The Birth of the Anti-Vax Movement by Seth Koven: 12th Annual Lore Kephart Lecture Series

On September 28 at the new Mullen Performing Arts building on the Villanova University campus, I was able to represent my parents at the 12th Annual Lore Kephart Lecture Series by Professor Seth Koven. This was a particularly anticipatory lecture for me, not only because it was the first without my dear father's presence, but also because Professor Koven knew my mother when he started his career at Villanova. What truly struck me was that Professor Koven gave a captivating lecture my mother would have loved: one that taught us, merely from fact, about a history repeating itself, wrapped in Christian pathos, politics, class, race and large cultural challenges.

In this case, Professor Koven wove a teaching moment about the Anti-Vax movement. About the birth of conscientious objection. The effect of national and international health policy on both people and their economies. In short, a freaking fascinating lecture I was not obligated to attend, but very glad I did. So much so, professors and students asked a preponderance of questions and they had to be cut short.

Please take a watch and listen on youtube if you are seeking be well oiled in a Thanksgiving discussion about mandatory vaccination during a pandemic, or just because you want to be educated. The youtube link is here: Conscience Wars: Christianity and Coercion in Modern Britain and Its Empire by Professor Seth Koven

Here is my probably inaccurate summary of the lecture, but a gist to tantalize:

While many of us may feel on the flipside of the worst of the COVID pandemic and its effect on our international health, travel, economy and politics, at the heart of much of it has centered on the "anti-vax" v. "pro-vax" movements. I never have understood the anti-vax point of view, personally. What I did not know is that the anti-vax movement was not new.

In fact, both the anti-vax movement and conscientious objection were both born out of the smallpox epidemic in Victorian England which decimated one-third of the British population. The epidemic resulted in a smallpox mandatory vaccination law. Yes, there was a vaccination designed and made mandatory in the 1830s using cows and their pox to curtail the deathly smallpox. Today the protocols regarding cleanliness, standardization of vaccination ingredients, and application of this smallpox vaccine would be astoundingly questionable, but for that time, it was astounding a vaccine was created and available at all.

English law directed implementation and distribution of the smallpox vaccine out of the English Poor Houses. The law's political connection to the poor made the vaccination seem less a barrier to a deathly disease and more an imposition by a hostile government who often treated the poor more like the chattel from which the vaccine was inhumanely exacted, than humans worthy of a decent life. Combined with that viewpoint were intellectual Christians of a different class, who believed that God would never intend a foreign substance be placed in the body, and conscientiously objected to it being mandatory. Both the poor and the rich inaccurately associated other health problems to those vaccinated as caused by the vaccine itself, with such ignorance further fueling what became the anti-vax movement.

In addition, British subjects in India and South America, for example, were deemed by some British politicians to be unable to have a conscience, and thus enabled a huge debate on whether vaccination should be mandatory on subjects outside of England. This debate ensued over who was capable of having a conscientious objection, if by class and race you were argued incapable of having a conscience to begin with. While initially associated with the smallpox anti-vax movement, conscientious objection would become a mainstay for objection to many other activities, including being called to support a war a century later.

An international pandemic, a national debate on mandatory vaccination, and an effect on the health and economic well being of the world. Completely timely and fascinating.

I close with how the lecture began, with a heartwarming tribute to my mom by Professor Koven. I turned on my phone recorder. The following is transcribed.

Villanova is a place where I grew up... I'm very proud to be here... Among the very first people to greet me when I came to Villanova was Lore Kephart. And so to get to give a lecture that honors Lore, who I see absolutely vividly (my mom graduated from Villanova in 1986 but continued to provide "volunteer" history department support for years after) ...

She wore an elegant gray Scots twill jacket with matching skirt. She had just that perfect salt and pepper hair in a perfect wave. She had just the right amount of intellectual curiosity, passion for community, and an incredible commitment to Villanova undergraduate history majors. She committed countless hours to fostering the Villanova Undergraduate History Journal.

Most of all, she was there for all of us. She made us feel welcome and invited us to do the core things, which I think is part of what Villanova invites all of its community to do, which is to be caring, and put forth that caring. And Lore always gave that to me. And so I feel a special honor in being able to do this lecture that is in her memory.

I want to thank my youngest daughter, Claire H.K. Roberts ('22) for attending with me and asking the jugular question of the evening. My dear Duke friend and professor herself, Anu Charlot Ghai, and dear family friend Lisa Kazanjian, for attending with me.

At Villanova, I want to thank Diane Brocchi, who has flawlessly executed the Kephart Lecture series since its inception 12 years ago when my father trusted the series to Villanova. Adele Lindenmeyr, Dean of the Liberal Arts and Sciences Department, and also dear friend to my mother as student and thereafter, Assistant Dean Rebecca Rebalsky, and History Chair Marc Gallicchio, who all work to make the lecture happen every year. Villanova is ascending in its intellectual prowess and because of the hard work of Villanovans. A final thank you to Villanova President Father Peter Donohue, in attendance.

I am proud and honored my family has a part in supporting Villanova.