"The public health care state has developed as completely decentralized, in collaboration with voluntary organizations, and under the banner of "non-political" scientific agencies. The early history of this system explains how and why public health leaders were able to hide its growth in later periods. Understanding this foundational history is important for three reasons. First, the state-voluntary collaboration shaped the U.S. health care system, leaving it fragmented and unequal. Second, leaders in the public health coalition characterized the state's close collaboration with the voluntary sector as "private provision," abetting the beginning of the American Myth and setting the stage for grow-and-hide. And third, this formative history provides insight as to why the mixture of public and private "has been so ubiquitous in American history as to be almost invisible.""--