Changes

Just as Regulars had demonized Homeopaths and Eclectics in the past, licensed physicians from the three medical sects worked together and relentlessly attacked these new medical specialists. Licensing united the three sects against these new interlopers. While the sects still viewed medicine somewhat differently, their differences were not nearly as great as those between them and these new medical apostates. Additionally, Regulars, Eclectics, and Homeopaths dominated medical licensing, and they did not want these specialties to flourish unchallenged. Licensed physicians directed their state organizations to prosecute Osteopaths and Christian Scientists.<ref> Martin Kaufman, Homeopathy in America: The Rise and Fall of Medical Heresy (The Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore, 1971), 141-142.</ref>

There were several early decisions that addressed whether Osteopaths needed to be licensed as physicians under existing licensing laws. Typically, Osteopaths defended themselves by claiming that they were not physicians and did not fit within the existing licensing laws. In Missouri, the state legislature passed an exemption in 1892, but Osteopathy presented a conundrum for most state courts. Courts struggled to develop a consensus on whether Osteopathy was a practice of medicine. Interestingly, courts ended up analogizing Osteopathy to Christian Science. Typically, if courts believed that Christian Science was a medical practice, then they would come to the same conclusion about Osteopathy.<ref> In Nebraska, both Osteopathy and Christian Science were found to be medical practices. See Little v. Nebraska, 60 Neb. 749 (1900) and Nebraska v. Buswell 58 N.W. 728 (1894). </ref>