-Caveat Lector-
an excerpt from:
The Strange Death of FRANKLIN D. ROOSEVELT
A History of the Roosevelt-Delano Dynasty America's Royal Family
Emanuael M. Josephson©1948
CHEDNEY PRESS
127 East 69th Street
New York 21, N. Y.
--[11]--
CHAPTER XI
INFANTILE PARALYSIS
"MY GEORGIA WARM SPRINGS BUSINESS"
In August 1921, Franklin Delano Roosevelt yachted to his summer home
at Campobello, New Brunswick, with his employer Van Lear Black. There he
succumbed to a paralyzing illness which had only recently begun to appear on
an extensive scale in this country. The disease was called poliomyelitis or
infantile paralysis by an orthopedic specialist who was not a spe-cialist on
acute infectious diseases.
Many rumors have circulated about the true character of Franklin Delano
Roosevelt's, illness. The rumors relate that he was delirious for an extended
period in the acute stage of the illness. They point out that it left him
with mental stigmata that are not characteristic of true poliomyelitis; that
his judgement became impaired and he became so highly suggestible that he
would agree with everyone and act on the counsel of the last person who
advised him; and that he suffered from prolonged and uncontrollable attacks,
or fits, of excitement and laughing alternating with depression and crying,
that often were brought on by displeasure and stress at being thwarted, and
sometimes by the pleasure; and were publicly witnessed on a number of
occasions.
So persistent were these rumors that Dr. Lindley Rudd Williams, son-in-law of
Kidder of the Morgan affiliate, Kidder, Peabody and Company, and director of
the Rockefeller subsidized New York Academy of Medicine, was called upon,
just prior to the Presidential nomination, in 1932, to write for Collier's
Magazine an article vouching for the state of Roosevelt's physical and mental
health.
Roosevelt's condition can be very simply explained. There are two types of
"infantile paralysis". There is the type that involves the spinal cord and
only the lower, respiratory areas of the brain. That is known as
poliomyelitis. This condition had become fairly well-known to the American
medical profession after the severe epidemic of 1916.
There is a second type of "infantile paralysis" that was very little known
and rarely recognized in 1921. Prior to that time it had begun to appear
extensively among animals, especially horses; and to the veterinarians it was
known as- equine encephalomyelitis. In 1932, the first extensive human
epidemic of the disease occurred in St. Louis.
The encephalomyelitic form of "infantile paralysis" also causes paralysis
involving the spine and the lower centers of the brain. But in addition it
involves the upper centers of the brain and generally damages them severely.
Sometimes the disease assumes the form of "sleeping sickness". But almost
always it leaves mental stigmata in addition to paralysis.
It is reasonably certain that Franklin Delano Roosevelt suffered from an
attack of encephalomyelitis that was unrecognized because his was among the
earliest group of human cases in this country. The diagnosis serves to
explain the stigmata above mentioned. Eleanor Roosevelt and shrewd and loyal
Louis Howe, carefully withheld the facts regarding F. D. R.'s true condition
for fear that it would interfere with his career, if he recovered.
On his recovery, and his return to business, Franklin Delano Roosevelt became
involved in a series of malodorous, messy stock flotations that the S. E. C.
would now label highly fraudulent. There was absolutely no need for him to
become entangled in such deals because of the many friends, relatives and
business associates indebted to him anent war activities.
It is obvious that his judgement was far from what it might be and that it
was so seriously impaired that he was excessively suggestible and too easily
talked into things.
George Foster Peabody, New York confederate of Rockefeller, approached F.D.R.
during his recovery, in 1924, with a story of a Georgian, helpless victim of
infantile paralysis who had recovered from the paralysis sufficiently to
walk, by swimming in a pool at Warm Springs, Georgia. Peabody had bought the
Springs and wanted to turn them over to him. Roosevelt visited the Springs
and Louis Howe was on the job to see that he got a good press. A syndicated
article entitled "Swimming Back to Health" brought Warm Springs into the
limelight and kept the spot on F. D. R. The article brought a number of
victims of infantile paralysis to the, Springs. Roosevelt accepted Warm
Springs from Peabody, attracted the attention of the Orthopedic Society, at
its convention in Atlanta in 1926, by the device of asking. for an
investigation; and organized it as a hydrotherapeutic institute under the
supervision of Dr. Le Roy W. Hubbard of the New York State Department of
Health. In July 1926, at about the time that he invited investigation by the
Orthopedic Society, F. D. R. organized in Delaware a business corporation
that has been carefully shielded from the public eye, the Georgia Warm
Springs Foundation Inc. of Delaware. Title to the property was placed in this
holding company. Not even Lindley, Roosevelt's biographer knew about it.
According to Ernest K. Lindley, in his "Franklin D. Roosevelt, A Career in
Progressive Democracy," Georgia Warm Springs Foundation was incorporated in
the State of New York in January, 1927, to be given title to the Warm Springs
property obtained from George Foster Peabody. Lindley does not relate the
accurate data contained in the following let[t]er, which has entirely escaped
his notice:
STATE OF DELAWARE
OFFICE OF SECRETARY OF STATE
Dover, Del.
March 6, 1936
Walter Dent Smith
Secretary of State
Dr. Emanuel M. Josephson 108 East 81st Street
New York City
"Dear Sir:
"Replying to your communication of February 1, kindly be advised the Georgia
Warm Springs Foundation, Inc., inco[r]porated under the laws of this State
June 29, 1926, changed its name to Meriwether Reserve Inc. by Amendment filed
in this Department August 1, 1927.
The annual report filed for the year 1934 shows of-fice at 120
Broadway, New York City, together with the following named officers and
directors:
President, Hon. Franklin D. Roosevelt, The White House, Washington, D. C.
Vice President and Assistant Secretary, Raymond H. Taylor, 120 Broadway, New
York City.
Secretary-Treasurer, Basil O'Connor, 120 Broadway, New York City.
Assistant Treasurer, Arthur Carpenter, Warm Springs, Ga.
Directors, Hon. Franklin D. Roosevelt, Basil O'Connor, Raymond H. Taylor.
"Delaware corporations are not required to file, a list of stockholders in
this Department; therefore, we regret to be unable to furnish you with same."
"Yours truly,
"(Signed) Walter Dent Smith,
Secretary of State."
The existence of a holding company, obscure and hidden from public gaze, in
the President's widely publicized philanthropy, strikes one with justifiable
surprise. For President Roosevelt fought holding corporations of this type
with the utmost venom and vigor. If Georgia Warm Springs is a private
commercial activity of the President, one would have expected his own
pronouncements in the case of Mayor James Walker to impel him to take the
public into the secret, rather than to hide it in an obscure Delaware
corporation. The generous gifts of the nation, amounting to millions of
dollars in the past two decades, should have compelled a frank publication of
the accounts of this "holding company." But an inquiry directed to the
Treasurer of the Foundation, Basil 0'Connor, law partner of the President,
elicited the fol. lowing reply:
GEORGIA WARM SPRINGS FOUNDATION, INC.
120 Broadway
New York
President
Hon. Franklin D. Roosevelt
Treasurer Basil O'Connor
July lst, 1935
Dear Sir:
No annual reports have been issued by Georgia Warm Springs Foundation, Inc.
MERIWETHER RESERVE, INC., (DELAWARE) HOLDS TITLE TO THE PROPERTY.
Very truly yours,
(Signed) Basil O'Connor
Treasurer
The source of the half million dollars required for purchasing the
surrounding property and the initial development of the Springs was kept a
secret even from Lindley. He stated that "where this money came from has
always been a mystery." (ibid p. 211). The names of only two of the donors
were released, be. cause they had no political implications. Henry Pope of
Chicago gave twenty thousand dollars, and Frank C. Root of Greenwich,
Connecticut, an unspecified sum. It may be reasonably inferred that the
Rockefeller-Morgan-Ryan-Dodge group were as generous in their donations to
Roosevelt's venture as they were to his campaign funds. They had spent
considerable time and funds in grooming the heir-apparent of the Dynasty as
their tool. His illness made him potentially even more valuable for the role
for which he was beIng groomed. But his identification with their interests
by publishing their names and contributions would be politically bad.
Mr. and Mrs. Edsel Ford, Lindley relates, contributed the money to build a
glass-enclosed pool; and other gifts were received for specific purposes. The
literature of the Foundation states vaguely:
"The funds required by the initial capital in-vestments were subscribed by
the Governor and a group of his friends"*.
By 1927 Roosevelt and the Dynasty felt that his build-up had been sufficient
to insure victory at the polls; and the Rockefeller-Morgan crowd felt that
their plans would soon call for a change in political party on the national
scene, just as had been done in 1920 to appease popular clamor, and decided
to take their synthetic "statesman" out of mothballs. That he was directed no
longer to refuse political office is indicated by the sudden change of name
of the Georgia Warm Springs Foundation, Inc. of Delaware, the business
corporation, on August 1, 1927, to Meriwether Reserve Inc.
To be sure, in the following year, Smith, Lehman, Raskob, and others at
Albany, made a great show of extending the nomination to F. D. R. across the
coun. try at Georgia Warm Springs. Roosevelt made the grand-stand Caesarian
play of thrice rejecting it with truly royal disdain. Louis Howe saw to it
that the press was at hand and ate it up. The entire country was being held
in suspense.
" . . . he put it by thrice, every time gentler than the other; and
at every putting-by mine hon-est neighbors shouted." (Julius Caesar, Act 1,
Sc. II.)
Julius Caesar and his "falling sickness" were child's play as compared with
this scene for rousing public sympathy. Far indeed has the art of perverting
public opinion progressed.
Finally Roosevelt who never missed a chance to turn an easy penny, interposed
what he pretended was his main "objection" to accepting the nomination:
" . . . my Georgia Warm Springs business."
Raskob is reported to have shouted impatiently, "Damn Georgia Warm Springs,
we'll take care of it."
Undeniably this enterprise was well taken care of. Franklin Delano Roosevelt
was magnificently bribed to run for office. By the end of 1930 some seven
hun. dred thousand dollars had been poured into the cof. fers of the
Foundation. It is reported that Raskob contributed a quarter of a million
dollars with a proviso regarding the nomination of Al Smith in 1932. A Board
of Trustees was set up which read much like the board of directors of the
enterprises identified with the Morgan, Rockefeller, Chase National and
National City Bank groups. They were:
James A. Moffett, Vice President of the Standard Oil of New Jersey. He was
rewarded among others with an oppointment[sic] as housing czar under the New
Deal; and was able to secure for his RockefellerStandard Oil employers from
the Government, a thirty million dollar appropriation of American taxpayers'
money to be paid by the British Government to the King of Saudi Arabia to
avoid the cancellation of the concession, in Saudi Arabia, of the Standard
Oil of California and Texas Companies, and hundreds of millions more to
maintain the Rockefeller-Standard Oil crowd in the good graces of the King,
Ibn Saud; Recently Moffett sued the companies for $8,000,000, the price he
alleges they agreed to pay him for his influence with Roosevelt and the New
Deal in the successful raid on the U. S. Treasury. If he collects the eight
million dollars he will be amply repaid for his donation to Georgia Warm
Springs. He was also instrumental, on behalf of the Rockefeller-Standard Oil
interests, in bringing Roosevelt's innate duplicity into play in promising
Palestine to both the Jews and the Arabs, to hold the loyalty and cooperation
of both.
Jeremiah Milbank, Director of the Rockefeller. con. trolled Chase National
Bank and Metropolitan Life Insurance Company. His family are heavily
interested in the Borden Company and operate it for the controlling Chase
National Bank-Rockefeller interests. A. G. Milbank is President and Chairman
of the Board of Borden. His $55,000 gift, or bribe, to Roosevelt through
Georgia Warm Springs-Meriwether Reserve brought magnificent returns. Shortly
after its receipt, Governor Roosevelt secured the passage by the New York
State Legislation of favorable milk laws that increased the price of milk
from 5¢ to a minimum of twenty-two cents a quart and put billions of dollars
into the coffers of the Rockefeller-controlled Milk Trust.
But that was only the beginning of the story of what Jeremiah Milbank got for
his $55,000 "contribution". He is the familiar brand of "philanthropist" who
insists upon having his odds very long. For example in 1928 he contributed
$10,000 to the Republican Campaign fund, Vice President Garner revealed that
this was followed by the following tax refunds:
"Jeremiah Milbank, New York, Director Chase
National Bank, refunded $41,239 in 1928; Director Metropolitan Life Insurance
Company, $32,102 in 1929, and $77,848 in 1930; son of Joseph Milbank whose
estate was granted a refund of $46,344 in 1929."
Eugene F. Wilson, Vice President of the Rockefeller-Morgan controlled
American Telephone and Telegraph ,Company. His company was munificently
rewarded by the New Deal. Despite the attack on utilities and holding
companies by Roosevelt and the New Deal, the A. T. & T., the greatest utility
monopoly was never molested. The sham investigation, launched against it to
quiet public outcry against its- outrageous staggering of rates even during
the depression, was conducted by the Telephone Company's own loyal employees.
And when unfavorable evidence got into the records, they were destroyed by a
mysterious fire and the investigation was hurriedly dropped. Under the New
Deal the mo. nopoly of the A. T. & T., instead of being broken down, had been
greatly intensified. Even the use of radio-telephone that served so well in
the war, is, by absurd licensing requirements, barred to the public except
through payment of exorbitant tribute to the Tele. phone Company.
William H. Woodin, President of the American Car and Foundry Company;
Director of General Motors; Member of the Executive Committee and Director of
the American Ship and Commerce Company; and Director of Remington Arms
Company. He was a J. P. Morgan and Co. henchman who stood high on their pre.
ferred list. He received the appointment of Secretary of the Treasury.
Leighton McCarthy, President of Canadian Life Insurance Company, Vice
President and Director of Union Carbide Co. and of the Bank of Nova Scotia;
and Director of Aluminum Ltd.
George Foster Peabody, President of Broadway Realty Co. and close associate
of John D. Rockefeller, who participated with them in the foundation of the
General Education Fund and other purposeful "philanthropies", of which this
is a sample.
Frank C. Root.
There can be no question that Roosevelt paid his debts handsomely, — with the
taxpayers' money and when required, with their lives and the security of the
nation. This makes it hard to draw the line as in so many other similar
situations involving the RooseveltDelano Dynasty, between "contribution" and
plain bribery and corruption.
It is interesting to note that none of these generous trustees are to be
found on the Board of Directors of Meriwether Reserve Inc. So far as has been
determined, Meriwether Reserve is owned outright by FDR and his family. The
land adjacent to the Springs, which normally sold at ten to twenty dollars an
acre, was sold to families of the victims who wished to live near them at
$500 a lot, in the name of Sara Delano Roosevelt, the supposed owner and
mortgagor.
In 1931 and 1932 Governor Roosevelt engineered im. portant changes in the
milk industry, that were highly profitable to Milbank's Borden Company. The
sale of synthetic milk, labelled "homogenized" and sold at higher prices,
previously had been barred, as adulterated and inferior. It was now
permitted. Likewise adulteration of milk with alkalinizers, in violation of
the Pure Food and Drug Act, and the misrepresentation of pasteurized milk, as
absolutely safe, was given the official stamp of approval.
By curious coincidence, in the self-same year which witnessed the momentous
changes in the milk industry which added billions of dollars to the milk bill
of the public and by the same amount enlarged the take of what Wallace termed
the "Milk Trust", Governor Roosevelt's Warm Springs Foundation, received an
additional grant of $5,000 from the Milbank Memorial Fund, the income of
which is derived from the stock of one of the components of the "Milk Trust",
Milbank's Borden Company.
To collect funds for President Roosevelt's "philanthropy", there were
organized the "President's Birthday Balls". The moving spirit behind their
origin was the notorious Cities Service utility magnate, Henry L. Do. herty,
whose dishonest manipulations cost the invest. ing public hundreds of
millions of dollars. He shud. dered at the fate of Insull and the rest of the
utility crowd who were not in Roosevelt's favor. Shying at attempting -direct
bribery, he turned for advice to his publicity man, Carl Byoir, who enjoyed
the strategic position of also representing Roosevelt's Georgia Warm Springs.
The outcome was the Birthday Balls which netted Roosevelt's "philanthropy"
millions. Doherty calculated well. He was never harassed or prosecuted by
Roosevelt's New Deal in spite of the flagrant character of his activities.
The Birthday Balls had worked as a "pay-off".
For years, physicians throughout the nation bombarded the Foundation with
applications to secure free admission of poor victims of infantile paralysis
to Georgia Warm Springs. Though millions of dollars had been contributed by
the nation for this purpose, applications for free services were made without
success, except in rare cases. In the years 1933 to 1935, the physicians were
flatly told by the Foundation that it did not welcome charity patients,
except under very special circumstances.
Such special circumstan[c]es appear to have been primarily publicity value. A
paralyzed newspaperman sponsored by the Hearst newspaper chain closely
identified at the time with the President was one such case accepted gratis.
Poor patients for whom communities gathered funds and paid the charges were
accepted. To be sure, amid clicking cameras and nation-wide publicity, Mrs.
Eleanor Roosevelt, with great ostentation, turned over to a poor victim of
the disease the thousand dollar prize awarded her by Gimbel & Company for the
specific purpose that it be spent at Geor. gia Warm Springs. It looked much
like taking money out of one pocket and putting it into another.
When favorable publicity was not involved, however, the physician was
informed that the basic rate for stay at Warm Springs was about forty-five
dollars a week, with various charges for extras. This charge is made in a
section of the country where the cost of living is so low that the average
Relief allowance a week for a family of six was two to three dollars. If the
physician made so bold as to inquire what was being done with the millions
gathered for the treatment of poor folks at the Springs, he was belatedly
informed that in very special cases the basic charge would be reduced fifty
percent.
With election in sight, and with an eye to an undercurrent of unfavorable
comment on the activities of the Foundation and due to quiet but persistent
investigation by interested parties, the tactics of the Foundation were
changed. After the "Birthday Balls," a pretense of an accounting was made in
the press. It related that part of the fund gathered from the parties was
left with the local committee to pay expenses and to provide for local
infantile paralysis work; and that a small fraction of the sum turned over to
the President's Foundation had been paid out to specific institutions and
investigators for research work on the disease.
A written request was made by me to the Foundation in April 1936, asking that
two poor patients, who could manage to raise only enough money to pay their
train fares to the Springs, be admitted for treatment of paralysis. It
elicited the following reply:
THE GEORGIA WARM SPRINGS FOUNDATION
50 East 42nd Street
New York City
Franklin D. Roosevelt,. Keith Morgan,
President Vice-President
Basil O'Connor, Treasurer
April 29, 1936
Emanuel M. Josephson, M. D.
108 East 81st Street
New York, N. Y.
My dear Dr. Josephson:
Your letter of April 28th has been received during the absence of Doctor
LeRoy W. Hubbard, who is Director of Extension. Immediately upon his return,
in about ten days, it shall be brought to his attention."
Very truly yours,
(Signed) Katherine Woods
On the specified date Dr. Hubbard communicated with me by telephone and
explained that the capacity of Warm Springs is limited, and that only a few
charity patients are taken. He offered the suggestion that the Springs
therapy is not recommended for all victims of the disease. After inquiring
the age of the patients, he definitely eliminated the school child, because
he said the Springs were not advisable for younger children unless
accompanied by nurse and governess.
He suggested that they might consider the admission of the adolescent victim,
provided that after an examination by himself he felt that the patient might
be benefited by the Springs. There was a change of tone and attitude as
compared with previous communications; straightforward rejection of the
charity patient was replaced by qualified evasion, which offers less startling
contrast with the objects for which the public have been led to contribute to
the institution.
My curiosity in the matter was aroused by my experience and information. I
addressed the following letter to President Roosevelt:
May 27, 1936.
Hon. Franklin D. Roosevelt, President Meriwether Reserve, Inc., White House,
Washington, D. D.
Dear Sir:
In the course of a study of various types of social service and philanthropic
organizations, and of their financial structure, for a volume which I am
writing on the subject, I have come across the data relating to Georgia Warm
Springs Foundation of New York and the Meriwether Reserve Inc. of Delaware,
concerning which I ask your help and explanation.
In reply to an inquiry, Mr. Basil O'Connor, Treasurer of the Foundation, has
informed me that the Foundation has issued no financial reports, and that its
property is held by the Meriwether Reserve Inc. of Delaware, a business
corporation.
The Secretary of State of Delaware informs me, on the other hand, that the
Meriwether Reserve Inc. files no financial reports or list of stockholders.
1. Where may I secure financial statements, lists of contributions, and
stockholders' lists of the Meriwether Reserve, Inc. for the years since 1926,
when it was organized as the Georgia Warm Springs Inc., Delaware, until the
end of the last fiscal year?
2. What is the exact relation between the Meriwether Reserve Inc and
Georgia Warm Springs Foundation of New York, and what is the objective and
function of the two different organizations incorporated in different states?
3. As a business organization so incorporated, does the Meriwether
Reserve Inc. pay dividends on its stock?
4. If so, what have the dividend rates been since the date of
organization?
5. In what manner does this dual structure affect the handling of
charitable cases, and what percentage of the cases are free and charitable,
part pay, and full pay?
I would highly appreciate an early reply to these questions, for the survey
must go to press in the near future.
Very truly yours,
(Signed) Emanuel M. Josephson
This letter elicited several telephone inquiries from agents of the
Meriwether Reserve Inc. about the source of my information. The inquiring
agent assured me that I would receive a prompt reply. No reply has ever been
received before or since the publication of the study.
Before the Birthday Balls of January 1938, there was announced a
"reorganization of the philanthropy." There was formed a new foundation, the
National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis. The public was high-pressured by
such a foundation propagandist as the avowed left-winger, Paul de Kruif, into
contributing to this new Foundation. Keith Morgan, vice-president of the
Foundation, took over the publicity and management of the campaign, and even
larger sums of money were mulcted from the public. Dr. Joseph S. Wall,
professor of diseases of children of Georgetown University Medical School,
stated before the Subcommittee on Public Health, Hospitals and Charities of
D. C. on January 7, 1938, that the money for the Founda. tion derived from
the Birthday Balls would be devoted to animal research. "Not a penny of that
fund will go to buying a crutch for a crippled child. The majority of the
dollars in that fund will go for the purchase of monkeys," he testified.
About one month after the January 1938 Birthday Balls of the reorganized
Foundation, a naive, pathetic letter by Mrs. Martha Hickok appeared in the
Miami Daily News. She related the experience of her mother in her persistent
attempts for six years to gain free admission of her child, a victim of
infantile paralysis, to Georgia Warm Springs.
The application was repeatedly rejected by the "board of advisers" though Dr.
Hoke considerately assured the mother that the child's dependence on crutches
could be eliminated in two years at the Foundation. He offered as an
explanation for the child's rejection the information that the Foundation
limited its charity cases to a ratio of ten charity cases for every ninety
full pay cases, the writer stated.
Mrs. Hickok related that not even the intercession of her postmaster or of
Postmaster General Farley helped. She stated that she had a large collection
of correspondence from the Foundation extending over a period of six years
which showed she believed, that unless one had loads of money Georgia Warm
Springs is just a crippled child's dream of paradise. She stated that her
motive in writing was to correct the false impression that the Warm Springs
Foundation is open and available to any infantile paralysis sufferer who
admittedly might be helped.
A million or more dollars was raised by the 1938 Birthday Ball and by
subscriptions for the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis. The active
principals of that Foundation nevertheless participated in in. troducing
legislation at Albany in March 1938 which provided free medical care by the
State or City of New York for the victims of infantile paralysis.
Accounts of some of the money collected for the Foundation were published in
December 1939. But they were very loose and failed to account for much of the
money that has been taken in. They showed, however, that at least some of the
money collected for the relief of infantile paralysis victims may be used for
that purpose.
There is much additional evidence on hand that. Roosevelt cared as little for
the victims of infantile paralysis as he cared for the interests of the
nation at large, except where political and financial advantages accrued.
Most flagrant was the death of scores of humans resulting from the
administration of the so-called "immune serum" in the treatment of the cases
suspect. ed of having infantile paralysis during the epidemic of 1931. This
was a case of deliberate risk and sacri. fice of human life by
experimentation, engaged in by a Committee of the New York Academy of
Medicine which was headed by the late Dr. Linsley R. Williams, whose position
interlocked Organized Medicine and Social Service. Dr. Williams also was
mentioned as the prospective incumbent of the post of Secretary of Health
which it was reported was to be created for him on the Cabinet of President
Roosevelt, after hehad written an article, published in Collier's magazine,
certifying that Governor Franklin D. Roosevelt was physically and mentally
fit for the Presidency of the United States.
The sale of the fake cure and the attendant publicity were designed to build
up Dr. Linsley Williams as a na. tional figure and to publicize the
Medical-Social-Service Trust which he dominated, as a prelude to his expected
political advancement and as a prelude to turning over the control of
medicine, under national legislation, to the Trust. The infantile paralysis
epidemic was used also as a pretext for raising the price of milk to the poor
of New York City in the midst of the de. pression to a higher figure than
prevailed in time of prosperity, by the elimination of loose milk. The
Milbank Memorial Fund and the Rockefeller Institute played dominant roles in
both campaigns.
In this exploit, the Medical-Social-Service Trust, under Dr. Williams, was up
to one of its old tricks stealing the stale thunder of medical experimenters
as a pretext for a wild burst of quackish publicity. The "immune serum" was
known to be worthless and dangerous long before the human experiment was
started. Within two weeks before the date when it was advertised and
publicized as a "cure" for infantile paralysis, the National Health Institute
of the United States Health Public Service reported on a series of cautious
experiments and studies made with it on monkeys over a period of three years.
The Institute reported that the serum was both worthless and dangerous when
used in many of the manners suggested.
The serum goes back to the days of the French investigator, Levaditi, who
discovered in 1911 that the virus contained in nasal drippings of victims of
the disease, which would cause infantile paralysis when injected into the
nervous system of monkeys, could Be neutralized and made harmless by the
blood of adults or of persons who had had infantile paralysis, when the two
were mixed in a test tube: In the New York City epidemic of 1916, Dr. Herman
Schwartz had tried out such a serum on a group of his patients. He reported
that he found it not only worthless but- actually injurious and deadly when
used in certain manners.
The best informed authorities on the subject including Dr. Josephine Neal and
Dr. William Parks of the New York City Health Department Research
Laboratories, both of whom were members of the Committee, constituting a
minority, had unequivocally condemned the serum on the basis of accumulated
data. They pronounced it to be of questionable value and actually injurious
when used in certain manners. As early as 1929, Dr. Josephine Neal had
pointed out in her publications the danger of the use of the serum in
poliomyelitis, and had condemned it in no uncer. tain terms. All the
cumulative evidence pointed to the fact that this supposed "cure" exploited
by the Academy was both worthless and injurious.
Dr. Williams, himself, characterized the use of this serum at a hearing, of
the Board of Censors of the New York County Medical Society of March 11,
1932, as a "clinical study.," or experiment on humans, undertaken by the
Committee to prove or disprove the value, or lack of value of the serum. Dr
Williams stated at the hearing,
"This study was made, really, upon the ,recommendation of Dr. Simon Flexner
and Dr. George Draper. Dr. Flexner and Dr. Draper were particularly
interested and also was Dr. Amoss and Dr. Aycock. Dr. Neal did a great deal
of work on this subject some eight or nine years ago in the 1918 epidemic,
and I think she has always had the feeling that this serum. was of very
doubtful value."
In other words, Dr. Williams placed the responsibility for this disastrous
experiment squarely on the Rockefeller Institute, of which he was a director,
and on its staff.
At a discussion before the Society of Medical Jurisprudence on October 12,
1931, Dr. Josephine Neal said:
"I have always opposed the use of serum intraspinally on account of the
consequent meningeal irritation that so often follows .. sometimes with
disastrous results."
Dr. Sobel, an eminent pediatrician, confirmed Dr. Neal's statement in the
following words:
"If the truth were told about the use of the serum intraspinally I am afraid
that some sad stories would come out. I have some good reason to- believe
that several deaths have occurred as a result of its use in this way, and
while names such as status thymolymphaticus have been used for the cause of
death, it has been more directly attributable to meningeal irritation than
anything else."
The concurring statement of Dr. Neal and Sobel make it clear that it is
widely known in the medical profession that it is a common expedient of the
Medical-Service Trust in its explotitation[sic] of public health to falsify
records to make them show results desired by them. In this manner they often
hide from the public the sacrifice of human life that results from their
activities.
In spite of its worthlessness and its known danger, the Committee on
Poliomyelitis of the New York Academy of Medicine undertook to experiment on
humans with this "cure" in manners that were known to be most dangerous,
including injection into the spine. It solicited the serum from former
victims of the disease among the public, most of whom contributed their blood
free of charge. Governor Roosevelt contributed 500c.c. of serum. In the role
of an "authority" on the subject, he wrongly informed the public that doctors
who would not use the "cure" were ignorant and not to be trusted. This
statement proved as true and reliable as have many of his other statements on
the subject of health, medicine and other topics.
The Academy then sold this serum to the public through its agents, young and
inexperienced physicians, for as much as the traffic would bear, usually
twenty-five dollars a dose. In violation of the municipal law of New York
City, even charity patients in municipal hospitals were compelled to pay a
minimum price of twenty-five dollars for this supposed cure; and were led to
believe that failure to use it meant death or worse.
The outcome of this experiment was exactly what might have been expected on
the basis of accumulated data, highly disastrous. The published report of the
Committee stated that the serum had been used only in cases which had
developed no paralysis. This meant that many of those cases did not have
infantile paralysis to begin with; for there is no positive method of
diagnosis of the disease until paralysis develops. The death rate, however,
among the group treated with the serum was considerably higher than among the
proved victims of infantile paralysis. The incidence of paralysis among the
former was also higher than among those not treated with the "cure."
The case of Marvin Zanger illustrates the danger of the serum. The story is
beat told in a letter which his mother wrote me.
November 28, 1931.
Dr. E. M. Josephson
Dear Sir:
Read your statement in the papers of a week ago pertaining to the serum which
was used during the epidemic. May I state my case, please.
On August 19, my boy, nine and a half years old, became ill ... We took him
to the Morrisania Hospital at 168th Street and Walton Avenue, The Bronx.
While admitting my child who was so, so very ill, I was told that it was
necessary to 'use serum and it would cost twenty-five dollars. I'm an
American woman, and had been reading the paper, but had never noticed a fee
for serum mentioned. I spoke of this to one of the doctors and he informed me
there was a charge for it at all times. Of course, being a mother and so
frightened,
I borrowed the twenty-five dollars to pay for it. I sat with my dear child
for three hours before Dr. . . . [an agent of the New York Academy of
Medicine] came . . .
My child died anyway. I have not been able to write you before this, as my
heart is broken. But in order to help others who may not be able to borrow as
I did, and to help you who are brave and big enough to come forward [I write].
Mrs. Diana Zanger
1925 Gerard Avenue
The circumstances and the records of the case left little room for doubt that
the death was directly due to the irritation of the serum and its mode of
administration.
Another equally tragic case was related by another mother who wrote to Mrs.
Zanger:
"Several weeks ago, I read in the New York-American about your suit against
the New York Academy of Medicine for the loss of your child from infantile
paralysis.
"Your sufferings find an echo in my heart, for I am also an unfortunate
mother who lost a four-year-old son. I have a daughter aged twenty, in the
hospital, who is a sufferer from the same dreadful scourge.
"My boy was running around well in the hospital until the serum was
administered. He died within five days.
"My daughter was paralyzed following the serum. She is in the hospital for
the past seven months. God, if I could only lose my memory completely!"
The suit brought by Mrs. Zanger for the death of her child was settled by the
parties out of court.
To stop the sale of this quack cure, I filed charges with Governor F. D.
Roosevelt against the Academy and its Committee, accusing them of sacrificing
human lives in what they chose to call an "experiment." The Academy pleaded
"charity" in defense and extenuation of its acts but stopped the sale of the
serum. The fate of these charges reveals in its full extent the sincerity of
Roosevelt's "humanitarianism."
My indictment of Dr. Williams, and of the Academy Committee and their serum
was embarrassing to Gov. ernor Roosevelt for several reasons. First, Dr.
Williams was a personal friend and an important political ally. Second, his
Georgia Warm Springs enterprise had been widely publicized as supplying some
of the serum used for the "cure." Third, Roosevelt and his cam. paign
managers had used the serum as the basis of large number of "human interest"
press releases, and his campaign had played up his "humanitarianism" thus
manifested.
For obvious political reasons, the Governor failed to act on the charges
himself. He passed the buck to New York State Commissioner of Health, Thomas
Parran, now Surgeon General of U. S. Public Health Service.
Dr. Parran owed his appointment as Commissioner to Dr. Linsley R. Williams
and had himself actively advocated the use of this infantile paralysis "cure."
As might have been expected, Dr. Parran refused to hold hearings on the
charges. Several months after they had been filed with him, Parran brushed
aside my charges in a letter released to the press, in which he stated that
he himself was involved in the charges, con. sequently they could not be
true. Dr. Parran's denial of the truth of the charges followed closely upon
the tacit acknowledgment of the Committee in its own report that my charges
were absolutely true.
Commissioner Parran recommended, furthermore, that my zeal in protecting the
health of the public and in preventing human sacrifice should be rebuked. He
recommended that I be censured for my efforts.
I protested in vain to Governor Roosevelt against this formerly un-American
procedure of permitting a man accused of a crime, and confessedly guilty, to
be his own judge. The Governor replied affirming, in substance, the value of
the "cure," directly contradicting the report already rendered by the
Committee.
The trail of deaths arising from human experiments with infantile paralysis
did not terminate with the tragedies of the "curative" serum. On the
contrary, the protection offered to human experimenters by government
authorities and the powers of State Medicine, constituted by the Health
Departments and their Commissioners, seconded by the great influence of the
interested social service -rackets, encouraged further human experimentation.
Financed in part by a small grant from the moneys collected through the
"President's Birthday Balls," Dr. John A. Kolmer of Temple University,
Philadelphia, undertook to infect a group of children with infantile
paralysis virus that was supposedly attenuated by treatment with sodium
ricinoleate, a soap made from castor oil. On October 8, 1935, Dr. T. M.
Rivers of the Rockefeller Institute, reported the results at a meeting of the
American Public Health Association. Dr. Rivers' announcement read as follows:
"Only eight out of twelve thousand children who were injected. (with the
infective material) developed the disease."
In defense of this situation, Dr. Rivers offered the "In the case of the
eight children, it is probable that they had incurred the malady before they
had been injected."
It is also possible, nay probable, that the infections and deaths were caused
by the injected virus.
These deaths illustrate the menace of authoritarian, irresponsible State
Medicine to the health and life of the public. They should be a warning to
repudiate the various compulsory health insurance schemes which the self-same
group as were responsible for these killings are now seeking to foist upon
the public.
In 1943, in response to the pressure of an aroused public opinion which
demanded a truthful statement of the uses made of the moneys raised for
Georgia Warm Springs, a report was issued by the Foundation. No mention was
made in the report of the huge individual donations that had been subscribed
initially by the Moffetts, the Milbanks and others; or of Meriwether Reserve
Inc. of Delaware, its resources or its connection with the Foundation or the
uses that it made of the moneys that had been diverted to it; or of how much
of the funds raised by the public goes to help the 63% of the victims which
it classes as "aid", in contrast to the fully and exorbitantly charged "pay
19 victims; or if any of the victims are really full charity cases or if a
large income is required to supplement the help given the "aid" cases; or if
discrimination against colored victims despite acceptance of contributions
from colored, folks, will ever be eliminated in the institution controlled by
family who have given so much lip service the colored cause.
There is no record that any colored victim of infantile paralysis has ever
been admitted to Georgia Warm Springs. It is a case of "Do as I say, not as I
do."
Dr. Haven Emerson, Emeritus Professor of Public Health Administration at
Columbia University condemned the racket that has been built up about Georgia
Warm Springs in no uncertain terms, in giving the annual Cutter Lecture at
the Harvard University Medical School November 28, 1947. He stated:
"There is no more pitiful picture of the importance and ineptitude of popular
enthusiasm about widely publicized disease than the fantastic promotion of
unprofitable measures financed with reckless extravagance for the control of
poliomyelitis.
"These manifestations of newspaper or public relations experts concerned with
dime collections on a percentage basis makes monkeys of honest health
officers while hysterical warnings and inflated news items inflame local
fears of a disease which no health officer has yet said with honesty that he
has modified as to prevalence or fatality."
The last statement is of exceptional interest because Dr. Emerson was himself
a member of the New York Academy of Medicine Poliomyelitis Committee that
sold the phony serum "cure" in 1931. He confirms the charges which I made
against the Committee to Governor F. D. Roosevelt and which quack "Dr."
Roosevelt denied, in company with his distinguished Commissioner of Health,
later Surgeon General of the U. S. Public Health Service, and Trustee of the
Rockefeller Foundation, Dr. Thomas Parran.
"Voluntary agencies", Dr. Emerson continued, "ris. ing high on the emotional
appeal of the dramatic de. formities and sudden deaths from infantile
paralysis so mask the truth and exploit the seasonally recurrent prevalence
of this disease that rational education of the public as to the state of our
ignorance of effective measures is almost unheard amid the din of personali.
ties.
"The health officer is humiliated and his prestige is lowered before the
public when daily bulletins come to the press from the hirelings of
philanthropy instead of from the responsible officers of the United States
Public Health Services, which is (Ed. this unfortunately is not true because
of the calibre and allegiance of some of its Surgeon Generals) the only
trustworthy source of reliable information of any of such epidemic disease
and its national aspect."
Though there appears an element of professional jealousy in Dr. Emerson's
statements, there emerges a picture of the enormous commercial and political
pressure that was brought to bear on him, and other honest health officers,
to have compelled him before his retirement to support such frauds as the New
York Academy of Medicine's 'immune serum" Georgia Warm Springs, and other
equally creditable "philanthropies" that have been wrought by Bismarck's
imitators as political devices.
The use of foundation's and other pseudo-philanthropies for commercial and
political purposes is quite commonplace. The "non-profit" corporation is the
only type that can be readily chartered in New York State for medical and
social service purposes, and have the advantage of being tax exempt. Many of
them have proved extraordinarily profitable to their operators. No clear
statements have ever been issued by Georgia Warm Springs Foundation, and no
statements have been issued by Meriwether Reserve to indicate what profit, if
any accrued to Franklin Delano Roosevelt or his family from them, in addition
to the publicity and political advantage. But the Dynasty members are far too
practical to go into any venture solely for their health or for principle.
The picture presented by Roosevelt's infantile para. lysis activities does
not bespeak integrity or even human. itarianism. It confirms the picture
presented by go many of his activities, cupidity, corruption, low cunning and
duplicity.
STATE or NEW YORK
EXECUTIVE CHAMBER
ALBANY
FRANKLIN D. ROOSEVELT
February 15, 1932
Dr. E. H. Josephson, 993 Park Avenue, New York City.
My dear Dr.. Josephson:
I have read very carefully the latest charges which you have submitted to me
under date of January 30, 1932. I have also read the several previous
communications you addressed to me and to the State Health Commissioner, Dr.
Thomas Parran, Jr.
I have been fully informed concerning the activities of the State Department
of Health In its splendid efforts to minimize the effects of the
poliomyelitis epidemic and to limit the spread of this disease, for which I
requested a special appropriation from the Legislature and received their
approval.
The charges you make are not substantiated by facts, and are therefore
dismissed.
Very sincerely yours.
F.D.R.
This letter was received in reply to my protest against State Commissioner of
Health Dr. Thomas Parran's dismissal of my charges branding the infantile
paralysis "curative" serum a worthless and dangerous quack remedy, the use of
which resulted in many deaths. This letter constituted in substance an
affirmation of the value of the serum. It is dated months later than the
report of the Poliomyelitis Committee which fully supported my charges. Dr.
Parran has risen to greater heights of authority and power since this
incident, on appointment by President Roosevelt. The use of the serum has
been abandoned.
pps 116-144
--[cont]---
Aloha, He'Ping,
Om, Shalom, Salaam.
Em Hotep, Peace Be,
Omnia Bona Bonis,
All My Relations.
Adieu, Adios, Aloha.
Amen.
Roads End
Kris
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