well executing, practising, or using the faculty
of Physic, he may within fourteen days after notice appeal to the
College, and the judgment given on such appeal shall be final. Sect. 3.
of the same act gives a similar right of appeal to Apothecaries. But
this Act, as we have before observed, has expired; should its enactments
ever be revived, this right of appeal should not be omitted, for it is
expedient that some control should be exercised over all summary
jurisdictions. To the policy of the 3d and 6th sections we cannot so
readily give our assent; the one exempts drugs in merchants warehouses
from search, and the other enacts that Patentees for the sole making any
medicine shall not be prejudiced thereby. By the first of these the
Censors are excluded from some known manufactories of factitious drugs,
and an important security is taken away from our export trade, for it is
evident that foreigners would more readily buy the drugs which have
passed through our hands, if they were assured that their quality had
been subjected to strict and competent scrutiny. To Patent Medicines we
may be allowed to avow our most decided hostility, and as it is
notorious that the greater part of them are not made up according to
their specifications, we may without charge of illiberal prejudice claim
for the public some security that the preparations which they buy as
“_mild vegetable extracts_,” may not be clandestinely poisoned with
Antimony, Mercury, and Arsenic. It may be said that the public have a
remedy by the forfeiture of the Patent consequent on the falsehood of
the specification, but this can only be effected by an expensive process
to which the mere purchaser of a phial of trash may not choose to
subject himself, even if he have skill enough to detect the fraud
practised upon him.[101]
We have thus shown by repeated precedents that none can legally practise
Physic in London, or within seven miles circuit of the city, who are not
either Fellows or Licenciates of the College, nor can any, except
Graduates in Physic of Oxford and Cambridge, lawfully practise in the
country, without a similar license; yet, as the Act of Parliament has
annexed no specific penalty to the transgression, the only remedy in
such case is by indictment for a misdemeanor: for where there is no
punishment attached by statute to the violation of a prohibitory clause
in an Act of Parliament, this indictment lies. (See 4 _Term Rep._ 202.)
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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