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The legislation in its original form was sponsored by the 's account of its Campaign Against Psychiatry . The Act succeeded in its initial aim of establishing a mental health care system for Alaska, funded by income from state-owned lands. However, during the 1970s and early 1980s, Alaskan politicians systematically stripped the mental health system of its lands. This significantly reduced its funding and had a severe effect on the provision of mental health care in the state. The asset-stripping was eventually ruled to be illegal following several years of litigation and a reconstituted mental health trust was established in the mid-1980s. BACKGROUND TO THE ACT , the author of the original Alaska Mental Health Bill]] Alaska possessed no mental health treatment facilities prior to the passage of the 1956 Act. At the time of the Act's passage, it was not a U.S. State , being constituted instead as a Territory Of The United States . The treatment of the mentally ill was governed by an agreement with the state of Oregon dating back to the turn of the century. On June 6 1900 , the United States Congress enacted a law permitting the government of the then District Of Alaska to provide mental health care for Alaskans. In 1904, a contract was signed with the privately-owned Morningside Hospital in Portland, Oregon , under which Alaskan mental patients would be sent to the hospital for treatment.Boyvey, Roger. "Mental Health and the Ultra-Concerned", ''Social Service Review'', 38:3 (1964:Sept.) p. 281-293. A commitment regime was established under which a person said to be mentally ill was to be brought before a jury of six people, who would rule him sane or insane. The patient was routinely sent to prison until his release or transfer to Portland; at no point was a medical or psychiatric examination required.Kominsky, Morris. ''The hoaxers: plain liars, fancy liars, and damned liars'', p. 111-116. Branden Press, 1970. ISBN 0828312885. By the 1940s it was recognized that this arrangement was unsatisfactory. The American Medical Association conducted a series of studies in 1948, followed by a Department Of The Interior study in 1950. They highlighted the deficiencies of the program: commitment procedures in Alaska were archaic, and the long trip to Portland had a negative effect on patients and their families. In addition, an audit of the hospital contract found that the Sanatorium Company, which owned the hospital, had been padding its expenses. This had enabled it to make an excess profit of $69,000 a year (equivalent to over $588,000 per annum at 2007 prices). The studies recommended a comprehensive overhaul of the system, with the development of an in-state mental health program for Alaska. This proposal was widely supported by the public and politicians. At the start of 1956, in the second session of the 84th Congress , Representative Edith Green ( D -Oregon) introduced the Alaska Mental Health Bill (H.R. 6376) in the House Of Representatives . The bill had been written by Bob Bartlett , the Congressional Delegate from the Alaska Territory who later became a long-serving member of the U.S. Senate. Senator Richard L. Neuberger (D-Oregon) sponsored an equivalent bill, S. 2518, in the Senate. DETAILS OF THE BILL The Alaska Mental Health Bill's stated purpose was to "transfer from the Federal Government to the Territory of Alaska basic responsibility for the hospitalization, care and treatment of the mentally ill of Alaska." In connection with this goal, it aimed:
The bill provided for a cash grant of $12.5 million (about $94 million at 2007 prices) to be disbursed to the Alaskan government in a number of phases, to fund the construction of mental health facilities in the territory. To meet the ongoing costs of the program, the bill transferred one million acres (4,000 km&2) of federally-owned land in Alaska to the ownership of the proposed new Alaska Mental Health Trust as a Grant-in-aid —the federal government owned about 99% of the land of Alaska at the time. The trust would then be able to use the assets of the transferred land (principally Mineral and Forestry rights) to obtain an ongoing revenue stream to fund the Alaskan mental health program. Similar provisions had applied in other US territories to support the provision of public facilities prior to the achievement of statehood. In addition, the bill granted the Governor Of Alaska authority to enter into reciprocal mental health treatment agreements with the governors of other states. Alaskans who became mentally ill in the Lower 48 States would be properly treated locally until they could be returned to Alaska; likewise, citizens of the lower 48 who fell mentally ill in Alaska would receive care there, before being returned to their home states. The bill was seen as entirely innocuous when it was introduced on January 16 1956 . It enjoyed bipartisan support, and on January 18 it was passed unanimously by the House of Representatives. It then fell to the Senate to consider the equivalent bill in the upper chamber, S. 2518, which was expected to have an equally untroubled passage following hearings scheduled to begin on February 20 . CONTROVERSY Sounding the alarm In December 1955, a small anti-communist women's group in is very near Alaska and since it is obvious no one needs such a large land grant, we were wondering if it could be an American Siberia." They said that the bill "takes away all of the rights of the American citizen to ask for a jury trial and protect him {Link without Title} from being railroaded to an asylum by a greedy relative or 'friend' or, as the Alaska bill states, 'an interested party'." The APRF had a history of opposing mental health legislation; earlier in 1955, it had played a key role in stalling the passage of three mental health bills in the California Assembly . It was part of a wider network of far-right organizations which opposed psychiatry and Psychology as being pro-communist, Anti-American , Anti-Christian and pro-Jewish. The Keep America Committee, another Californian "superpatriot" group, summed up the anti-mental health mood on the far right in a pamphlet issued in May 1955. Calling "mental hygiene" part of the "unholy three" of the "Communistic World Government", it declared: "Mental Hygiene is a subtle and diabolical plan of the enemy to transform a free and intelligent people into a cringing horde of zombies".Marmor, Judd. "Psychodynamics of Group Opposition to Mental Health Programs", in ''Psychiatry in Transition''. Butterworth, 1974. The APRF's membership overlapped with that of the much larger Minute Women Of The U.S.A. , a nationwide organization of militant anti-communist housewives which claimed up to 50,000 members across the United States. In mid-January 1956, Minute Woman Leigh F. Burkeland of Van Nuys, California issued a bulletin protesting against the bill. It was Mimeograph ed by the California State Chapter of the Minute Women and mailed across the nation. On January 24 1956 , the strongly Libertarian '' Santa Ana Register '' newspaper reprinted Burkeland's statement under the headline, "Now — Siberia, U.S.A." Burkeland issued a lurid warning of what the future might hold if the Alaska Mental Health Bill was passed by the Senate: :"Is it the purpose of H.R. 6376 to establish a concentration camp for Political Prisoner s under the guise of treatment of mental cases? The answer, based on a study of the bill, indicates that it is entirely within the realm of possibility that we may be establishing in Alaska our own version of the Siberia slave camps run by the Russian Government . ..." :"This legislation, say its opponents, will place every resident of the United States at the mercy of the whims and fancies of any person with whom they might have a disagreement, causing a charge of 'mental illness' to be placed against them, with immediate deportation to SIBERIA, U.S.A!""Now — Siberia, U.S.A.", ''Santa Ana Register'' (California), January 24, 1956. Fanning the flames After the ''Santa Ana Register'' published its article, a nationwide network of activists began a vociferous campaign to torpedo the Alaska Mental Health Bill. The campaigners included, among other groups and individuals, the white supremacist Rev. Gerald L. K. Smith ; Women for God and Country; the For America League; the Minute Women of the U.S.A.; the right-wing agitator Dan Smoot ; the anti-Catholic former US Army Brigadier General Herbert C. Holdridge ; and L. Ron Hubbard 's Church Of Scientology , which had been founded only two years earlier. Increasingly strong statements were made by the bill's opponents through the course of the spring and summer of 1956. In his was organized."Benjamin R. Epstein, Arnold Forster, ''Danger on the Right'', p. 141. Random House, 1964. Dr. George A. Snyder of Hollywood sent a letter to all members of Congress in which he demanded an investigation of the Alaska Mental Health Bill's proponents for "elements of treason against the American people behind the front of the mental health program." The Keep America Committee of Los Angeles similarly called the proponents of the bill a "conspiratorial gang" that ought to be "investigated, impeached, or at least removed from office" for treason. Brigadier General Holdridge sent a public letter to President Dwight Eisenhower on March 12 , in which he called the bill "a dastardly attempt to establish a concentration camp in the Alaskan wastes." He went on: :"This bill establishes a weapon of violence against our citizenry far more wicked than anything ever known in recorded history — far worse than the Siberian prison camps of the Czar s or the Communists, or the violence of the Spanish Inquisition . . . The plot of wickedness revealed in this bill fairly reeks of the evil odor of the black forces of the Jesuits who dominate the Vatican , and, through officiates in our Government, dominate our politics." For their part, America's professional health associations (notably the American Medical Association and American Psychiatric Association ) came out in favour of the bill. There was some initial opposition from the Association Of American Physicians And Surgeons , a small and extremely conservative body which opposed Socialized Medicine ; Dr. L. S. Sprague of Tucson, Arizona said in its March 1956 newsletter that the bill widened the definition of mental health to cover "everything from falling hair to ingrown toenails." However, the association modified its position after it became clear that the AMA took the opposite view. By March 1956, it was being said in Washington, D.C. that the amount of correspondence on the bill exceeded anything seen since the previous high-water mark of public controversy, the Lend-Lease Act of 1941. Numerous letter-writers protested to their Congressional representatives that the bill was "anti-religious" or that the land to be transferred to the Alaska Mental Health Trust would be fenced off and used as a concentration camp for the political enemies of various state governors."State Mental Health Bill Hearing Opens Proposal Criticized as 'Anti-Religious'". ''Daily Alaska Empire'', February 20, 1956. The well-known broadcaster Fulton Lewis described how he had "received, literally, hundreds of letters protesting bitterly against the bill. I have had telephone calls to the same effect from California, Texas and other parts of the country. Members of Congress report identical reactions."Fulton Lewis, Jr., "Criticize Alaska Health Bill", ''Chronicle-Telegram'' ( Elyria, Ohio ), March 15, 1956. A letter printed in the ''Daily Oklahoman'' newspaper in May 1956 summed up many of the arguments made by opponents of the bill: :"The advocates of World Government , who regard patriotism as the symptom of a diseased mind, took as step closer to their goal of compulsory asylum "cure" for opponents of UNESCO , when, on January 18, the U.S. House of Representatives passed the Alaska Mental Health Act. :"The Act was prepared by the U.S. Department Of Justice , Department of the Interior and the socialist-oriented Department Of Health, Education And Welfare . It closely follows the Model Code, drafted by the American Psychiatric association, which has been working with the World Health Organization , a specialized agency of the United Nations ... :All of you who don't want members of your family railroaded to an asylum had better start writing your senator, now.""The People Speak", ''Daily Oklahoman'', March 13, 1956. During February and March 1956, hearings were held before the Senate Subcommittee On Territories And Insular Affairs . Proponents and opponents of the bill faced off in a series of tense exchanges, with strong accusations being made against the people and groups involved in the bill's introduction. Stephanie Williams of the American Public Relations Forum said that the bill would enable Russia to reclaim its former Alaskan territory: " {Link without Title} contains nothing to prevent Russia from buying the entire million acres — they already say Alaska belongs to them." "Woman Sees 'Political Siberia' in Alaska Mental Health Bill". ''Daily Alaska Empire'', February 21, 1956 Mrs. Ernest W. Howard of the Women's Patriotic Committee on National Defense castigated the slackness of Congress for not picking up on the bill's perceived dangers: "Those of us who have been in the study and research work of the United Nations, we feel that we are experts in this . . . you as Senators with all the many commitments and the many requirements, are not able to go into all these things." John Kaspar, a White Citizens' Council organizer who had achieved notoriety for starting a race riot in Clinton, Tennessee , declared that "almost one hundred percent of all psychiatric therapy is Jewish and about eighty percent of psychiatrists are Jewish . . . one particular race is administering this particular thing." He argued that Jews were nationalists of another country who were attempting to "usurp American nationality." Passing the bill The arguments of the bill's opponents attracted little support in the Senate. The Eisenhower administration, the Alaska territorial government and mainstream religious groups were all in favor of the bill. The Alaska . An overwhelming majority of Senators of both parties were also supportive. The bill's original author, Alaska Delegate Bob Bartlett, spoke for many of the bill's proponents when he expressed his bafflement at the response that it had received: :"I am completely at a loss in attempting to fathom the reasons why certain individuals and certain groups have now started a letter-writing campaign . . . to defeat the act. I am sure that if the letter writers would consult the facts, they would join with all others not only in hoping this act would become law but in working for its speedy passage and approval." Other Senators expressed similar mystification at the agitation against the bill. Senator Henry M. Jackson of Washington stated that he was "at a loss" to see how the bill affected religion, as its opponents said. Senator Alan Bible of Nevada , the acting chairman of the Subcommittee on Territories and Insular Affairs, told the bill's opponents that nothing in the proposed legislation would permit the removal of any non-Alaskan to the territory for confinement. Republican Senator Barry Goldwater of Arizona modified the bill to state that "Nothing in this title shall be construed to authorize the transfer to Alaska, pursuant to any agreement or otherwise, of any mentally ill person who is not a resident of Alaska." In effect, this eliminated the bill's most controversial element—the provision for the transfer of mental patients from the lower 48 states to Alaska. Thus modified, a revised version of the bill (S. 2973) was passed unanimously by the Senate on July 20 , after only ten minutes of debate. AFTERMATH Following the passage of the Act, an Alaska Mental Health Trust was set up to administer the land and grants appropriated to fund the Alaskan mental health program. During the 1970s, the issue of the trust's land became increasingly controversial, with the state coming under increasing pressure to develop the land for private and recreational use. In 1978, the . The loss of the land and the revenue earned from it had a severe effect on mental health care in the state. In 1982, Alaska resident Vern Weiss filed a lawsuit on behalf of his son, who required mental health services that were not available in Alaska. The case of ''Weiss v State of Alaska'' eventually became a Class Action lawsuit involving a range of mental health care groups. The Alaska Supreme Court ruled in 1985 that the abolition of the trust had been illegal and ordered it to be reconstituted. However, as much of the original land had been transferred away, the parties had to undergo a long and complex series of negotiations to resolve the situation. A final settlement was reached in 1994 in which the Trust was reconstituted with 500,000 acres (2000 km&2) of original Trust land, 500,000 acres (2,000 km&2) of replacement land, and $200 million to replace lost income and assets. SCIENTOLOGY AND THE ALASKA MENTAL HEALTH BILL ". The exhibition asserts that psychiatrists sponsored the Alaska Mental Health Bill, the Holocaust, the Bosnian War and the September 11th, 2001 terrorist attacks as part of a worldwide conspiracy to impose control through the guise of mental health.]] The Alaska Mental Health Bill plays a major part in the Church of Scientology's account of its (''see Brainwashing Manual ''). Scientology position The Church's official website asserts that the bill was "psychiatry's attempt to establish a million-acre Siberia-type camp for mental health patients in Alaska, far from the prying eyes of civil libertarians"" Standing Up for Human Rights: Social Reform ", Church of Scientology International. Retrieved '':
Church officials have stated their belief that the American Psychiatric Association intensified its "interest in destroying Dianetics and Scientology organizations ... when the Church of Scientology actively opposed a bill whose introduction in Congress had been secure by the APA. ... The APA was well aware of who was behind the massive response that defeated the legislation, and they never forgot, as can be seen from some of the attacks its members generated." Heber C. Jentzsch , "Scientology", p. 141 in ''New Religious Movements and Religious Liberty in America'', ed. Barry Hankins, Derek Davis. Miscavige on ''Nightline'' Similarly, David Miscavige , the Church's leader, told Ted Koppel in an interview on the '' Nightline '' program:
Conspiracy theories In '' Ron's Journal 67 '', Hubbard said that the people behind the bill were "less than twelve men. They are members of the Bank Of England and other higher financial circles. They own and control newspaper chains, and they are, oddly enough, directors in all the mental health groups in the world which have sprung up."Hubbard, ''Ron's Journal 67'', lecture of September 20, 1967. According to David Miscavige, the bill was the product of a conspiracy by the American Psychiatric Association. In a public address in 1995, he told Scientologists that it was "in 1955 that the agents for the American Psychiatric Association met on Capitol Hill to ram home the infamous Siberia Bill, calling for a secret concentration camp in the wastes of Alaska." It was "here that Mr. Hubbard, as the leader of a new and dynamic religious movement, knocked that Siberia Bill right out of the ring — inflicting a blow they would never forget." " David Miscavige's Address from the Grand Opening of The Church of Scientology, D.C. ", October 21, 1995. Church of Scientology Washington, D.C. Retrieved 2007-07-18. The assertion that Scientologists defeated the bill is made frequently in Scientology literature. See e.g. 1) " Dianetics Services and Books by L. Ron Hubbard ", Church of Scientology International: "In November 1956, shortly after Scientologists had worked to prevent and successfully prevented the passage of a "Siberia Bill" in the USA". Retrieved . However, the bill in fact passed, albeit with amendments. Contemporary publications Contemporary Church publications suggest that Scientology did not even become involved in the controversy until the start of March 1956, over two months after the American Public Relations Forum had first publicized the bill. A March "Professional Auditor's Bulletin" issued by Hubbard, who was staying in Dublin at the time, includes a telegram from his Washington-based son L. Ron Hubbard, Jr. and two other Scientologists:
Although the Church says that Scientologists led the opposition to the bill, the '' Congressional Record '''s account of the Senate hearings into the bill does not mention the Church. A contemporary review of the opposition to the bill likewise attributes the lead role elsewhere and to right-wing groups, rather than the "civil liberties" organizations cited by the Church:
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