Chapter 638. For the promotion of anatomical science and to prevent the desecration of graves in the District of Columbia
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CHAP. 638.— An Act For the promotion of anatomical science and to prevent the desecration of graves in the District of Columbia. April 29, 1902. [[Public, No. 87](/us/pl/57/87).] *Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, * District of Columbia. Anatomical board for control and distribution of dead human bodies created. That there shall be, and is hereby, created, in and for the District of Columbia, a board for the control of the dead human bodies hereinafter described, and for the distribution of such bodies among and to the schools in said District conferring the degree of doctor of medicine or doctor of dental surgery, or both: the.
Post Graduate School of Medicine, incorporated by an Act of Congress, approved February seventh, eighteen hundred andVol. 29, p 4. ninety-six. entitled “ An Act to incorporate the Post Graduate School of Medicine of the District of Columbia;’’ the medical schools of the United States Army and Navy: the medical examining boards of the United States Army. Navy, and Marine-Hospital Service; and the board of medical supervisors of the District of Columbia. Said boardMembers of the board. shall be known as the Anatomical Board of the Dist rict of Columbia, and shall consist of the health officer of said District and two representatives from each school aforesaid actually engaged in teaching, to be selected by and from the faculty thereof in accordance with the by-laws of such faculty, except in the case of the medical schools of the United States Army and Navy, the representatives from which shall be selected and detailed by the Surgeon-General of the Army and the Surgeon-General of the Navy.
Said health officer shall call a meeting of .said anatomical board for organization at a time and place to be fixed by said health officer as soon ns practicable after the pas-sage of this Act. Sa id anatomical board shall have full power to establishPowers of the board. by-laws for its government and to appoint and to remove proper officers and agents, and shall keep full and complete records of its transactions and of all material facts pertaining to the receipt and distribution of bodies.
Said records shall be open at all times for inspectionRecords. by any member of said anatomical hoard and by the United States attorney for the District of Columbia. Sec. 2. That every public officer, agent, and servant, and everyNotification by employees of almshouses, etc.Vol. 28, p. 686. officer, agent, and servant of any and every almshouse, prison, jail, asylum, morgue, hospital, and other public institutions and offices having charge or control of dead human bodies requiring to be buried at public expensé, shall notify said anatomical board, or such person as may be designated by the said board, whenever any dead human body comes into his possession, charge, or control for burial at public expense.
And every such officer, agent, anil servant shall, uponDelivery of bodies. application by said anatomical board or its agent, without fee or reward, and complying with the laws and regulations governing the removal of dead human bodies in the District of Columbia, deliver every such body to said board and permit said board or its agent to take and remove, the same. The notice aforesaid shall be given inWritten notice. writing and forwarded to said anatomical board within twenty-four hours after said officer, agent, or servant comes into possession, charge, or control of such body for burial, and shall include such material174 information as said board may designate.
But no such body shall beRestrictions concerning delivery of bodies. delivered if the deceased person, during his lust illness, without suggestion or solicitation, requested to be buried or cremated; or if within the time specified above and before the actual delivery thereof any person claiming to be and satisfying the officer in charge of Shell body that he is of kindred or is related by marriage to the deceased shall claim the said body for burial or cremation, or request in writing that it be buried at public expense: or if within the time specified above and before actual delivery any person claiming to be and satisfying the officer in charge of such body that he is a friend of the deceased arranges to have the same properly buried or cremated without expense to the District; or if the deceased person was a traveler who died suddenly; but in any such ease said body shall be buried or delivered to said applicant for burial.
Sec. 3. That the said anatomical board may receive the bodiesDistribution of bodies by the board. reported to it as aforesaid, and may distribute and deliver such as are received among and to such of the schools and boards entitled thereto as request in writing to receive the same, except as otherwise expressly directed in this Art. Each such school and board shall receive annually,Proportional number for medical schools. as nearly as may be practicable, such proportion of the ent ire number of bodies distributed as the number of students enrolled and in regular attendance at such school, and the number of candidates appearing for examination before such board, respectively, engaged bona fide at such school, or examined by said board in dissecting, and operative surgery on the cadaver, bears to the total number of students so enrolled in attendance, and engaged, and of persons so examined, in the District of Columbia.
The secretary, dean, or other proper officer of each such schools and board shall report to said anatomical board the names of all such students in attendance at such school or per-sons examined by said board, as the case may be, at such times and in such form as said board may direct. All bodies shall be deliveredNotice of death to relatives, etc. among such schools and boards in regular order so as to maintain, as nearly as may be practicable, an equitable allotment at al! times: and bodies assigned to any school or board in regular order and refused by such school or board without sufficient cause shall be charged against the quota of such school or board in such manner as not to prejudice any other school or board.
But no body shall be delivered to any school or board unless within not less than twenty-four hours prior to such delivery notice of the death has been given by said anatomical board to the nearest known kinsman, relative by marriage, or friend of the deceased, or if none such be, known, published by said anatomical board at least once in a daily newspaper published in the city of Washington, in the District of Columbia. The notice required by this section shall be deemed to have been given if served in writing on the person to be notified, or if left at his usual place of residence with some adult person residing therein, or a member of the family of such person.
Said board shall take receipts by name, or if the name be unknown, by a description, for each body delivered; all receipts so obtained by said board shall be properly filed by it. Sec. 4. That no school except the medical schools of the UnitedBond. States Army and Navy shall receive any body under the provisions of this Act until said school has given bond to the District of Columbia, and the Board of Commissioners of said District has approved such bond, which said bond shall be in the penal sum of two hundred dollars and conditioned that all bodies which said school shall receive shall be used in said District and only for the promotion of the science and art of medicine and of dentistry.
Sec. 5. That it shall be the duty of each and every officer, agent,Bodies must be used in the District of Columbia. and employee of every school and board receiving bodies under the provisions of this Act to see that such bodies are used in the District175 of Columbia and for the promotion of the science and art of medicine and of dentistry, and for no other purpose whatsoever, and that after being so used the remains thereof are disposed of in accordance with law. Sec. 6. That any person who shall, in the District of Columbia, sellTraffic in bodies prohibited. or buy any body aforesaid, or in any way traffic therewith, or transmit or convey any such body to any place outside of said Distinct, or cause or procure any such body to be so transmitted or conveyed, or who shall, in said District, disturb or remove, without legal permit,any body from any grave or vault, shall, on conviction thereof, be finedPenalty. not more than two hundred dollars or imprisoned in the workhouse of said District for not more than one year.
Sec. 7. That neither the United States nor the District of Columbia,Expenses. nor any officer, agent, or servant thereof, shall be at any expense by reason of the delivery of any body or bodies aforesaid, except such as may be properly chargeable on account of bodies delivered to the medical schools of the Army and Navy, the medical examining boards of the Army, the Navy, and the Ma line-Hospital Service, and the board of medical supervisors of the District of Columbia; but all expenses of such delivery and distribution, except as hereinbefore specified, and of said anatomical board, shall be paid by the schools receiving such bodies, in such manner as may be specified by said board and by such school in proportion to the number of bodies which it has received; and no school which has failed or refused to pay its just proportion of such expense as determined by said board shall be allowed to receive any body or bodies, or parts thereof, while the amount so due remains unpaid.
Sec. 8. That any person having any duty enjoined upon him by theFailure to perform duty. provisions of this Act who willfully neglects, refuses, or fails to perform the same, shall, upon conviction thereof, be punished by a finePenalty. of not more than one hundred dollars or by imprisonment in the work-house of the District of Columbia for not more than one year. Sec. 9. That all prosecutions under this Act shall he in the policeProsecutions. court of the District of Columbia, on information brought in the name of said District on its behalf.
Sec. 10. That all Acts and parts of Acts inconsistent with this ActRepeal. be, and the same are hereby, repealed. Approved, April 29, 1902.