Library of Social and Economic Aspects of Medicine of Michael M. Davis, 1920-1966

Series 1: Medical Economics and Medical Sociology

Arrangement

Divided into nineteen sub-series, each futher sub-divided into subject-catalogued folders.

Scope and Content

This series contains material that is concerned with the cost of medical care and with special studies by, for, and about the Committee on the Costs of Medical Care, including confidential reports in typescript carbon copies by such eminent authorities of the 1930s as Haven Emerson, Louis I. Reed, and C. Rufus Rorem. A great deal of the work concerns Michael M. Davis’ evaluations of the work of this important committee and its implications for the development of its recommendations, made during the period of Davis’ term as director of Medical Services of the Julius Rosenwald Fund during the depths of the depression, when the health needs of the population were in great flow and public resources at their lowest ebb. The files are filled with publications, special studies, reports, drafts of minutes of committee meetings, and special groups concerned with public income data, taxes, and similar material (with much of a contemporary and ephemeral nature) concerning President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s Committee on Economic Security and the Advisory Council on Economic Security, from the time of its establishment by executive order on June 29, 1934. This is supplemented by special studies (some undertaken by Dr. Davis or his associates) on the program of grants-in-aid for rural hospital services, and of Social Security programs. Many special stuides, both published and unpublished, are in this group of files, such as those on the attitudes of Roman Catholics toward Social Security, the report of the Michigan Governor’s Study Commission on Prepaid Hospital and Medical Care Plans (1962), etc.

Original questionnaires returned by certain labor unions, requresting information on their attitudes toward and experience with medical care and hospital insurance, are in one of these drawers, along with manuscript reports, typescripts of articles, addresses, etc., concerned with Blue Cross (including its early history) — much of it separately classified by subject or by state.

Material on state, industrial and cooperative medical plans, comprehensive group medical plans, and union health programs fills are also present, providing a mine of information about social trends of the period. This is material that cannot be duplicated and does not appear in any other library collection as a unit standing ready for the analyses of scholars of the future who will build on the experience detailed in the records of the Davis collection.

Series 2: Medical Care in the United States

Arrangement

Divided into sixty one sub-series.

Scope and Content

In this series, confidential reports made for foundations in the United States on the subject of medical care abound, and the files are replete with correspondence, publications, clippings, and other documentation on the distribution of medical care, medical care for dependents of military personnel, home care, and social medicine.

Material contained in the file drawer on various diseases is of secondary sources, and although there are some scarce and unusual reports (e.g. The Middle Atlantic Educational Congress on Vision in the Defense Industry, April 1942 – a 218-page transcript), the bulk of this subseries is probably duplicated by the Academy’s holdings. Apparently Dr. Davis used these materials for background information.

When we go on to national affairs and social planning, however, we return to a principal interest of Dr. Davis’, and again we come onto a number of usual documents – published and unpublished – such as increasing literate study that Benjamin C. Gruenberg made for the Committee on American Museum of Hygiene of the American Public Health Association in 1937, A Museum of Health.

And so it goes, on and on, conveying early antipoverty programs, population problems, regional and medical programs for heart disease, cancer, and stroke, urban renewal and urban planning, health conditions in the United States, etc., with a great deal of material on the problems of youth in urban communities. The administration of medical research comes into its own throughout the records of these files, and there is a great deal of valuable material, much of it wholly ephemeral and not retained elsewhere, on various special, typical, and particular public or private health surveys. The file on Health in Wartime provides a specialsource on health programs in defense migration, the effect of war (usually referring to World War II) on the medical profession, the war and medical manpower, hospital and health center requirements in defense areas, etc.This series also contains material of an historical nature on rural economic conditions from the 1930’s through the 1950s, and on rural health problems and programs, especially with regard to national and state government interest in health security measures for farm and migrating laborers. The section continues with extensive material in the nature of private reports, correspondence, surveys, and publications on group practice of medicine, including files on specific organizations, and on prepayment plans made by specific labor unions, much of it not available elsewhere.

The series also includes materials on medical education (federal aid, intern training, regional cooperation, etc.), medical personnel, and physicians (choice and change of doctors, discrimination in medicine, the involvement of druggists, ethics, fee-splitting, etc.), specialists, dentists and dentistry, medical social workers, nurses and nursing, etc.

Reports, correspondence, and publications on hospitals, including some complete and broken files of newsletters and reports of hospital councils and organizations, as well as privately conducted surveys and studies of hospitals, their services, administration, and financing are also present. Dr. Davis’ files include an accumulation of years concerning the American Hospital Association and its various subsidiary parts, much of which is supplemented in the extensive separate correspondence files that make up a part of this gigantic collection.

There is a large file on public medical care programs, particularly as they concern the aged and aging, public welfare programs, public health, and workmen’s compensation (with detailed studies of variations, laws, etc.).

Of special interest is a drawer devoted to some of the restricted records of the 1952 hearings of The President’s Commission on the Health Needs of the Nation and other related confidential transcripts, correspondence, etc. There is a very complete file on the Salk Vaccine debate of 1955 which, besides containing hearings and releases from the U.S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare and from the Committee for the Nation’s Health, has Dr. Davis’ comments (manuscript lecture notes, correspondence, etc.), on all aspects of the argument. Also included is a valuable collection of different organizations’ official and unofficial statements on the subject.

Problems of Veterans Administration medical care programs and a small file on the War Stabilization Board Report on Health, Welfare, and Pension programs are housed in a large file drawer, three quarters of which is taken up by an extensive record related to Medicare, which bridges a break in Dr. Davis’ collection between Series II and Series III, covering federal and state legislation for public health care under Social Security programs and other forms of state-administrated medical care.

Series 3: Legislation and Legal Aspects

Arrangement

Divided into seven sub-series.

Scope and Content

The National Health Insurance Legislation file contains original texts of bills, committee hearings, and basic data in the form of official publications and statements of organizations and individuals (clippings, correspondence, published releases, etc.). There are also folders of correspondence and other expressions of different and differing attitudes as evidenced by labor, “organized medicine,” commercial and political organizations. The whole picture of a nation concernedis here — and there are files of statements by personalities in all fields, newspaper and columnist’s comments, articles from all kinds of magazines, along with radio and television publicity, and cartoons.

Not only the early health insurance bills and actions sponsored by Flanders and Herter in 1949, the Humphrey Cooperative Health Act of 1949, and the Taft-Smith-Donnell action of 1946, 1947, and 1949 are here, but these records are accompanied by Dr. Davis’ complete files of correspondence, clippings, confidential reports, and annotated copies of published items referring to these legislative movements. Most inclusive are the files on the Wagner-Murray-Dingell bills and their evolution from previous legislative proposals dating back more than 30 years.

In addition to these specific files, there are materials on legislation since 1950, and pertinent publications, reports, correspondence, and ephemera relevant to legislation prior to 1950, public assistance and child welfare, mental health, and state legislation, including sickness and disability insurance programs to be paid for by the state.

There are further materials on the legal aspects of hospitals, their medical staff relations, and licensing laws regarding hospitals and convalescent institutions. The file on legal suits and medical societies is especially fascinating, including as it does a unique scrapbook of newspaper clippings on “The A.M.A. Trial” of 1941, when the American Medical Association was indicted for alleged violation of the antitrust act. This, along with trial records of other legal actions affecting medical organizations, optical rebates, and so forth, give us substantial corps of reference materials not easy to come by and, in most cases — particularly where Dr. Davis’ correspondence or ephemera are added — not to be duplicated in any other collection.

Series 4: Organizations

Arrangement

Divided into eight subseries.

Scope and Content

Samples of special reports, annual reports, and letters to and from Dr. Davis concerning the work of various organizations are included in this part of the collection, which is grouped into the following sections: Professional Organizations, General Organizations, International Organizations, and Political Organizations.

A large part of Dr. Davis’ intrinsic interest in the dozens of organizations represented in this portion of the collection is more substantially supported by correspondence located by subject designation elsewhere in the files and, also, in the large part of the collection devoted to “Personalities.” There is considerable material on rural or farm organizations and on a number of temporary groups.

One of the chief values of the section devoted to organizations, however, is the inclusion of a good deal of material on groups now defunct or inactive, along with publications derived from them; also, many publications that are now unobtainable from organizations that are still existent are in the file drawers of the Academy.

In addition to the miscellaneous organizations just commented on, also present is Dr. Davis’ complete file of records, correspondence, interviews, confidential reports, etc., concerning the Committee for the Nation’s Health, with articles promoted or arranged for by the committee in various publications, 1948 to 1956; there are also memoranda, minutes, and financial statements. Dr. Davis was, of course, chairman of the Executive Committee of the Committee for the Nation’s Health. This is an absolutely unique and basic record of the work and administration of one of the most effective instruments for public education with regard to medical security ever to be active in this country. The work of the Committee for the Nation’s Health, its internal administration and public programs, will serves as a model for many other social drives in the future. Likewise, the similar files of the Committee on the Research in Medical Economics (CRME) gives the Academy a corner on research in the field of medical economics. The unique, priceless archives of these two organizations will undoubtedly be the cornerstone of a research collection that will be of growing importance to all branches of the medical profession.

The American Medical Association was, naturally, of prime interest to Dr. Davis and his colleagues in the various committees and groups with which he worked toward the goal of government-sponsored or government-supported health plans. The collection includes basic studies of the A.M.A., and its organization, with detailed publications, reports, correspondence, clippings, and private studies gathered from many sources. There are folders of correspondence with several individuals and officers of the A.M.A., with a good deal of supplementary material such as reports of the association’s meetings, speeches made to them, etc. The A.M.A. files continue with medical societies (state and county) filled with correspondence as well as with clippings and other secondary source records of “position statements” made by auxiliary groups across the country during the years of the great debate on “socialized medicine.”

Not less interesting are the files on the A.M.A.’s public relations programs, with confidential internal documents of policy and procedures (some conducted by outside surveyors), and documentation of the high-gear efforts of the association to publicize its views about publicly supported health programs. The file contains fascinating documentation on the crisis in the mid-1940s when a noted public relations counseling firm withdrew from its association with the A.M.A. in a dispute over purpose and intention. The bitter battles of the A.M.A. against the programs of the Committee on the Costs of Medical Care, the Committee on the Nation’s Health, and findings or recommendations of these and similar bodies are all exposed in Dr. Davis’ collection — a picture of social turmoil in professional-societal relations in flux over many, many years.

One drawer contains “The A.M.A.-Record,” with extensive coverage–in confidential correspondence, secret reports, brochures, clippings, and other published or unpublished formats–of documentation that is beyond value for historical consideration of the battle of the A.M.A. Campaigns and samples of advertising literature are described (with numerous actual examples), the 1948 assessment of $25 and reactions to it, attitudes toward health insurance, folders on medical ethics and economics, tax exemption, etc. Position papers and studies on various legislation such as compulsory health insurance, disability insurance, family doctors, federal aid, health care for the aged, public school systems, Social Security, and veterans care are only part of this exciting story of social change.

This “record” is further extended by files describing the “A.M.A. in Politics,” the National Professional Committee for Eisenhower (1952), action in political campaigns, “Doctors for Nixon-Lodge,” and similar efforts that were made over the years to bring the proper forces into line for political action. It is all rather a desperate story, and Dr. Davis’ files enhance a view of political battles that is not otherwise available in such completely documented form. Take, for example, the folders on the famous Whitaker and Baxter activities of 1952 to 1954 and the campaign to fight for voluntary medicine described as “one of the choicest plums and hottest potatoes in U.S. public relations,” or the file on the National Physicians Committee, and the lobbying activities of the various medical organizations other than the A.M.A.

Series 5: Medical Care in Foreign Countries

Arrangement

Divided into nine subseries, each containing multiple subject catalogued files.

Scope and Content

This series contains much public documentation and correspondence with leaders and private physicians concerned with social medicine and public health abroad. Most of these folders are devoted to the era in Great Britain that preceded and followed the Beveridge Plan, and are abundantly supplemented by comments (in print and letter form) made by practitioners, consultants, and specialists referring to the National Health Service Act and all aspects of its administration. There is a long correspondence with Sidney Lamb, one-time secretary of the International Hospital Association and secretary of the Merseyside Hospitals Council (Liverpool) who devoted so many years to the cause of improved hospital care in Great Britain and elsewhere, a correspondence containing warm and sensitive expressions of hopefulness for “the health help needed by the people of all countries.”

Much of the foreign material from Great Britain, the Continent, Asia, Africa, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand appears in the form of published and unpublished reports, most of it probably not duplicated in other collections on the social and economic aspects of medicine, health insurance, etc. One especially interesting part of the files at this point is correspondence and other material originating in the United States and commenting on the National Health Service in Great Britain — a remarkable display of varieties of opinion both favorable and hostile.

Series 6: Personalities

Contains folders for 74 individuals.

Arrangement

Arranged alphabetically by surname.

Scope and Content

The series on Personalities contains Dr. Davis’ correspondence, notes, comments, clippings, personality evaluations, and memorabilia to, from, and about all of the leaders associated with him in his multifarious activities. Some individuals represented include Elin Anderson whose grass-roots pioneering efforts brought more adequate medical service to thousands of people in the United States; other names follow in a list of movers and shakers on the social scene there, such as: Dr. Georger Baehr, Harry Becker, Dr. George Berry, George Bugbee, Morris L. Cooke, Thomas E. Dewey, Oscar Ewing, Dr. I. S. Falk (an exceptionally long file dating from 1933 to 1954), Dr. Channing Frothingham, Sir William Jameson, Mr. and Mrs. Albert D. Lasker, Dean Leonard Mayo, Dr. James C. McCann, Dr. Frederick D. Mott, Anna M. Rosenberg, Adlai Stevenson, Senator Robert Taft, President Harry S. Truman, Albert W. Whitney, and hundreds of others. Most of the files contain correspondence of greater or lesser significance; many are reflections of Dr. Davis’ numerous activities and include his terse comments–sometimes kindly, sometimes stringent and critical.