California v. New York

(See front cover) Lucifer, who was thrown out of Heaven for wanting to carry his particular Light to mankind, would have grinned sardonically had he looked up through the floor of an official chamber in Manhattan last week. Dr. Walter Bernard Coffey of San Francisco was again asking the State of New York's Department of Social Welfare permission to open a cancer research laboratory and clinic at Huntington, L. I. (TIME, March 23). His cohorts surrounded him. Opposed were Dr. John Augustus Hartwell, president of the New York Academy of Medicine, spokesman for organized Medicine, and his cohorts.

The simple question was: Should the State authorize the cancer clinic? But in the train of that simple question came a most extraordinary range of considerations--the nature and cause of cancer; the nature and authenticity of the Coffey-Humber cancer treatment; medical ethics, human nature, public policy, money, fame, and even national politics. Representing great wealth, prestige, knowledge and political power, the contestants in this greatest medical fight of many a year in some degree represented buoyant, bouncing, sometimes crass California against balanced, urbane, sometimes effete New York.

The Protagonists-- In the room were: Dr. Coffey, 63, square-faced, burly, choleric.* He is chief surgeon of Southern Pacific Co. and Dollar Steamship Lines. For the railroad he has 600 doctors working under him. They care for 70,000 railroad men and their families. On the principle that ''the health of the community is the wealth of the railroad," Dr. Coffey's staff help public health officials throughout the railroad's territory. Dr. Coffey is an important California executive and a political power in the State. Professionally he is a surgeon. Characteristically he is an empiricist. "What works must be good.'' His first case, when he began practice in San Francisco 35 years ago, was a Negro who needed a minor operation. When the Negro saw the operating scissors he hauled on his clothes and ran. Dr. Coffey ran after. He, very poor, needed that first fee. A patrolman halted the patient and made him return to Dr. Coffey's office. Under threat of the patrolman's club the Negro, howling, submitted to cutting, paid his small fee, left. Dr. Coffey was obliged to give part of his small fee to the patrolman, who argued that he was the anesthetist.

Dr. John Davis Humber, 36, short & stocky, pallid from years of laboratory work. He worked out, under Dr. Coffey's direction, the anatomy of the sympathetic nervous system. Together they have proved that the sympathetic system carries sensations of pain, that the terrific pain of angina pectoris is sympathetic. Dr. Coffey stops the pain by cutting sympathetic nerves in the neck. The Coffey-Humber sympathetic studies led them to their cancer work.

Mrs. Grace Isabell Hammond Conners, 31, the slim, comely, brown-eyed, determined widow of the late William James ("Fingy") Conners, Buffalo steamship, newspaper and political tycoon. The Connerses lived so gaily at "The Monastery," their estate at Huntington, Long Island, that since he died (1929) she has refused to return there. (One of the rooms is paved with old tombstones.) She also gave up the motorboat racing at which she was enthusiastically expert. Last summer while she was traveling in California and thinking of founding a children's home somewhere with her inherited wealth (she is a devout Roman Catholic convert), she heard of the Coffey-Humber cancer work in San Francisco. She visited the Southern Pacific General Hospital unannounced and found the patients praising Coffey, Humber and God. Injections they had received had relieved their pain. Their cancerous growths were sloughing off. Mrs. Conners was persuaded that Drs. Coffey & Humber were on the track of a positive cure for cancer. Later, in Manhattan, Mrs. Conners met the Californians personally. For their further experimental work they could have, she then told them, "The Monastery" which with its 15 acres was worth $1,000,000. She would also see that they had an endowment. Dr. Coffey replied that he would accept the gift only in the name of the Better Health Foundation of California.

Celestine James Sullivan, 58, doctor of laws, is secretary of the Better Health Foundation. Its purpose is to improve general health in California. To that end it cooperates with California medical schools and research institutions (like the Hooper Foundation); publishes health advice in the daily papers; prints Better Health, a magazine like the American Medical Association's Hygeia. Dr. Sullivan, physically a huge man, when he learned of the proposed Conners gift, went to

C. Walcott Durbrow, 51, the physically tiny valuation counsel of the Southern Pacific. Mr. Durbrow was in Washington early last week, trying a case before the Supreme Court of the U. S. He dashed to New York to try to consummate the legal work he began in San Francisco last autumn. That work was the chartering of a New York Better Health Foundation to take possession of "The Monastery." His legal correspondent in New York is

Herbert Livingston Satterlee, 67, silver-haired, silver-bearded, blue-eyed corporation lawyer and humanitarian. Near him as he stood at the Manhattan hearing last week sat his wife, who is John Pierpont Morgan's sister. She knew that this cancer dogfight was distracting Mr. Satterlee from his battle to get back for depositors the savings they entrusted to the failed Bank of U. S. (TIME, Dec. 22 et seq.). She knew how he had got into the cancer fight: at Lawyer Durbrow's request. Mr. Satterlee had organized the New York Better Health Foundation. Then he had learned of harsh medical opposition to the Coffey-Humber work. Why should they not have opportunity to work in New York as in California? he wondered. Let them have opportunity to prove their value or their futility. He dashed into the professional battle with all his tenacity and brilliance, despite the fact that some of his best friends, potent New York medicine men, were opposing him.*

Dr. John Augustus Hartwell, 61, president of the New York Academy of Medicine, a great surgeon and teacher, is one of those friends. He and Mr. Satterlee sat immaculate at opposite ends of a long table. They intermittently scowled and smiled at each other. Dr. Hartwell, a tall, bald, big-boned, well-groomed gentleman, thoroughly hated his chore of speaking for New York medicine. But he and most of his associates want Drs. Coffey & Humber and their cancer extract kept away from New York. They are positive that the Californians have no scientific foundation for their work and claims. They fear that the hope of a Coffey-Humber cancer cure will persuade the cancerous to abandon the orthodox treatment of surgery, X-rays and radium. To support his arguments he had present the presidents of every county medical society in and adjacent to New York City. In addition he had:

Dr. Clarence Cook Little, 42, onetime (1925-29) president of the University of Michigan, now managing director of the American Society for the Control of Cancer. His Society for the Control of Cancer, he explained, took no side on the Coffey-Humber matter. But he personally believed that Drs. Coffey & Humber had better follow up their work in California. Dr. Francis Carter Wood, 61, the ruddy, learned director of the Crocker Institute of Cancer Research, editor of the new American Journal of Cancer (TIME, Jan. 12) was also present. Dr. Wood is one of his country's greatest experimenters in cancer. Francis Patrick Garvan and his Chemical Foundation act upon everything that Dr. Wood says regarding cancer. He said last week that there was no established merit in the Coffey-Humber extract; better leave it alone.

Dr. Burton Thorn Simpson, 58, the rotund, chubby director of the New York State Institute for the Study of Malignant Disease at Buffalo, spoke for himself and for Dr. Thomas Parran, State Commissioner of health. Dr. Simpson agreed with the other Easterners.

Dr. Shirley Wilmott Wynne, 48, New York City's health commissioner, who has a row on with the New York Academy of Medicine and other local medical organizations (he believes in socialized medicine; they do not), sat through four hours of the hearing, on a hard seat, hard-eyed, alert. Dr. Hartwell, prosecutor for the opposition against Drs. Coffey & Humber, asked Dr. Wynne if he would say something. Said he with the others: "There are enough institutions for cancer work in and around New York City. We don't need another. Let Drs. Coffey & Humber supply our institutions with their extract. We'll give it a fair trial." Dr. James Ewing, 64, to whom Medicine paid rare homage this year (TIME, Jan. 12) was the delight of the whole hearing. He knew everybody and everything they knew about cancer. Dark, wearing dark glasses, slightly stoop-shouldered, he would sit slumped into a chair until cramped. Then he would limp out to the hall for a few puffs at a cigaret. Between puffs he would take a whimsical glance at the tense group of recriminating doctors and lawyers, whose time for the afternoon was worth at least $100,000. Cancer Situation, When the time came for Dr. Ewing to give his opinion, the cancer situation was well understood. Cancer is, after heart disease, the worst killer in the U. S.--111,569 in 1929, more in 1930, still more for 1931. (Federal data.) The cause is undetermined. Best thought advises minute study of both healthy and abnormal cells. At present the only approved method of attacking cancer is to recognize its presence quickly (the propaganda of the American Society for the Control of Cancer) and then to destroy the malignant growths by surgery (knife or cautery), X-rays or radium, alone or in combination. They can cure certain types of cancer in reachable parts of the body. They also, especially X-rays and radium, can do profound harm. Sometimes a cancer clears up of its own accord and gives the charlatan cause for boasting. With advanced cases of cancer, the specialist can only make the victim more comfortable while he slowly, painfully dies. Coffey-Humber Extract Drs. Coffey & Humber make a water extract from a part of the cortex (not the entire cortex as those not in the secret believe) of the adrenal glands of sheep. That cortical extract is a vasodilator, it relaxes the blood vessels. The walls of the blood vessels are threaded with sympathetic nerve fibres which, Drs. Coffey & Humber are positive, transmit the pain of cancer. Very quickly after a sufferer gets a Coffey-Humber injection, his pain quiets, and in 71% of the cases disappears. In most of the cases who do not die (Drs. Coffey & Humber will treat only the moribund, cases rejected as hopeless by at least two reputable doctors), the cancer becomes necrotic, ceases to smell, and sloughs off leaving a clean hole. That undeniably happens. Why that happens is debatable. Drs. Coffey & Humber reason a priori and inductively that cancer is a constitutional disease; that some principle in the body, probably a hormone, regulates cell growth; that when that principle becomes scant or disappears, body cells (flesh or bone) are apt to efflorate noxiously. Empirically they began some three years ago to locate that principle. After 211 experiments with various organs they found their principle --they sincerely believe--in a part of the adrenal cortex. If they have a cure or a palliative for cancer--they are uncertain of the cure, positive of the palliation--the rewards are stupendous in fame and wealth. For the wealth they care little. Dr. Coffey's professional income is more than $50,000 yearly, from the Southern Pacific, the Dollar Line, and private surgery. Dr. Humber "makes a living." His wife Agnes, a War nurse, is content. Say they: let the Better Health Foundations in New York and California get the royalties for the manufacture of Coffey-Humber extract. (They patented the process of extraction last year, before they knew exactly what they had, primarily to keep the drug away from quacks.) But for fame the two men--Dr. Coffey. 63, and Dr. Humber, 36--are avid. "A Square Deal" When Dr. Swing's turn came last week to say why Drs. Coffey & Humber should be excluded from New York, he was a benign Dutch uncle: "The most important question is whether Drs. Coffey and Humber are getting a square deal from the organized medical profession. I am very much concerned about that. A good many physicians have said that it would be a great pity if the organized medical profession should by virtue of its power prevent competent investigators from carrying out research of great value. "Strong financial, social and political forces have been enlisted in California and elsewhere to support the Coffey-Humber process. It has more backing than any other cancer remedy ever put forward. Therefore, there is no danger of them missing a square deal. "I advise you [Dr. Coffey and Dr. Humber] not to push this undertaking in New York in the face of this organized opposition. Confine your activities to California for the present. Other men have been burnt by cancer remedies. I've been burnt by one or two myself." Last Word. The New York State Department of Social Welfare which conducted hearings last week and in March on the Coffey-Humber fight, issued no immediate decision on the Coffey-Humber permit. It is not stretching a point to say that this decision involves Governor Franklin Delano Roosevelt's candidacy as Democratic Presidential nominee. Ambitious Governor & Mrs. Roosevelt are striving mightily to build up voters' goodwill and sympathy. (So preoccupied is he especially, that Mrs. Roosevelt must make specific appointments for any of their five children and two grandchildren to visit him.) Governor Roosevelt dares not alienate the powerful medical profession and its allied professions, arts and businesses. And he needs, apart from the populace, the goodwill and co-operation of political machines. In California Dr. Coffey, chief surgeon of the Southern Pacific and the Dollar Line, is a powerful political force. If Californian Coffey is not treated well in New York, New Yorker Roosevelt might not be well-treated by Californians at the Democratic nominating convention. Most potent of all is William Randolph Hearst, whose 23 newspapers have been whooping characteristically for Coffey-Humber cancer extract. In his own State, with Tammany Hall in New York City lukewarm to him, Governor Roosevelt has need of solid support from Buffalo. Mrs. Conners' late husband was the Democratic boss of western New York. Although his namesake, her stepson, who has the heritage and power of the Buffalo Courier-Express, keeps his newspaper free from partisanship, the Conners machine still grinds. There was real power in Mrs. Conners' exclamation after last week's Coffey-Humber hearing ended: "What's good in California should be good in New York! If they [organized Medicine] won't let Dr. Coffey take my estate and stop the sufferings of human beings, I'll see Governor Roosevelt myself."

* He has high blood pressure. At the hearing he carried in his pocket a soothing telegram from Mrs. Coffey, urging him to keep his temper. * Other Eastern directors of the New York Better Health Foundation are James Joseph Irwin Jr., Lawyer Satterlee's junior partner (David Milton, son-in-law of John Davison Rockefeller Jr. is another junior partner); and Dennis Russell Scanlon, pugnacious, square-headed young Irishman who has risked the prosperity of his surgical instrument business to fight Coffey-Humber opponents.

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