The AMA’s defeat of President Truman’s health care proposal in

1948

Morlie L. Wang, MD MPHJohn H. Stroger Jr Hospital, Chicago

What did Truman want to do with health care?

What did Truman want?• National health insurance plan run by the federal

government1

• Single Universal Health Plan 3

• Protect against “economic fears” of sickness1

• Citizens would pay a mandated monthly fee in to plan2

• Public agencies would pay the insurance premiums of those too poor to pay for themselves2

• People would continue to get medical and hospital services as they currently do1

• Doctors should expect higher earnings1

W-M-D Bill2

• Social Security expansion bill (WMD bill) first officially introduced principals of Truman’s eventual health proposal in 1943– Senators Robert Wagner (D-NY), James Murray (D-MT),

Representative John Dingell (D-MI)• 3 months after the end of WWII, in November 1945,

Truman officially called upon Congress to pass a national program to assure the right to adequate medical care and protection from the “economic fears” of sickness

Reaction to Truman plan

• Physicians: No– National Physicians committee– AMA– AMA House of delegates

• Public: Initially Yes– 58 % approval in national polls1

Truman’s plan associated with communism

• Senator Murray, Chairman of the Committee on Labor and Public Welfare, asked that the health bill not be described as socialistic or communistic during initial Congressional hearings1

• Senator Taft (senior Republican) said “I consider it socialism. It is to my mind the most socialistic measure this Congress has ever had before it”1

• Taft suggested that compulsory health insurance came right out of the Soviet constitution1

Republicans in Congress call National health insurance a socialist scheme

• Republicans boycotted the Congressional hearings• Eventually, the Republicans took control of Congress in 1946

and Senator Murray was replaced by Senator Taft• A House subcommittee investigating government propaganda

for health insurance concluded, “Known Communists and fellow travelers with Federal agencies are at work diligently with Federal funds in furtherance of the Moscow party line”1

• As anti-communist sentiment rose in the late forties, national health insurance became vanishingly improbable1

AMA Fights• Despite the setbacks suffered in 1946, Truman

promised national health insurance during the 1948 election campaign– Following his unlikely victory in 1948, physicians were very

concerned that national health insurance could come to fruition

AMA Fights• In response, the AMA charged $25 per member to mount a

campaign• Whitaker and Baxter (public relations firm), funded by the

AMA, mounted a nationwide public relations campaign against Truman’s plan

• Pamphlets, the Press, public speakers, private contacts• Volunteerism• “Would socialized medicine lead to socialization of other

phases of American life?”1

– The AMA’s campaign answered: “Lenin thought so” he declared ”Socialized medicine is the keystone to the arch of the Socialist State”. The Library of Congress could never locate this quotation in Lenin’s writings.1

AMA Fights• The AMA’s campaign, headed by Whitaker and

Baxter, cost $1.5 million in 1949 – At the time, it was the most expensive lobbying effort in

American history

• They were so successful in linking Truman’s health care plan with socialism, that even supporters of the plan referred to it at “socialized medicine”

Truman vs. AMA

• AMA wins– By 1949, public opinion polls showed only 36% of

Americans favored health care reform (down from 58% in 1945)

• Truman’s health care bill did not pass

References1. Social Transformation of Medicine by Paul Starr 19842. http://www.trumanlibrary.org/anniversaries/healthprogram.

htm3. http://www.pnhp.org/facts/

a_brief_history_universal_health_care_efforts_in_the_us.php?page=all