By Chris Dalrymple, D.C., F.I.C.C
The Gilded Age, a term coined by Mark Twain to describe the time from 1870s to about 1900, was the time when the science of chiropractic was founded and developed. In 1878 Harvey Lillard lost hearing in his left ear after lifting a heavy weight while stooped. He would later become the first chiropractic patient on September 18, 1895, when D. D. Palmer successfully adjusted his spine and improved hearing resulted. By the late fall of that year Palmer had developed four methods of adjusting the vertebrae of the spine. In the summer of 1896 he also trained a few individuals in the healing art of chiropractic.
D. D. Palmer and Willard Carver were neighbors and frequently discussed matters of anatomy and physiology. In 1888 D. D. Palmer moved to Davenport, Iowa; The same year Willard Carver entered law school there.
By 1889, the modern medical practice acts, which required graduation from medical school, now placed the licensing function within state agencies. Medical schools no longer could independently license their graduates. The licensure acts were challenged in courts for depriving many existing and potential new-school practitioners of their right to practice medicine. The 1889 U.S. Supreme Court however, in the case of Dent v. West Virginia established that the state has a duty to protect the health, welfare, and safety of its citizens and that as long as the licensing acts were rationally related to this state duty they would be upheld.
Frank Dent was a physician of the Eclectic sect of medical practice, a group which accepted and taught the conventional medical science of the time, but who, in the area of therapeutics, carried on a rigorous campaign against excesses of drugging and bleeding, practices still used by many physicians at the time. Dent had been in practice for six years when he was convicted under a West Virginia law which required physicians to hold a degree from a reputable medical college, pass an examination, or prove practice in West Virginia for the previous ten years. In this case, the State Board of Health refused to accept Dent’s degree from the American Medical Eclectic College of Cincinnati. His lawsuit eventually found its way to the US Supreme court.
The Supreme Court decision ultimately led to the licensure of a number of professional occupations. Ten professional occupations soon became subject to state licensure and regulation. By 1920, some 30 occupations were subject to licensure and regulation and by 1977, 35 separate health care professions were licensed and regulated in the various states.
