Licensed to Practice

The tale told by Professor Mohr is not a dry sequence of facts, but is instead an evocative page-turner. Mohr’s description of the characters in this tale is massively evocative and filled with palace intrigue and scheming worthy of Henry II… To learn the fascinating details I refer you wholeheartedly to this marvelous depiction. – Howard Wainer Journal of Medical Regulation Mohr presents a thoroughly researched and eminently readable account of the times, people and circumstances that led to the passage of the West Virginia licensing law and its subsequent legal challenges… Reading this fascinating and personal history of a watershed moment in physician regulation encourages one to dig deeper into the history of medical regulation. – John Harris Social History of Medicine In sprightly prose Mohr explains how the practice of medicine came to be licensed. His archival sleuthing has unearthed a complex drama involving personalities, ideas, and interests. – Jeffrey Kahana Journal of American History Mohr clearly explains the rationale for opposing licensing and makes it easy to understand why for over a decade legal authorities remained confused and unconvinced by the decision. This book will be a useful case study for historians attempting to make the case for the contingent nature of change to non-historian policy makers. – Joel D. Howell Bulletin of the History of Medicine

James C. Mohr is the College of Arts and Sciences Distinguished Professor of History and the Philip H. Knight Professor of Social Science at the University of Oregon. He is author of Doctors and the Law: Medical Jurisprudence in Nineteenth-Century America and Radical Republicans in the North: State Politics during Reconstruction, both published by Johns Hopkins.