Will Representative Charles W. Boustany, Jr., M. D., of Louisiana’s 7^th District, be better able to convince his fellow-lawmakers about the dire consequences of a nationalized healthcare plan than Dr. Benjamin Rush could from the days of America’s founding? Dr. who?  Dr. Benjamin Rush, the only physician to sign the Declaration of Independence, was the first physician to address the issue of medical freedom over two centuries ago?  He argued to his fellow-founders for the inclusion of the Right to Medical Freedom in the Bill of Rights.  According to the website http://encyclopedia.stateuniversity.com/pages/2603/Benjamin-Rush.html, “Rush believed that Americans should enshrine the right to medical freedom in their Constitution, much as the right to freedom of religion is expressly guaranteed in that document.   Rush is reported to have argued that ‘Unless we put Medical Freedom into the Constitution, the time will come when medicine will organize into an undercover dictatorship.’”

The valiant Americans who turned out for the townhall meetings to challenge the legislators about the national healthcare bill are picking up where Dr. Benjamin Rush left off 200+ years ago, and rightly so for here, indeed, is Dr. Benjamin Rush’s fear becoming reality as the U. S. Government attempts to enshrine rather than a right to medical freedom a right to healthcare insurance, in essence an undercover dictatorship.  Should any honest, soul-searching legislator genuinely wish to ensure liberty and justice for all rather than insure all Americans with prefabbed healthcare, he/she would  finish the will of Dr. Benjamin Rush while simultaneously putting himself/herself on the side of the People of this Republic who have come out to these townhall meetings, in essence, to fight for the right of medical freedom.

Instead, the people have been put on the defense because of a proposal to have a national healthcare option and because of a contemptuous legislature who has no use for the voices of the people.  As with any insurance plan, the national healthcare plan will have innate limits because of cost and structure.  Medical freedom, on the other hand, only limits one by his or her own choices and means, and his/her means by which to get means.  National healthcare would strap to a stretcher like subjects the nation’s people.  On the other hand, the right to medical freedom would amputate the long arms of elected officials to control its citizens under the guise of healthcare.  After all, the Constitution was designed to limit the power of government—not to let it control one-sixth of the country’s economy and the very lives of its people. The Constitution was designed to ensure the rights of a man as “endowed by his Creator”not insure him like a parasitic growth dependent on government for breath and life. 

Unfortunately, at the nation’s founding, Dr. Benjamin Rush could not make his fellow-founders see the wisdom of his own insights, that “Unless we put Medical Freedom into the Constitution, the time will come when medicine will organize into an undercover dictatorship … to restrict the art of healing to one class of men, and deny equal privilege to others, will be to constitute the Bastille of Medical Science. All such laws are un-American and despotic and have no place in a Republic … The Constitution of this Republic should make special privilege for Medical Freedom as well as Religious Freedom.” http://www.biographicon.com/view/tjeez  According to Dr. Benjamin Rush, the lack of a Right of Medical Freedom will not only impede individual liberty but it will imperil Medicine.  Medicine can only advance when a society is free to explore the realms of possibilities afforded it by freedom.  Is it any wonder more medical advancements and technologies originate from The United States of American than any other country?  Fortunately but dismally, today, many American citizens see the reality of these threats very clearly on the horizon, and they are making their fears known on behalf of the multitudes reflected in the polls.  These are the Paul Reveres leading the charge at the looming threat of a dictatorship bundled securely in a healthcare bill that undoubtedly opens the door to the shredding of all the rights and liberties guaranteed under the Constitution and transforms the people into subjects not citizens.     

Think this is an over-assertion of the innate power of a government-run healthcare plan?  Think again:  Can’t one imagine a day when healthcare costs per person are too expensive for the government that childbearing must be legislated to curtail cost?  Can’t one imagine when abortions or sterilizations are mandated because of a correlation between healthcare costs and population?  Townhallers express an immediate concern about the possibility of the final bill requiring all Americans to pay for abortions; how about the possibility of having abortions or sterilizations mandated by a population czar to curtail governmental costs on healthcare to literally controlling population?  Can’t one imagine that the right to bear arms must be suspended indefinitely when healthcare costs exceed budget because of criminal and accidental gun-shot wounds?  Can’t one imagine the day that Prohibition must be enacted again for the good of all when alcohol’s effects on bodily well-being and inadvertent costs of its unintended DUI victims add to healthcare costs?  Can’t one imagine when the legislators must regrettably limit freedom of speech because conservative talk radio has increased healthcare costs by contributing to the population’s growing anger and consequential stress-induced health issues?  Can’t one imagine a day when too much bad news from 24/7 cable news programs takes such a toll on the mental state of citizens so that cable news must be banned to contain costs of anti-depressant drugs?  Can’t one imagine when food is rationed in an attempt to control obesity in this country under the guise of healthcare?  Can’t one imagine when foods are deemed legal and illegal based on the slightest, even trendiest,  evidence of the food’s impact on physical or mental health?  Can’t one imagine the day that freedom of religion must be shelved indefinitely when violence-induced healthcare fees escalate over religious statements like “God Bless American” vs “God D--- America” or over conflicting views on religion itself?  Can’t one hence imagine when life becomes meaningless and fruitless because it no longer belongs to oneself but to a beaureaucracy?  Well, at least one imagined it over two centuries ago, Dr. Benjamin Rush, and many more than that one can imagine it today based on polls and townhall turnouts.    

All too soon, recess ends for the House and Senate, and the legislators will return with the healthcare bill in the forefront.  The only rebuttal to reforming national healthcare is to enshrine medical freedom first as Dr. Benjamin Rush so willed 200+ years ago and as the majority of this Republic apparently will it today.  Years ago, our founders and ordinary people--wannabe Americans--fought to the death for liberty, shed blood and sacrificed limbs, family, and personal wealth for the rights of the individual.  Today, commendations not contempt to those Paul Reveres who have been advancing the charge against that tyranny bundled in a healthcare bill awaiting passage at the recess’ end like the cloaked ammo of a suicide bomber awaiting passage in a side door to wreck damage on this country.  Dr. Benjamin Rush forebode “an undercover dicatorship” at America’s founding when he insightfully saw a vital need for medical freedom in the Constitution or an inevitable time in the future when . . . Can’t one imagine?