· 1/14/1889

Dent v. West Virginia

Citations

129 U.S. 114
9 S. Ct. 231
32 L. Ed. 623
1889 U.S. LEXIS 1669

Syllabus

The statute of West Virginia (§§ 9 and 15, chapter 93, 1882) which requires every practitioner of- medicine in the State to. obtain a certificate from the State Board of Health that he is a graduate of a reputable medi-._ cal college in the school of medicine to which he- belongs; or that he has. practised medicine in the State continuously for ten years prior to March 8, 1881; of that he has been found upon examination to be qualified to practise medicine in all its departments, and which subjects a person practising without such certificate to prosecution and punishment for a misdemeanor, does not, when enforced against a person who had been.a practising physician in the State for a period of five years before 1881, without a diploma of a reputable medical college in the school of medicine to which he belonged, deprive him of his. estate or interest in the profession without due process of law. The State, in the exercise of its power to prpvide for the general welfare of - its people, may exact from parties before they can practise medicine a degree of shill and learning in that profession upon which the community employing their services may confidently rely; and, to ascertain whether they have such qualifications, require them to obtain a certificate or license from a Board or other authority competent to judge in that respect. If the qualifications required are appropriate to the profession, and attainable by reasonable study or application, their validity is not subject to objection because of their stringency or difficulty. Legislation is not open to the charge of depriving one of his rights without due process of law, if it be general in its operation upon the subjects to which it relates, and is enforceable in the usual modes established in the administration of government with respect to hindred matters; that is, by process or proceedings adapted to the nature of the case, and such is the legislation of West Virginia in question. Cummings

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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

1889 United States Supreme Court case

Dent v. West Virginia, 129 U.S. 114 (1889), was an important United States Supreme Court case involving the reputable practice of physicians and state laws in the late 19th century. It was a direct challenge to West Virginia having passed "the nation's first genuinely restrictive physician licensing law in the early 1880s."[1] [2]

The case

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Frank Dent was a physician who practiced with his father and grandfather in Newburg, West Virginia. Frank had only apprenticed with his father and practiced for six years when West Virginia passed its Board of Health Act in 1881 requiring either a diploma from a reputable medical college, a certificate showing ten years' practice, or successful passing of a state-administered exam. In 1882 Dent submitted a diploma from the American Eclectic Medical College in Cincinnati, which the Board of Health determined to be a fraudulent eclectic institution. Dent continued practicing and the Board's President, James Reeves, had Dent arrested. Frank Dent turned to his cousin Marmaduke H. Dent , Grafton West Virginia attorney and the first graduate of the West Virginia University for his defense. At his trial in 1883 Frank Dent was found guilty of practicing without a medical license. Marmaduke Dent appealed the decision to the West Virginia Supreme Court on the grounds that the state could not interfere with a citizen's right to practice a lawful trade.

The West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals heard Dent's case in 1884 and rejected Marmaduke's arguments. M.H. Dent then filed an appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court in 1885 claiming a violation of his cousin's rights under the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment . The Supreme Court had a considerable backlog and did not hear the case until 1889.[3]

The Decision

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The Fuller Court .

Justice Stephen J. Field delivered the Court's unanimous opinion on January 14, 1889, which upheld the West Virginia statute. Field noted that each citizen had a right to follow any lawful calling, subject to natural restraints such as age, sex, etc., as well as state restrictions, as long as those state restrictions were reasonable. In addition, the Court ruled that medicine, because of the careful nature of its training, the large knowledge of the human body required of doctors, and the nature of life-and-death circumstances with which doctors dealt, reliance needed to be placed on the assurance of a license. Certain circumstances might prompt states to exclude people without licenses from practicing medicine.[4]

Aftermath

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Later, the Court would extend its decision in the case _Hawker v. New York _, 170 U.S. 189 (1898) when it ruled that character was also an important qualification for doctors wishing to obtain a license. As in any Supreme Court case, Dent has been cited numerous times, particularly in defining the legitimate role of state regulation versus Constitutional prohibitions on Bills of Attainder. See, for example _SBC Communications, Inc. v. FCC _.

References

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↑ Mohr, James C (2013). Licensed to Practice - The Supreme Court Defines the American Medical Profession. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press. ISBN 978-1-4214-1142-2 .
↑ Harris Jr, John M. (March 14, 2019). Professionalizing Medicine : James Reeves and the Choices that Shaped American Health Care. Jefferson: McFarland & Company. ISBN 978-1-4766-7636-4 .
↑ "U.S. Reports: Dent v. West Virginia, 129 U.S. 114 (1889)" . _Library of Congress _.
↑ "U.S. Reports: Dent v. West Virginia, 129 U.S. 114 (1889)" . _Library of Congress _.

External links

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Works related to Dent v. West Virginia at Wikisource
Text of Dent v. West Virginia, 129 U.S. 114 (1889) is available from: Cornell CourtListener Google Scholar Justia Library of Congress

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How courts have described this case

Verbatim parenthetical descriptions written by other courts when citing this decision. Ranked by citation-network relevance.

holding that former communist ties are not sufficiently related to the practice of law to warrant disbarment
holding that states have' a legitimate interest in regulating the medical profession through doctors’ licensing requirements
recognizing a right to follow a lawful calling “subject only to such restrictions as are imposed upon all persons of like age, sex, and condition”
upholding doctors' licensing requirements because states have a legitimate interest in regulating the medical profession
affirming legislature’s authority to enact regulations to protect citizens from consequences of unfitness or incompetence in health profession
upholding a statute requiring physicians in West Virginia to obtain a certificate from the State Board of Health

Source: CourtListener parenthetical corpus (CC0).

Judges: Fíeld

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