The Politics of Public Health Reform: Felix J. Underwood and the Mississippi State Board of Health, 1924-58

Abstract

WITH MEDICARE, environmental safety, and medical costs among the issues pervading today's American dialogue, health clearly looms as one of the nation's most controversial and pressing problems. This is quite understandable. Health affects Americans individually and collectively. For over a century, since scientific discoveries provided the tools and bureaucratic expansion provided the means for improvement, the public's health has increasingly become a matter of public concern. While specific problems have varied greatly since public health activities formally began, many of the underlying difficulties have remained surprisingly constant. If one of the uses of history is to shed light on the present by elucidating the past, then it is worthwhile to examine how these problems were handled in former years. Close scrutiny suggests that the public's health is an important dimension of any social order and that, at its core, public health reform is essentially political in nature. The experience of Felix J. Underwood and the Mississippi State Board of Health between 1924 and 1958 serves as an excellent case in point. Felix Underwood was by training a medical doctor, not a politician or policymaker. A native Mississippian, he graduated from medical school in 1908, engaged in private practice for several years, and became a