Men and Women Medical Students, 
I 1 I 
AND 
THE WOMAN MOVEMENT. 
There seems a general disposition to grant that it 
i§ improper for medical students of Loth sexes to attend 
the clinical lectures and examinations, at the same 
time and place; but it does not seem to be remem- 
bered that this impropriety as lately exhibited at the 
Pennsylvania Hospital, was the act of the women who 
went there, and that their unwelcome attempt to join 
the male classes was the first and true cause of the 
disturbance that followed. It is very true that their sex 
should always protect women from unkindness and in- 
sult at the hands of men, but age and refinement, no less 
than the circumstances under which the sexes are 
brought together, have much to do with the treatment 
reasonably to be expected. The medical students are, 
for the most part, quite young-generally at the forma- 
tive age between boyhood and manhood : the women- 
students are, relatively, much older in years and in 
1 2 
feelings, as well as experience. Yet, in the recent 
outbreak at the Pennsylvania Hospital, the women 
were the exciting cause of the state of mind in the 
lads, which expended itself in misplaced manifesta- 
tions of contempt. And it may not be denied, that 
with the hot blood of youth, gentlemanly instincts 
sometimes lurk beneath indiscreet expressions of dis- 
gust or disapprobation toward a woman who unsexes 
herself in public. Even among the male patients at 
the Hospital clinic on that occasion, some " old tars " 
made strong objections to being exhibited with their 
peculiar infirmities, to women, and this, too, would 
seem like gentlemanly instinct, in men who make no 
pretensions to being gentlemen. It is said also tluy; 
the lecturing professors, with the refined and culti- 
vated feelings of gentlemen, were put to the blush, and 
disinclined to exhibit certain cases, or explain their 
cause and character, in the presence of women, whose 
modesty, if they had any, ought to be shocked. 
The old Quaker blood, and the love of gain exist- 
ing in the few leading managers of the Hospital may 
have misled them into the idea that young men and 
women might be brought together to look at and talk 
about all parts of the nude human body, without any 
impropriety-without improper excitements and im- 
pulses. And yet, strange to say, these same old 
Quakers, at their " first-day meetings " carefully 
separate the men and women of all ages and relations, 
on opposite sides of their assemblies! Can there be 3 
less danger in the contact and mixing of the sexes 
while attending a medical clinic, than when assembled 
for religious worship? These managers know less 
of human nature than is required in the government 
of a large body of medical students, 03? the affairs of 
a public hospital. And thus it was, that in the sale 
of about thirty tickets to women, made no doubt in 
sympathy with the so-called "woman movement," 
they have tried a dangerous and indelicate experiment 
in their pet institution. 
When it is said significantly that the male students 
proved by their conduct they "were gentlemen,' 
why is there not equal force in saying that the female 
students proved, by seeking the clinics and their as- 
sociations, that they " were not ladies And this 
would seem to square the account, if there were not 
serious considerations involved, touching the inter- 
ests both of the city and its medical colleges. If these 
old Quakers, with their ideas of "Woman's Rights," 
and their ambition to sell more tickets to the clinics 
of their Hospital, should succeed in driving the medi- 
» 
cal students from Philadelphia (about a thousand 
young men from the various States) to the medical 
schools of less reputation, who sanction the presence 
of the female students,-we ask if the women would- 
be-doctors could support the colleges, or in any way 
compensate the city for the loss ? The estimate is 
readily made, of the value to Philadelphia of the in- 
fluence which her medical schools bring to her 4 
general prosperity, whether in a pecuniary sense, or 
in the high and honorable reputation for science which 
has so long been hers. 
The same evil complained of here, has existed for 
two winters, with equal objection, in the medical 
colleges of New York, where it has been reluctantly 
submitted to. But a recent letter which was read at 
a meeting of the University and Jefferson Medical 
Faculties, from the eminent physiologist, Dr. J. C. 
Dalton, of that city, reports the women's advent there 
as doing great mischief. He says it is variously 
spoken of being from "lad" to " unmitigatedly 
disgusting"-and there is no higher authority among 
physicians, whether of the United States or Europe, 
than that of Dr. J. C. Dalton. 
The question of how far it may be wise and proper 
for women to enter the medical profession, and to 
what degree, or in what department, is still an open 
and unsettled one. The experiment of the Old World 
is unfavorable, in promise, to the permanent success 
of such an experiment in the new. In France it has 
died out of its own accord, after being allowed every 
possible opportunity for a fair trial: there are no 
successors to the well-deserved reputations of Mes- 
dames Boivin and Lachapelle. How far that period 
of trial may have lowered the moral standard of 
French medical students of either sex, it may not be 
well or appropriate to investigate here. But the 
whole subject, in its social bearings, demands wise 5 
and careful consideration, and we would (with due 
deference) recommend the managers of the Pennsyl- 
vania Hospital, and the medical students of both 
sexes, to study Mr. Horace Bushnell's book, entitled, 
" Women's Suffrage.- The reform against nature." 
It is believed there have been some hidden influ- 
ences at work, which, though not visible, are under- 
stood in their quiet, stealthy leverage, and of which 
the women at the men's medical clinics, are but a 
sympathetic feature. The establishment of female 
medical colleges, and the lecturing of women to public 
audiences on politics and all sorts of subjects, are due 
to the same reformers (?), and if we are to accept 
such as "Miss-Doctor-Major-Harriet* Walker," as a 
practical result and specimen of what they can and 
will do for their country, may heaven save us from 
the " Woman's Rights Movement" in all directions, 
as these people understand and pursue it. 
The women-doctors, we must presuppose, are either 
to remain unmarried (and few do this voluntarily as 
a general rule), or to marry such poor specimens of 
men as will permit them to pursue an arduous pro- 
fession for the support of the family, which they have 
the cowardly meanness or laziness to neglect, or the 
incapacity to support themselves. But the Rev. Dr.. 
Bushnell says, "Manly women are not wanted, and 
womanly men are not wanted, and most happy it is, in 
both cases, that they are not." There is probably no 
profession, in the preparation for, or in the practice 6 
of which a greater tendency exists to make " manly 
women,'1 than in that of medicine, unless we except 
the military, in consideration of the exploits of the 
"Major-Doctor" above alluded to. And the mana- 
gers of the Hospital cannot well be ignorant of this 
tendency to evil, in the mixing or close companionship 
of the two sexes, especially while engaged in investi- 
gations that seem, as it were, to possess inherent in- 
delicacy. The presence of women must either forbid 
all full examinations and instructions, or produce un- 
welcome interruptions, as well as unhappy results. 
True,, we do not hear of any striking beauties or 
graceful forms among the female students at the 
medical clinics,' such as would necessarily withdraw 
all attention, on the part of young men, from every- 
thing else but their charming selves; but, some of 
these days, it might happen that a beautiful woman 
took it into her mischievous head to attend the clinics 
among the men, and then-well-we should recall 
the old Spanish song- 
" Man is fire, 
Woman tow, 
Comes the devil 
And begins to blow." 
The argument of the "Woman-Faculty" of "the 
Female College," derived from the experience of forty 
women-students who attended the clinics of the Block- 
ley Almshouse last winter, is most unfortunate as ap- 7 
plying to the modest distinctions which they intended 
to make, of attending only when "proper cases" were 
before the male class. The refined sense of propriety 
of those forty women-students was not in the least 
violated at the introduction of a man patient with 
cutaneous disease, in an entire state of nudity, with 
other results then and there, that will not bear print- 
ing. No shock was felt, or at least none was mani- 
fested by those " manly" female students, who seemed 
perfectly undismayed, while the young men witnessed 
their presence with evident feelings of disgust. We 
are here again reminded of Mr. Bushnell's philo- 
sophical reasoning in regard to the influence or ten- 
dency of manly pursuits upon the womanly nature or 
character. He says : " Make no doubt of it, women 
are venal as well as men; a great deal more easily 
preyed upon by art, and cheated by stratagem. As 
they sooner believe, they are sooner made prey of. 
And they will only suffer the more from the art, the 
stratagem, the prey, that they go to the practice of it 
themselves and get the fair sweet motives of their 
womanhood mixed up with so many obliquities. As 
certainly as women are human, and none of us have 
any doubt of that, they will take in the political (or 
medical) corruptions, with a prone-minded human 
facility. Nor is it a fit answer to say, that they have 
as good a right as men to be in such corruptions, pro- 
vided they are not in worse. They will be in worse; 
a woman cannot be as bad as a man in anything, with- 8 
out being worse; for a selfish, plotting, intriguing, 
political, make-shift woman has a great deal more of 
the fine fair stuff to mar and muddle, in becoming 
what she is, than a man will have." 
And yet the advocates of these reforms make out 
that all the pursuits of man should be equally open 
to woman (regardless of the dangers to woman's high- 
est and holiest life and characteristics) ; that she 
should join the medical societies, and vote at the 
elections, and fill public offices. Have they forgotten 
the sad examples in the early history of politics, in 
the State of New Jersey ? and " the proud Duchess of 
Devonshire, who allowed herself to be kissed by a 
butcher, at the hustings, provided he would vote for 
Mr. Fox ?" When our women join in the ranks of 
men, in professions and political parties, and in medi- 
cal clinics, medical societies, &c., we may expect votes 
of similar or worse kind; and whatever steps have 
the tendency to produce such results, it seems wise, 
for the interests of women as well as men, should be 
avoided. 
But in the late innovations, first at the Bellevue 
Hospital, New York, and now at the Pennsylvania 
Hospital clinics, Philadelphia, the true and only ques- 
tion that has arisen, seems to be overlooked or avoided, 
in the arguments or commentaries of the public prqss. 
It is not whether women may or may not study medi- 
cine and become doctors by profession; nor is it 
whether they shall attend clinics; it is solely whether 9 
they may with propriety, and with advantage either 
to themselves or the male students, attend at the same 
clinics with men ; or, whether the sexes shall mingle 
together, in pursuit of the medical profession. There 
has been no effort made to prevent the women from 
pursuing whatever calling they choose: on the con- 
trary, great facilities have been afforded them, in a 
college of their own, and men have been, and are 
their teachers. But, as a Western man has said,. 
" they not only want their own rights, but they want 
our rights also." It is true that a very large and 
sensible portion of the people of this country, both 
men and women, agree in the opinion that it is un- 
wise and inappropriate for women to become medical 
practitioners, while it is very desirable they should 
qualify themselves to fulfil intelligently, the duties of 
nurses to the sick, as have done the Sisters of Mercy 
and Miss Nightingale. 
There is great force in the sensible and character- 
istic answer of an intellectual and distinguished lady 
to a committee of the New York Female Hospital, 
when asking for a public reading in aid of their In- 
stitution. She said: " No; I never can approve of 
women adopting the medical profession, so long as they: 
are creatures with a natural monthly hinderance toper- 
forming its duties." 
There have been great mistakes, we observe, in the 
public announcements here and in the New York 
papers, that the body of male medical students had 10 
returned to the clinic of the Pennsylvania Hospital, 
on the succeeding Saturday, after the unpleasant and 
undue expression of their opposition to the attend- 
ance there of the female students. The limited num- 
ber who did attend on the next Saturday, and who 
have continued to do so since then, are made up from 
the united forces of the small medical schools, who, 
jealous of the University of Pennsylvania and the 
Jefferson College, are glad to avail themselves of any 
chance, to join in an attack upon these older and 
justly more prosperous institutions. One of these, it is 
noteworthy to state, goes so far as to adopt the name 
of " University," at the risk (fortunate ?) of being some- 
time mistaken by uninitiated students for the ancient 
and honored Medical University of Pennsylvania. 
Less than one hundred of such students continue to 
give their countenance in favor of clinics before mixed 
classes of both sexes; but the great body of young 
men (from 450 to 500), of the two regular medical 
colleges of Philadelphia, whose outraged sense of pro- 
priety recently caused them to give vent to undue 
expressions of indignation, have not returned to the 
hospital clinics since. In this they show, at least, 
that they would not willingly risk being tempted to 
repeat such an offence; and in this, too, they have 
the sanction of their professors, who wisely think it 
better to lose the paltry subscription, and the benefits 
of a single source of instruction, than to place them- 
selves in a false position, or in the way of temptation 11 
to exceed the measure of a just indignation. Their 
continued absence, while the hospital managers still 
admit the female students to the clinics, should be 
accepted as a proof of their good faith and honest 
disapprobation of the impropriety they have op- 
posed. 
These views, we are aware, stand in direct oppo- 
sition 1*o a recent decision of " The General Council 
of Edinburgh University." But it is a great conso- 
lation, under the circumstances, to know that the 
Medical University of Edinburgh, has the misfortune 
of being entirely governed by the Town Council, and 
that its learned physicians have little or no power in 
the management of the Institution. The Town 
Council of Edinburgh we may naturally suppose to 
be as unfit to discuss or settle such a question, as are 
the various writers in our own newspapers. And it 
is to be regretted that in both cases, the whole subject 
was not left exclusively where it is best understood, 
viz., with learned and experienced medical men of 
the highest standing. 
We learn from the London Telegraph, that at the 
meeting of the General Council, or Supreme governing 
body of the Edinburgh University, the Rev. Dr. Phin 
proposed " that the audacious proposition should be 
set aside. Women, he believed to be mentally and 
physically disqualified for the treatment of disease ; 
it was out of their province; they should be kept 
within their sphere, &c." We wish the Scotch 12 
University every success, but we predict for it much 
trouble and small profit, and that it will, before many 
years, make the Town Council regret the experiment. 
Like the Legislature of New Jersey, thoroughly dis- 
gusted with the result, they will set aside the vote by 
their own act, and send the women back to private 
domestic life, where they belong. 
In our more extended country, and with our larger 
privileges as an independent, free people, the so-called 
"Woman's Rights Movement," is likely to take a 
wider range (we are said to "to run things into the 
ground") than among the staid and canny Scotch. 
Already there may be said to exist among some of 
our women, a crazy ambition for notoriety of any sort, 
more worthy of the other and colossal department of 
the Pennsylvania Hospital over the river, than of the 
sober elder brother on Pine Street. 
In this connection, we rejoice to learn that well- 
informed men who are deeply interested for the wel- 
fare of the Pennsylvania Hospital (some of them 
contributors), suggest that it will be judicious to elect 
separate and distinct managers for the " insane depart- 
ment," and the original institution on Pine Street. 
Why not transfer the Quaker leaders to Dr. Kirkbride, 
where all their sympathies already belong, and retain 
the other present managers for the City Hospital? 
Finally, we do not set up any claim to " a male 
monopoly " of the medical profession : if the women 
are resolved to be doctors, and they can find patients 13 
to practise upon, let them have their way. But it 
should be obtained through their own colleges and 
their own clinics, where the man element has no right 
or chance to meddle; where, indeed, he is strictly for- 
bidden to show himself as a student. And if thus left to 
themselves, it needs no Solomon to prophesy that 
they will, ere very long, be sick enough of it, and 
need, and obtain, male medical skill and sympathy to 
bring them back to their right places. 
" Philadelphia." 
November, 1869.