Rush, Benjamin (1747–1813)

Biographical Details

Rush was born outside of Philadelphia in 1747. His early boarding school experience under the tutelage of Reverend Samuel Finley combined with his college years at the College of New Jersey (Princeton), presided over by Presbyterian minister Samuel Davis, to imbue in him a religious fervor that emphasized the need to serve the common good and that attributed many of society's problems to moral failings. At the University of Edinburgh in Scotland, where he was influenced by the rationalist ideas of the Enlightenment with its skepticism of religion and strong belief in science, Rush earned his medical degree in 1768.

After medical school, Rush returned home in 1769 and became a professor of chemistry at the College of Philadelphia. In 1791, when the college merged with a university, he was appointed professor of medicine and clinical practice. He was considered one of the most influential physicians in the United States. During the yellow fever epidemic in Philadelphia in 1793, which killed an estimated 6,000 people, Rush worked tirelessly to develop a successful treatment and visited scores of sick people on a daily basis. In 1796, he wrote an important and graphic account of the yellow fever epidemic and described treatment options.

Politics, Medicine, and Penal Reform

Dr. Rush did not limit his activities to the field of medicine. He was deeply involved in the politics of his time and was very influential. In 1776, he signed the Declaration of Independence, and in 1787, he was a member of the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia. He served as president of a society that advocated the abolition of slavery, was a founder of the Philadelphia Bible Society, and a vice president of the American Philosophical Society. He also received honors from several European leaders for his contributions to medicine.

A year before the founding of the Philadelphia Society for Alleviating the Miseries of Public Prisons, Pennsylvania introduced new legislation that significantly reduced the use of corporal punishment and replaced it with hard labor to be performed in public. Known as the “wheelbarrow laws,” prisoners wore distinctive garb and were weighted down with balls and chains, which they [Page 867]carried with them from location to location. Many reformers were outraged by the new laws, including Rush, who wrote his first political pamphlet, An Enquiry Into the Effects of Public Punishments Upon Criminals and Upon Society. He argued that public sanctions increase an offender's propensity to commit crime by robbing him of his self-respect and encouraging a spirit of revenge. The Pennsylvania Prison Society was formed just two months after Rush read his pamphlet at a meeting in Benjamin Franklin's home of the Society for Promoting Political Inquiries.

...