People v. Barnett

240 Ill. App. 357, 1926 Ill. App. LEXIS 254
CourtAppellate Court of Illinois
DecidedApril 27, 1926
StatusPublished
Cited by1 cases

This text of 240 Ill. App. 357 (People v. Barnett) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Appellate Court of Illinois primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
People v. Barnett, 240 Ill. App. 357, 1926 Ill. App. LEXIS 254 (Ill. Ct. App. 1926).

Opinion

Mr. Presiding Justice Boggs

delivered the opinion of the court.

A jury being waived, plaintiff in error was tried, found guilty and sentenced to pay a fine of $100 and costs in the county court of St. Clair county, under an information charging among other things that he unlawfully attached the title “Doctor” to his name, indicative that he was engaged in the treatment of human ailments as a business, and that he did not possess a license so to do. To reverse said judgment, this writ of error is prosecuted.

The record discloses that plaintiff in error maintained an office in Belleville, above the door of which was the sign: “Dr. C. Edward Barnett, Naprapathy. Acute, Chronic and Nervous Diseases.” In the main door of the corridor of the building, on the directory appearing therein, were the words: “Dr. C. Edward Barnett, Naprapath.” A blotter from his office was also offered and admitted in evidence, on which was printed:

“Napr apathy
Cures When Others. Fail
Chartered Manipulation
World’s Greatest Healing Art
No Drugs, No Knife, No Risk Safe, Sane, and Sure
Phone
Office Bell 377
Bes. Bell 349-W, Kin. 650-B
Dr. C. Edward Barnett and staff
Dr. Porter W. Karr Naprapaths
46 First Natl. Bank Bldg. Belleville, Illinois.”

Plaintiff in error concedes that he has no license. It is his contention that no' provision is made in the Medical Practice Act of 1923 for the granting of a license for the treating of human ailments as a naprapath, and for that reason he did not apply therefor.

Section 9 of the Medical Practice Act of 1923 [Cahill’s St. ch. 91, ¶ 9], among other things, provides:

“Examinations of applicants who seek to practice any system or method of treating human ailments without the use of drugs or medicines and without operative surgery shall he the same as required of applicants who seek to practice medicine in all of its branches, excepting therefrom materia medica, therapeutics, surgery, obstetrics, and theory and practice, and shall be such in the judgment of the department (of Begistration and Education) as will determine the qualifications of the applicant to practice the particular system or method of treating human ailments without the use of drugs or medicines and without operative surgery which he specifically designated in his application as the one which he would undertake to practice.”

Plaintiff in error admits that said Act purports to make unlawful the treating of human ailments without the use of drugs, etc., but contends that said Act is not operative as to naprapathy for the alleged reason, as he contends, that there is no provision made for the licensing of naprapaths.

"While the Medical Practice Act of 1923 does not purport, in and of itself, to provide a means of examination and licensing of persona to practice medicine in all its branches, or for a limited treatment of human ailments, it specifically provides that the Department of Begistration and Education shall have charge of the same, subsection 6 of paragraph 59 of chapter 24a, Cahill’s Statutes, being as follows:

“The Department of Begistration and. Education shall have power to exercise the rights, powers and duties vested by law in the State Board of Health relating to the practice of medicine, or any of the branches thereof, or midwifery.”

It is the contention of counsel for plaintiff in error that the provisions above quoted do not provide for an examination of persons desiring to practice naprapathy; that the examination there provided for has to do with persons practicing medicine in all its branches.

One of the grounds set forth by plaintiff in error, in his motion for a new trial, was that the Medical Practice Act of 1923 is unconstitutional, and in the assignment of errors it is set forth that the trial court erred in overruling the motion for a new trial.

If plaintiff in error is undertaking to raise the constitutionality of said Act, he is not in a position to do so, having prosecuted his writ of error to- this court, and there being other questions raised by the assignment of errors which this court may pass on. He is therefore deemed to have waived any questions pertaining to the constitutionality of the Act. Drtina v. Charles Tea Co., 281 Ill. 259; City of Edwardsville v. Central Union Tel. Co., 302 Ill. 362; People v. Eaton, 233 Ill. App. 504-507.

However, the Supreme Court has held said Act constitutional. People v. Witte, 315 Ill. 282; People v. Walder, 317 Ill. 524. In People v. Witte, supra, the court had before it an information charging the practice of naprapathy. After setting forth the ailments treated by practitioners of that school, and the methods used by them in treating human ailments, the court at page 285 says:

“The General Assembly, in framing the Medical Practice Act, was confronted by the necessity of applying its provisions to the schools of medicine or medical practice now existing and to those which might arise from time to time. It was impossible to formulate a statute with particular reference to each. A plan of regulation was provided in a single, comprehensive enactment applicable alike to all schools, present and future. The plan divides licenses (Cahill’s Stat. 1923, ch. 91, ¶ 11), so far as physicians are concerned, into two classes, one of which confers the right to practice medicine in all of its branches, and the other to treat human ailments without the use of drugs or medicines and without operative surgery, the licensee under such a license to be restricted by its terms to the practice of the system or method which he specifically designated in Ids application as the one he would undertake to practice.”

The Supreme Court has frequently held that the term “practice of medicine” is not confined alone to those practitioners who may use drugs, etc. People v. Gordon, 194 Ill. 560; People v. Dunn, 255 Ill. 289; People v. Siman, 278 Ill. 257; People v. Krause, 291 Ill. 67; People v. Trenner, 144 Ill. App. 275; People v. Kane, 205 Ill. App. 32. In People v. Siman, supra, the court at page 257 says :

“The term ‘medicine’ is not limited to substances supposed to possess curative or remedial properties, but has also the meaning of the healing art, — the science of preserving health and treating disease for the purpose of cure, — whether such treatment involves the use of medical substances or not. In common acceptation, anyone whose occupation is the treatment of diseases for the purpose of curing them is a physician, and this is the sense in which the term is used in the Medical Practice Act.”

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Related

Potts v. Department of Registration & Education
496 N.E.2d 253 (Appellate Court of Illinois, 1986)

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Bluebook (online)
240 Ill. App. 357, 1926 Ill. App. LEXIS 254, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/people-v-barnett-illappct-1926.