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President's Address

Creator: E.R. Johnstone (author)
Date: June 1904
Publication: Journal of Psycho-Asthenics
Source: Available at selected libraries

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DELIVERED AT THE TWENTY-EIGHTH ANNUAL SESSION OF THE ASSOCIATION OF MEDICAL OFFICERS OF AMERICAN INSTITUTIONS FOR IDIOTIC AND FEEBLE-MINDED PERSONS HELD AT FARIBAULT, MINNESOTA, JUNE 23-25, 1904.

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E. R. JOHNSTONE, VINELAND, N. J.

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LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, MEMBERS OF THE ASSOCIATION: -- I wish to thank you heartily for the great honor you have conferred upon me by making me the President of your Association. I feel it all the more deeply because I am not a physician, and this gathering is named an Association of Medical Officers.

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Your kindness in this matter but goes to show that the spirit of the Great Physician is in and thruout the work for the feeble-minded, and therefore you give without partiality, honor to all who shall use their best endeavors to forward the cause lying so near the hearts of all of us.

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It is with diffidence that I present my address to you, feeling that I have but little to offer that is new, and recognizing the fact that most of you have been much longer in the work than I. There are, however, some things that are so pertinent to the cause that they will bear repeating, and then, perhaps as much as anything else, this Association must stand as the central bureau from which must emanate information so greatly needed concerning the feeble-minded. Thruout the history of the work, this idea appears: at times dominating all others, and again as a strong undercurrent, but ever present. Separated as we are by thousands of miles, and coming together but once a year, we find it hard, as an Association, to disseminate the knowledge as widely as we would wish, but as individuals bound together in a common cause, we have large local opportunities. While I would not be understood as an advocate of "rushing into print" I do feel that it is a duty we owe to society to keep our doings constantly before the public. The magazines and many of the better class of newspapers will give space to such information of a general sociological character, and it is only by taking advantage of these opportunities and recognizing the general ignorance on the subject that we can awaken the public to the needs of the feebleminded, and the others of the great family of neurotics.

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The interest is growing. The medical societies thruout the country, the Conference of Charities and Corrections and the National Educational Association are all doing their share, but it is to our Association and its members individually that the world looks for definite, expert information.

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We must lay before them our aims and our results. We must work in harmony with every movement of a social as well as of a medical or educational character, for among our inmates we find types that point toward the road which leads to the solution of pathological, psychological and sociological problems.

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We dare not work in a corner -- we dare not be too busy with the routine of the day. We must make the citizens of our states acquainted with our doings. They must be, in-so-far as possible, familiar with what goes on in our institutions, and have facts, not merely hazy ideas, in order that we may help the cause and successfully combat the criticism of disgruntled employes, parents who fancy their children abused and quacks who make wonderful cures, transforming idiots into geniuses, etc., for these people invariably "rush into print."

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Our JOURNAL is a valuable publication, and I should be glad to see some action taken at this meeting leading to its wider distribution.

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The various steps taken during the last hundred years have been so often outlined that I need not speak of them here. On every hand further progress is evident. New institutions are being established each year. New buildings are being added in the established institutions. Pennsylvania has been taking giant strides and will establish a third great institution this year. A village for epileptics is under consideration in Virginia, and so the movement is noticeable on all sides. The outlook is brighter than ever before, and now while the iron is hot we must strike and strike hard amid often, if we shall weld together the interests centering in our work.

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One of the significant facts is that in those states where there are already established schools for the feeble-minded more rapid steps are taken than in those having none -- thus showing the good influence of the schools themselves.

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Our Association and our institutions have a number of serious problems constantly presented to them, and to the solution of these problems we must give our best endeavors and call to our aid the hardest workers, the deepest thinkers, the most careful students and the strongest men and women in political and social life.

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Our great aim is to eliminate this class, and in order to do this we must of necessity consider the elimination of the neurotic, blind, deaf, and consumptives, tramps, paupers, petty criminals, prostitutes, etc., as well as the hereditary insane, epileptics and imbeciles.

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This aim is the same as it was in the days of Egypt's greatest civilization, and Sparta's glory, and probably for many generations to come there will be striving in the same direction.

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