Box Turtle Bulletin

The Daily Agenda for Sunday, March 20

TODAY’S AGENDA is brought to you by:

From David (a Jacksonville-based gay photography and lifestyle magazine), May 1972, page 18.(Personal collection.)

I can’t find any information about the Music Box Lounge, except that it appears to have lasted until sometime between 1982 and 1984. The location today houses a Bali import jewelry and decor store.

TODAY IN HISTORY:
► Single Women of New York Denounce “Old Bachelors”: 1749. Just a few centuries ago, marriage was more than a desirable arrangement for two people who love each other. It was, just as importantly, a significant economic proposition. This was especially true for women, whose options for earning a living were severely limited. While men had the entire world open to them as far as opportunities for making a living were concerned, women’s options were limited mostly to marrying men. In 1749, a group of single women who called themselves “The Petticoat Club” found themselves paying a severe economic penalty while they saw large numbers of eligible men refusing to settle down and marry. In a petition to the New York Gazette, the club proposed that those “old bachelors,” were not carrying out their proper duties, and should be taxed for their selfishness:

To all married Men … The Humble Petition of a Society of young Women known by the Name of The Petticoat Club, in Behalf of themselves and several Hundred of others, between the Age of Sixteen and Forty, in this City and Province. …

That your Petitioners being all of the ancient and honourable Family of the Wife-wou’d-be’s, and being arrived to the Age of Maturity, are as we flatter ourselves, of as good Abilities both of Body and Mind as any the World does afford … ; yet, notwithstanding all our Accomplishments and utmost Endeavours we are frustrated of this our laudable Design, by the unsufferable Stupidity and Obstinacy of a Set of Men called Old Bachelors, who know and ought to do better, and who in Contempt of the laws both of God and Nature, and to the inexpressible Damage of this Province, do oblige us, contrary to our Desires and Inclinations, to remain useless, and ever burdensome Members thereof.

For our Relief in these our deplorable Circumstances, ’tis our earnest Desire, that you would so far commiserate our Condition, as to use your utmost Endeavors, that there be such Fine laid on all Offenders of this Nature, as may bear some Proportion of the Heinousness of their Crimes; and that all Bachelors above 26 Years of Age, may be obliged to pay a moderate Tax, which should yearly increase till they arrive at 40; that the said Fine may be applied to the Education of the Boys of this Province, that so they may have the Opportunity of learning more sense and better Manners, and wherein the true interest of their Country does consist. — And if any of the aforesaid Drones shall presume to continue in their Obstinacy till the Age of 40, then we pray, that there may be some publick Mark of Distinction, that they be known from other Men; and we think it not improper to oblige such stubborn offenders to wear one Side of their Beard at full length, to show their Age, and the other Half shaved bare, as a Mark of their Folly; unless they can make appear they have done something to equivalent Advantage to their Country . …

That there are such Numbers of the ancient and honourable Family of the Wife-wou’d be’s, in this Province, is so manifest it needs no Proof; that the Treatment they meet with, is in Contempt to the Divine Law, is plain; for no sooner was Man created Male and Female, but God commanded them to increase and multiply, and replenish the Earth; which Command the Old Bachelors have no Regard to, unless to replenish it with such an illigetimate Race, as would be a standing Reproach to the Parents. … We could multiply Texts of Scripture to the Purpose; but … we shall pass on to show, that it is even contrary to the Laws of Nature. We see that the Male and Female of all Species of Creatures (except the Old Bachelors) have a natural Inclination towards each other, by which their Kind is propagated and maintained in the World. … ’til a general Rule with the whole Creation, and the Old Bachelor Seems to be the only Exception. [The women argue that] those that are best able, and have least Charge on their Hands, ought to pay the Most Tax; That the Bachelors have the least Charge, is plain, having none but himself to support, and yet has the same Liberty and Opportunity to pursue his Business as other Men; For which Reason if he is not capable, it’s his own Fault, which often happens; for having no suitable Companion at home, he is often inclined to indulge himself in drunken Frolicks abroad … often to the great Disturbance of the whole Town in which he lives. …

► Florida Supreme Court: Gays Can’t Be Barred From State Bar: 1978. In 1976, Robert F. Eimers, a recent graduate of Hastings College of Law in San Francisco, had already been certified for admission to the Pennsylvania bar when he moved to Florida and took the exam for the Florida bar. He passed, but the Florida Board of Bar Examiners found that he might fail to meet the “good moral character” standard for admission because, in response to a question at a hearing, Eimers said that he was gay. The twelve member board deadlocked on whether to admit him and referred the matter to the Florida Supreme Court. On March 20, the Supreme Court ruled in a 6-1 decision that a “substantial connection” between private behavior and the ability to carry out professional responsibilities would be required to bar Eimers from practicing law, and his homosexuality did not rise to that level. “Otherwise, the bar will be virtually unfettered in its power to censor the private morals of Florida bar members, regardless of any nexus between the behavior and the ability to responsibly perform as an attorney.”

That’s where the “Today in History” part of the story ends, but Eimers’ story continues. While Florida’s Supreme Court was correct in ruling that a gay man cannot be prohibited from practicing law because of his “private morals,” that same court nine years later would wind up disbarring Eimers because of his dismal public morals, not to mention breaking a few laws along the way. In 1982 Eimers, his law partner (who was not licensed to practice law) and husband-and-wife clients Daniel and Sally Phelps, were the subjects of an undercover sting involving money laundering and prostitution. In November 1982, they were all charged with two counts of money laundering, and the Phelps’s, in addition, were charged with three counts associated with the prostitution ring. After their arrest and indictment, they were all released on bail. The Phelps and Eimers were tried and convicted in June, 1983, but Eimers’s conviction was in absentia due to his becoming a fugitive in March. Eimers was sentenced to ten years and fined $100,000. In 1987, the Florida Supreme Court officially disbarred him (PDF: 176KB/6 pages) because of his felony conviction and allegations that he had misappropriated funds from three of his clients. I can’t find any record of his having served his sentence, but in 1993 the Pennsylvania Supreme Court also ordered his disbarment in that state as well. He apparently died in 1998 at the age of 51.

And that, as they say, is the rest of the story.

TODAY’S BIRTHDAY:
► Samuel-Auguste Tissot: 1728-1797. You know you’ll go blind if you keep doing that, don’t you? Ever wonder where those old medical “facts” came from? Blame this eighteenth-century Swiss physician from Lausanne, but also consider his time. In his day, the medical establishment was built on little more than folk medicine and superstitions, some of which where handed down from as far back as ancient Greece.

To his credit, Tissot tried to change that and turn the practice of medicine into a scientific endeavor. His 1761 textbook Avis au Peuple sur sa Santé (Advise to the Public Concerning their Health) became the best-selling medical self-help book of the century and it established his international reputation. In a 1769 essay, he argued that doctors must have a working knowledge of physics and the natural sciences: “Whoever is unacquainted with the powers and properties of bodies and the laws of motion will never be able to learn the art of healing.” He became an early proponent of exercise for “literary and sedentary persons,” observing that exercise “strengthens the fibres, preserves the fluids in their proper state, procures an appetite, facilitates the secretions particularly perspiration, raises our spirits, and produces an agreeable sensation in the whole nervous system.” His 1789 Traité des Nerfs et de Leurs Maladies (Treatise on the Nerves and Nervous Disorders) included an 83-page chapter devote to the study of migraines, which is today considered a foundational work for future doctors’ understanding of the phenomenon.

So you can see he was off to a pretty good start in professionalizing the practice of medicine. But his efforts were ultimately constrained by the state of medical knowledge in the 1700s which still came mainly from two sources: ancient manuscripts, from Greek and Roman times through the Renaissance, and ongoing observations by physicians who knew nothing about viruses, bacteria, hormones, genetics or even the precise functions of a number of organs. And so Tissot believed, like many of his contemporaries, that the human body was governed by a balance between the excretion of vital fluids — the ancient Greeks called them “humours” — and their replenishment through eating and drinking. Blood, obviously, was an essential humour. Lose too much of it, and death is certain. Perspiration was a humor, as was mother’s milk, which he called a “non-essential” humour — for the mother, anyway. Also, in the tally of humours:

There is another, the seminal fluid, which has so much influence on the strength of the body and on the perfection of digestion which restores it, that physicians of every age have unanimously admitted, that the loss of one ounce of it, enfeebles more than forty ounces of blood. We may form some idea of its importance by observing the effects it produces; when it begins to form, the voice, the countenance, and even the features change; the beard grows, and the whole body often assumes another appearance, since the muscles become so large and firm that they form a sensible difference between the body of an adult, and that of one who has not arrived at puberty. All these developments are prevented by debilitating the organ which serves to separate the fluid producing them. Correct observations prove that the extirpation of the testicles, at the period of virility, causes the loss of the beard, and the return of an infantile voice. Can we doubt, after this of its action on the whole body, and not perceive the many bad consequences with which the emission of so precious a fluid must be attended.

The third edition of Tissot’s L’onanisme, 1765.

That passage is from the introduction of Tissot’s most enduring work, his highly influential L’onanisme, ou Dissertation Physique, sur les Maladies Produites par la Masturbation (Onanism: Or a Treatise Upon the Disorders produced by Masturbation), published first in Latin in 1758, then in French in 1760. According to Tissot, the loss of just an ounce of semen brought about a terrible blow to the body. During the sexual act, Tissot observed that other humours were excreted through perspiration and heavy breathing, leading to the “evacuation of the semen,” which is accompanied by:

a general shock, a convulsion of all the parts, an increase of the rapidity of the movements of all the fluids, to displace and expel it. Is it too great presumption to say, we must regard this necessary concurrence of the whole system, at the moment of its evacuation, as a rational proof of its influence on the body? …The promptitude with which the weakness follows the act, appears to many people, and with reason, a proof that this cannot be occasioned by merely a loss of semen; but the debility of all those affected with convulsive diseases, proves that the weakness is produced by the spasm…

Men weren’t alone in their susceptibility to masturbation’s dangers. Semen’s analog in women was the fluids of vaginal lubrication. Like men, women also experienced the perspiration, the “rapidity of the movements of all the fluids,” the general shock and convulstions, and so forth. But masturbation posed an even greater danger to women because their weaker nerves made the loss of those vital fluids all the more serious. The consequences, for men and women both, were numerous: pimples, hemorrhoids, tuberculosis, weak-mindedness, weakness or partial paralysis in the limbs, ashen skin, pain, digestive problems, epilepsy, blindness, and even death.

The loss of semen was always bad, but it was worse when the loss occurred during non-procreative sex, all forms of which he grouped under the umbrella term “Onanism.” At least with ordinary vaginal intercourse, he reasoned, there was a reciprocity taking place which helped to lower the dangers:

A person perspires more during coition than at any other time, because the power of the circulation is quickened. This perspiration is perhaps more active and more volatile than at any other time: it is a real loss, and occurs whenever emissions of semen take place, from whatever cause, since it depends on the agitation attending it. In coition it is reciprocal, and the one inspires, what the other expires. This exchange has been verified by certain observations. In masturbation there is a loss without this reciprocal benefit.

Tissot’s L’onanisme wasn’t the first anti-masturbation tract. Some thirty-five years earlier, an unknown London doctor and clergymen published the final edition of Onania; or the Heinous Sin of Self-Pollution (see Oct 16), which warned about the many dangers of masturbation from both a medical and moral standpoint. But Tissot criticized the English Onania for its “theological and moral trivialities” which made it  “truly a chaos, the most unfinished work written for a long time.” Tissot’s L’onanisme, on the other hand, sought to correct those errors and re-cast sexual morality solely on the basis of the physical imperative rather than a divine one. It became a best-seller. Twelve authorized editions appeared between 1760 and 1799 in the original French, with translations into German, Italian, Spanish, Russian and English. Thanks to Tissot, the idea that masturbation was the source of a number of serious physical, medical and social diseases quickly became medical dogma all the way up to the beginning of the twentieth century.

[Source: Samuel-Auguste Tissot. Treatise on the Diseases Produced by Onanism. Translated by “A Physician” (New York: Collins & Hannay, 1832). Available online at Archive.org. The original 1760 French edition of L’onanisme is available at Google Books.]

 If you know of something that belongs on the agenda, please send it here. Don’t forget to include the basics: who, what, when, where, and URL (if available).

This your open thread for the day. What’s happening in your world?