30 Pa. Super. 631 | Pa. Super. Ct. | 1906
Opinion by
‘ The defendant was tried and convicted of “ entering upon the practice of medicine and surgery and practice of the same without having obtained from the medical council of Pennsylvania a license to practice medicine and surgery,” in violation of the requirements of the Act of May 18, 1893, P. L. 94.
The facts were undisputed and the court assumed the duty of instructing the jury, that the defendant should be found guilty on the second count in the indictment, and not guilty on the first and third ones. The whole question was reviewed
The registration in Susquehanna county in 1897 was of no avail, inasmuch as the act of 1893, specially provides in the 15th section, that such registration under the act of 1881 to be a sufficient warrant to practice medicine and surgery shall be made prior to March 1,1894. Registration after that date was outside the limitation of the act and was fruitless as a defense. The propriety as well as the necessity for such restrictive legislation has been fully considered by our courts. In regard to this particular act in In re Registration of Campbell, 197 Pa. 581, it is said “the Act of May 18, 1893, P. L. 94 is a valid and constitutional exercise of the police power of the state upon a subject plainly within that power, and urgently in need of control by it. So far as any federal question is supposed to be involved it is set at rest by Dent v. West Virginia, 129 U. S. 114 (9 Sup. Ct. Repr. 231), in which the supreme court of the United States pronounced an almost identical statute of West Virginia to be free from repugnancy to the constitution of the United States or the fourteenth amendment. In regard to the questions raised under the constitution of Pennsylvania, it would be sufficient to refer to Com. v. Finn, 11 Pa. Superior Ct. 620.” The present chief justice reviews the previous legislation on the subject and conclusively settles the necessity for a proper registration by all who ask the protection of our laws
The judgment is affirmed.