perhaps bill white will gainsay me on this point, but i think it's fair to
attribute THE DISEASE OF INEBRIETY to crothers. while it is true that the
aasci was plagued by conflict in its early years (when it was the aaci), by
the middle of the 1880s, all of the neo-washingtonians had dropped out
(save albert day of the boston home). neither crothers nor the aasci left
any unpublished papers, so the organization's internal politics are a
matter of conjecture. however, the organization's domination by rigidly
somatic neurologists by 1890 hardly seems in doubt. crothers seems to
have orchestrated this orthodox perspective, gathering its claims together
in his own work and downplaying any controversy (about the therapeutic
value of religious belief or the use of recovering people in therapeutic
roles, for example) largely by ignoring it. the fundamental message of the
aasci was that inebriety was a disease; and yet the subtleties of that
view, and the important implications of differing ideas about the meaning
of disease, almost never were addressed. this allowed people like frances
willard and regional leaders of the salvation army to support the
organization's aim of medical treatment without looking too hard at its
premises.
i highly recommend bill white's SLAYING THE DRAGON; you might also consult
my essay, "inebriate institutions in north america, 1840-1920," in cheryl
warsh's DRINK IN CANADA.
jim baumohl
bryn mawr college
At 09:13 AM 9/7/98 -0400, you wrote:
>Hi everyone
>I posted this message in the summer, but I figure that maybe a lot of
>people did not get it. I am still trying to find the answer to this
>question... Any ideas? (I apologize to those who have read it before, and
>I promise I won't repost again!)
>========================================================================
>I read (I wish I could remember where) a citation that credited the book
>_The Disease of Inebriety_ to T. D. Crothers. The book was credited to the
>AASCI in general when published in 1893, with Crothers as the editor, and
>Crothers was editor of the QJI at the time. Is there any way to confirm or
>deny this statement; is it valid to cite the book as the ideas of one
>person (Crothers) or is it more properly a compilation of the work of the
>AASCI? The book seems remarkably lacking in contrary ideas, while the
>AASCI, I seem to recall, was not so lucky.
>
>Dan Malleck
>=====================================================================
>Dept of History
>Queen's University
>Home 613-547-4341
>Office 613-545-6000 ex 4367
>
><http://qlink.queensu.ca/~3djm24/links.htm>
><http://qlink.queensu.ca/~3djm24/indiefsh.htm>
>
>"So we starve all the teachers, and recruit more marines;
>How come we don't even know what that means?"
> -Joe Jackson
>
>
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