John Kidd

“ It is equally as noble in communities, as in individuals, to acknowledge and amend an error; as it is ignoble to persist in it: and it must be admitted by every unprejudiced inquirer that, had all the existing institutions of the medical profession always adhered to the spirit of their original foundations, many of the present evils would have been prevented. ”

“ To the demand that of every candidate for a medical license, such an examination should be required as might shew a due qualification to practise either as a "physician," or a "surgeon," or as a "general practitioner," there does not seem any reasonable objection; nay, it is quite expedient that every candidate for a medical license should be so qualified. For, although it is true, as is observed in a very judicious and candid article on Medical Reform in the "Quarterly Review" of December 1840, that very few physicians practise surgery in this country ”

“ And this circumstance affords perhaps the best apology for any one within the pale of the profession, who, as in the present instance, proposes to offer his observations on the subject of Medical Reform: for thus other individuals, and more especially those from whom alone any national legislative measure can proceed, may probably be induced to examine the question more accurately, and be enabled to elicit more appropriate and important information. ”

“ The English Universities grant medical degrees, with a license to practise throughout England, except in London, and within seven miles around; to practise within which limits even Cambridge and Oxford medical graduates must have the license of the London College of Physicians. The license, however, of Cambridge and Oxford graduates to practise elsewhere carries with it no protection, for any one, qualified or not, may do the same. ”

“ And it ought to be particularly noticed, that although each of those judges gave a decision against the licentiates, yet they each observed, that, according both to the spirit and the letter of the original statutes of the College, the licentiates were admissible to the fellowship after due examination: but, inasmuch as the fellows were empowered to make by-laws, and the licentiates had accepted their license under those by-laws, the College could not be compelled to admit those as fellows who had accepted their license under laws which excluded them from the fellowship. ”

“ And not only the candidate himself, if found fit, has a personal right, but the public has also a right to his service; and that, not only as a physician, but as an officer in the College in the offices to which he will upon admission become eligible."
Lord Mansfield, having expressed his opinion on the same occasion, that the practice of establishing licentiates probably grew out of what he denominates an "illegal by-law, which formerly had restrained the number of the fellows to twenty," allowed that "the College, as now constituted, is at present to be considered as the body corporate." ”

“ With respect to the future condition of existing institutions, there appears nothing in the least derogatory to their dignity; nor, which is of much more consequence, to their professional utility and efficiency, in considering them henceforth as independent scientific societies ”

“ At present a much wider view is taken of that question; and in order to afford some data on which an opinion may be founded as to the expediency and requisite extent of Medical Reform, the following facts are mentioned as partially explanatory of the actual state of the profession.
It appears that there are no less than nineteen sources of examination for licenses or degrees in medicine; of which as many as seventeen are in constant operation: viz.—
It is a fact, at first hardly credible, that scarcely one of these institutions can afford legal protection to its members ”

“ The College, having the privilege of making by-laws, by degrees introduced distinctions among its members; admitting some applicants as fellows, and eligible to the offices—admitting others under the name of licentiates, with powers of practising medicine equally extensive as those of the fellows; but ineligible to college offices, as not being considered fellows. ”

“ It is important to observe, that during the period between lord Mansfield's and lord Kenyon's decisions, the positive number of the licentiates had been much increased; and the proportional number much more increased; and among them were many individuals distinguished, not only by their eminence in medicine and its allied sciences, but also in classical and general literature (as indeed lord Mansfield had acknowledged to be the case in his own time) ”