The great crime of the nineteenth century : why it is committed? Who are the criminals? How shall they be detected? How shall they be punished? / by Edwin M. Hale, M.D.

Edwin Moses Hale

Date:: 1867

Credit: The great crime of the nineteenth century : why it is committed? Who are the criminals? How shall they be detected? How shall they be punished? / by Edwin M. Hale, M.D. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, Harvard Medical School.

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$Still another class of criminals should be reached by the law—namely, those who advise women to resort to crim- inal abortion, and those who instruct them in the use of drugs or instruments for that purpose. This class is larger than has been generally supposed. It includes tlfree spe- cies of criminals ; id) unprincipled women who are in the habit of taking some drug, or using some instrument on themselves, and advise their female friends in their use; (J) venal nurses, quasi lecturers on physiology, health, etc., whose vile trail can be tracked all over this country, by the abortions which occur in their path; {c) ]3hysicians who have not the strength of principle requisite for all occa- sions, and who are influenced by entreaties and bribes to disclose to the erring woman, some means by which she destroys the child in utero. Physicians are more annoyed and troubled by the im- portumities of their female patients, than persons out of the profession, can have any idea. I have already referred to this when speaking of the inducements to the commis- sion of the crime. These three species of criminals should be brought to justice, if possible, and a requisite punishment meted out to them. The two first species mentioned have become a real pest in the land, and are rapidly increasing. Every physician of any practice will bear me out in this asser- tion. Were some severe penalty affixed to this form of participation in the crime, it would make a notable de- crease in the number of abortions caused, especially in the ratio of embryocides. There are other real accessories hefore the fact, whom no law can at present be framed to reach. Criminals, who, without resorting to drugs, instruments, or other forcible measures, are nevertheless guilty of causing, indirectly, the destruction of the unborn child. We are told in the Word, there are sins of omission as well as sins of commission. We will briefiy explain what is meant by the sin of omis- sion.^ in this connection. It is a fact well known to medical men, and of which the public are not entirely ignorant, that certain general or local diseases tend directly to cause abortion. From these causes the uterus is unable to retain and support the im-$