Lewis & Doctors

Equipped with chin whiskers which give him the traditional appearance of a doctor, Illinois' little Senator James Hamilton Lewis lives up to it by taking a lively interest in medicine. To members of the profession, however, Senator Lewis' whiskers may well seem less medical than Mephistophelean. Last month he appeared before the convention of the American Medical Association to predict that doctors were in danger of becoming nationalized as officers of the Federal Government in recompense for which the Government might pay the medical bills of citizens who could not afford to do so themselves (TIME, June 21). Last week, Senator Lewis took a step toward making the nationalization of doctors a reality by introducing a bill in the Senate to make all U. S. physicians and surgeons civil officers of the Government. The bill's provisions: "Any such physician or surgeon shall render such medical or surgical aid requested of him by any impoverished individual who is in need of such aid, and, where necessary, to order the hospitalization of any such individual. Any hospital to which such an order is directed shall, in so far as its facilities permit, provide for the hospitalization and care of any such individual in the manner best adapted to accomplish his recovery." The Social Security Board is to be "authorized and directed to pay" all bill's so created. Any patient or doctor who cheats is to be fined $1,000, jailed for three months, or both.

Senator Lewis's bill has little chance of passage by the present Congress, conditions being so tumultuous. Nonetheless the A. M. A.'s alert officers last week immediately denounced their bogeyman's motion. Spoke up Secretary Olin West: ". . . The Lewis measure appears opposed to every policy that the organized medical profession has stood for."

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