There is a common and grievous tendency to refer to the holiday just passed as “The Fourth of July,” when it is, in fact, “Independence Day”: a celebration specifically of the signing of the Declaration of Independence (plus or minus two days depending on whose account of the date you choose). Benjamin Rush, M.D., senior attending physician in the University of Pennsylvania and Surgeon General of the Continental Army, was very relevantly a signer of the Declaration of Independence of the nascent United States. Arguably our first published addiction specialist, Doctor Rush repeatedly returns to the metaphor of freedom and independence, in describing the effects of alcoholism on both the drinker and on the family and dependents of the drinker. The excerpt chosen in demonstration of his belief follows: Benjamin Rush, An Inquiry into the Effects of Spirituous Liquors on the Human Body, 1790 (rev. from 1784).

“The solitary instances of longevity which are now and then met with in hard drinkers, no more disprove the deadly effects of ardent spirits, than the solitary instances of recoveries from apparent death by drowning, prove that there is no danger to life from a human body lying an hour or two under water. Not less destructive are the effects of ardent spirits upon the human mind. They impair the memory, debilitate the understanding, and pervert the moral faculties. It was probably from observing these effects of intemperance in drinking, upon the mind, that a law was formerly passed in Spain which excluded drunkards from being witnesses in a court of justice.

“A more affecting spectacle cannot be exhibited than a person into whom this infernal spirit, generated by habits of intemperance, has entered. It is more or less affecting according to the station the person fills in a family, or in society, who is possessed by it. Is he a husband? How deep the anguish which rends the bosom of his wife! Is she a wife? Who can measure the shame and aversion which she excites in her husband? Is he the father, or is she the mother of a family of children? See their averted looks from their parent, and their blushing looks at each other! Is he a magistrate? Or has he been chosen to fill a high and respectable station in the councils of his country? What humiliating fears of corruption in the administration of the laws, and of the subversion of public order and happiness, appear in the countenances of all who see him!

“In pointing out the evils produced by ardent spirits, let us not pass by their effects upon the estates of the persons who are addicted to them. …Behold their houses stripped gradually of their furniture, and pawned, or sold by a constable, to pay tavern debts! See their names upon record in the dockets of every court, and whole pages of newspapers filled with advertisements of their estates for public sale! Are they inhabitants of country places? Behold their houses with shattered windows,— their barns with leaky roofs,— their gardens overrun with weeds,— their fields with broken fences, their hogs without yokes, — their sheep without wool,— their cattle and horses without fat,— and their children filthy, and half clad, without manners, principles, and morals! This picture of agricultural wretchedness is seldom of long duration. The farms and property thus neglected, and depreciated, are seized and sold for the benefit of a group of creditors. The children that were born with the prospect of inheriting them, are bound out to service in the neighbourhood; while their parents, the unworthy authors of their misfortunes, ramble into new and distant settlements, alternately led on their way by the hand of charity, or a little casual labour. Thus, we see poverty and misery, crimes and infamy, disease and death, are all the natural and usual consequences of the intemperate use of ardent spirits.

“I shall now take notice of the occasions and circumstances which are supposed to render the use of ardent spirits necessary, and endeavour to shew that the arguments in favour of their use in such cases are founded in error, and that in each of them, ardent spirits, instead of affording strength to the body, increase the evils they are intended to relieve. [Here, Rush examines the cases put in defense of strong alcohol, and his arguments in opposition.-WFH]”

With respect to all, in this week of celebration of autonomy,
- Wm. Haning, MD