262 Pa. 345 | Pa. | 1918
Opinion by
The appellant is under conviction and sentence in the Court of Quarter Sessions of Philadelphia County, November Term, 1916, under a bill of indictment charging that within the jurisdiction of the court and at the times specified he did then and there unlawfully engage in the practice of medicine and surgery, publicly professing to cure and heal diseases, nervous disorders, displacements, injuries and ailments by means of a certain system and treatment known as neuropathy, without first having received a certificate of licensure from the Bureau of Medical Education and Licensure, contrary to the act of assembly in such case made and provided. Appeal was taken from the judgment so rendered to the Superior Court, complaining of numerous errors alleged to have been committed in the court below. The appeal there was dismissed and the present appeal is from the judgment of the Superior Court. We shall not undertake to consider separately the numerous errors assigned inasmuch as the case presents but two questions and the
“That on and after January first, nineteen hundred and twelve it shall not be lawful for any person in the State of Pennsylvania to engage in the practice of medicine and surgery, or to hold himself or herself forth as a practitioner in medicine or surgery, or doctor of any specific disease, or to diagnose diseases, or to treat diseases by the use of medicines and surgery, or to sign a death certificate, or to hold himself or herself forth as able to do so, excepting those hereinafter exempted, unless he or she had first fulfilled the requirements of this act and has received a certificate of licensure from the Bureau of Medical Education and Licensure created by this act, which license shall be properly recorded in the office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction at Harrisburg.”
Taking the facts with respect to appellant’s line of conduct to be just as disclosed by the evidence adduced by the Commonwealth — and it may be here observed that no attempt was made on the trial nor here to controvert the correctness of any of them, — the first question that arises is: do these facts show a violation of the provisions of the Act of 3 June, 1911, P. L. 639, above quoted? and second, is the act in question a constitutional exercise of legislative power? The issues are thus stated and argued in appellant’s, brief as submitted: (a) is the practice of neuropathy, the practice of medicine? (b) is it the practice of a branch of medicine? (c) or a separate science? and second, is the Act of 1911, as amended, constitutional so far as it relates to neuropathy? Appellant’s line of conduct embraced the following acts, as stated with entire correctness in appellant’s history of the case; the defendant, a resident of the City of Philadelphia, had there engaged in the treatment of persons
The other question raised is as to- the constitutionality of the statute. The same question was raised in the ease of In re Registration of Campbell, 197 Pa. 581, where the earlier Act of 18 May, 1893, supplied by the present act, was involved. An examination will show that, so far as the present objections are urged as to the constitutionality of the act under which the defendant was convicted,