The American Plague: The Untold Story of Yellow Fever, The Epidemic That Shaped Our Nation by Molly Caldwell Crosby Page B
Authors: Molly Caldwell Crosby
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been fraught with controversy between the North and South. He had taken office only by assistance from the National Guard and a promise to withdraw federal troops from the South. His liberal views on the rights of blacks further united his enemies in the South. His only allies in that region had been the businessmen and merchants looking to profit from reconstruction, and now, their economic viability would certainly be at stake. On the brink of the 1878 epidemic, the Memphis Appeal had published a column entitled, “Poor Hayes: The Republicans hate and mistrust him; and the Democrats, knowing he occupies a position to which another was chosen by the people, have no respect for him.” A country not at all secure with his leadership was looking to Hayes for healing.
With Congress out of session in August of 1878, H. Casey Young, the congressman representing Memphis, had appealed to Hayes on behalf of the stricken city not only for relief aid but for a committee of experts to investigate yellow fever once and for all. But the president, one historian wrote, “was not in a position to commit the recessed Forty-fifth Congress to financial sponsorship of an investigation.” It would not take long, however, for the epidemic to demand the attention of the U.S. government and launch it into a controversial, public debate over the national health system.
In November, Hayes called his cabinet together to assess the situation; federal response had been slow. In the south, the dead were still rotting unburied in cities and farmlands. Thousands of people had been displaced and collected in camps, waiting for food and supplies. The entire cotton market had been injured. The first action would be to declare a state of emergency in the Mississippi Valley. Charities and state governments could be depended upon to rally support, as well as deliver supplies and wooden coffins. Already, $1 million in aid had gone to Memphis from every state in the union and overseas. Towboats barreled down the Mississippi River carrying over 333,000 pounds of beef, 23,000 pounds of crackers, close to 33,000 pounds of coffee and 200 gallons of whiskey. Train cars full of wooden coffins pulled into the Poplar Street station.
What Hayes needed was a way to comfort the minds of the people, to offer some sense of protection against a tragedy like this in the future. He needed a united force of experts and physicians to not only reassure the people but also actively work to prevent and manage epidemics. The country needed a federal board of health.
In the weeks that followed, a battle would ensue between the American Public Health Association and the Marine Hospital Service, which would later become the Public Health Service. The two agencies, each under the helm of an ambitious, headstrong leader, would fight for dominant control of American health. It also became the familiar battle of federal versus state rights, an echo of pre-Civil War debates. This time, however, southern politicians argued vehemently for federal control of quarantines, while northern owners of those railroads and shipping lines shouted for state control. After all, on a local level, states would be unlikely to risk their own economy with quarantine, much less the financial stability of northern-owned transportation. That very problem had arisen during the 1878 epidemic: New Orleans officialslike Samuel Choppin believed strongly in a quarantine against infected ships arriving in New Orleans; but, once yellow fever was present, city officials refused to tell the rest of the country for fear of being quarantined themselves. A reporter for Harper’s wrote in December of that year, “No question in medicine, and scarcely any in theology, has been debated more learnedly and more ardently—I may say, indeed, more furiously— nor for a longer time, than this one.”
After weeks of investigation, no new medical information was available, and the country was no closer to solving the
With Congress out of session in August of 1878, H. Casey Young, the congressman representing Memphis, had appealed to Hayes on behalf of the stricken city not only for relief aid but for a committee of experts to investigate yellow fever once and for all. But the president, one historian wrote, “was not in a position to commit the recessed Forty-fifth Congress to financial sponsorship of an investigation.” It would not take long, however, for the epidemic to demand the attention of the U.S. government and launch it into a controversial, public debate over the national health system.
In November, Hayes called his cabinet together to assess the situation; federal response had been slow. In the south, the dead were still rotting unburied in cities and farmlands. Thousands of people had been displaced and collected in camps, waiting for food and supplies. The entire cotton market had been injured. The first action would be to declare a state of emergency in the Mississippi Valley. Charities and state governments could be depended upon to rally support, as well as deliver supplies and wooden coffins. Already, $1 million in aid had gone to Memphis from every state in the union and overseas. Towboats barreled down the Mississippi River carrying over 333,000 pounds of beef, 23,000 pounds of crackers, close to 33,000 pounds of coffee and 200 gallons of whiskey. Train cars full of wooden coffins pulled into the Poplar Street station.
What Hayes needed was a way to comfort the minds of the people, to offer some sense of protection against a tragedy like this in the future. He needed a united force of experts and physicians to not only reassure the people but also actively work to prevent and manage epidemics. The country needed a federal board of health.
In the weeks that followed, a battle would ensue between the American Public Health Association and the Marine Hospital Service, which would later become the Public Health Service. The two agencies, each under the helm of an ambitious, headstrong leader, would fight for dominant control of American health. It also became the familiar battle of federal versus state rights, an echo of pre-Civil War debates. This time, however, southern politicians argued vehemently for federal control of quarantines, while northern owners of those railroads and shipping lines shouted for state control. After all, on a local level, states would be unlikely to risk their own economy with quarantine, much less the financial stability of northern-owned transportation. That very problem had arisen during the 1878 epidemic: New Orleans officialslike Samuel Choppin believed strongly in a quarantine against infected ships arriving in New Orleans; but, once yellow fever was present, city officials refused to tell the rest of the country for fear of being quarantined themselves. A reporter for Harper’s wrote in December of that year, “No question in medicine, and scarcely any in theology, has been debated more learnedly and more ardently—I may say, indeed, more furiously— nor for a longer time, than this one.”
After weeks of investigation, no new medical information was available, and the country was no closer to solving the
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