Jasper Republican, Volume 1, Number 40, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 18 June 1875 — A Lesson to Druggists. [ARTICLE]

A Lesson to Druggists.

The clerk of a druggist tn Mew Orleans recently sold spirits of camphor for camphor water. It was administered to a patient and produced death. A suit was brought against the druggist for damages, and it has just been disposed of by the Supreme Court of Louisiana, which held that the defendant was primarily liable, and also liable for the acts of his clerk in the regular discharge of his business. The court declared that the law does not place a community in the. position of being poisoned by mistakes, with no one to be held responsible therefor. If it was the master who did the wrong he is responsible. If ft was his servant who did it he is still responsible, for the master is responsible for the acts of his servant when done in the course of his usual employment. Such decisions as these are necessary to keep the dispensers of poisonous drugs and compounds up to a proper degree of watchfulness. In all cities there is far too much carelessness displayed in relation to this matter. In some cases incompetent assistants are put in position in drug stores on the principle of economy. A few hundred dollars are saved each year on the salary of clerks, and the proprietors take the chances. In other instances clerks are suffered to get into careless habits, and in this manner mistakes occur of a fatal character. But when the druggists are held to a strict and rigid accountability, not only for their own mistakes but for those of their assistants and clerks, there will be fewer mistakes and fewer deaths from the dispensing of improper drugs.—Philadelphia Times.