{"collection":"philosophy-ethics","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_47976/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_47976","id":"gutenberg_47976","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/47976","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Health & Medicine","Category: Philosophy & Ethics","Category: Science - Biology","Category: Sociology","Eugenics"],"text":"Transcriber Note\n\nItalic text is denoted by _underscores_.\n\n\n\n\n  \"Make no more giants, God\n  But elevate the race.\"\n\n                     Browning.\n\n\n\n\n                           RACE IMPROVEMENT\n                                  OR\n                               EUGENICS\n\n                  _A Little Book on a Great Subject_\n\n                                  BY\n\n                     La Reine Helen Baker\n\n\n                            [Illustration]\n\n\n                               NEW YORK\n                        DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY\n                                 1912\n\n\nCopyright, 1912\n\nBy DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY\n\n_Published, September, 1912_\n\n\n\n\nCONTENTS\n\n\n  CHAPTER                                               PAGE\n\n     I Introductory                                        1\n\n    II Heredity, Environment                              13\n\n   III The Child, Its Heritage                            28\n\n    IV Marriage                                           40\n\n     V Possibilities of Race Improvement                  55\n\n    VI Education, Eugenics                                69\n\n   VII Eugenics, The Modern Feminist Movement             86\n\n  VIII Positive, Negative Eugenics                       101\n\n       Appendices\n\n         A. State Endowment of Motherhood                120\n\n         B. Sterilisation in U. S. A.                    128\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER I\n\nINTRODUCTORY\n\n\nThe aim of this little volume is to interest the American public in an\nimportant and neglected subject. The writer has her own views on art,\npolitics, religion and other topics which divide mankind, she does\nnot intrude those opinions here, although conscious that \"to see life\nsteadily and see it whole\" much more is wanted than a single branch of\nstudy, however vital. It is not possible, however, to remain silent\nand, at least passively, acquiescent when the interests of the race are\nin danger of neglect. Need for apology is not considered when great\nand influential journals, magazines and volumes dissipate their powers\non all the feeble foolings of the hour. There are many honourable\nexceptions. There are organs of opinion in nearly all directions of\nintellectual speculation, education and philosophy and there are of\ncourse necessary volumes of information on cooking, travel, dress and\namusement. Every material interest except the basic material interest\nof our human existence is represented in our periodical press. An\nexpedition to the pole, a prodigious attempt to attract the attention\nof Martian observers whose very existence is denied by more than half\nour scientists, or a commission to inquire into the relative merits of\nvarious manurial nitrates, for these time and money, private enterprise\nand state aid are readily forthcoming. Professorial chairs are easily\nfinanced for lectures on every necessary and unnecessary subject other\nthan that of direct race improvement. Churches, universities and other\ninstitutions have been endowed for the sake of schisms which have no\ndirect bearing on any human need.\n\nI deny that people do not care what becomes of the race. There never\nhas been a time in the history of the world when parents would not\nrather have a healthy progeny than an unhealthy. The nation would\nalways prefer to be able to boast of improvement instead of blushing\nfor its deteriorating citizenship. As long as Mothers love their own\nyoung and as long as the average man sympathises with undeserved\nsuffering there will be perpetual possibilities for rousing interest in\nthe most promising of all sciences, Eugenics.\n\nEugenics is a word invented by Francis Galton to cover the philosophy,\ncollection of facts, the science, whatever we can call it, which\nregards race improvement as a desirable and practicable process.\nStirpiculture is an older word for a similar idea. New descriptive or\nmisleading phrases will be invented from time to time, sometimes by\nfriends, sometimes by enemies of the movement. It may be well from\nthe first to clear away some misinterpretations. Accusations against\nnew ideas commonly take the form of attempting to show that the new\nand possibly good idea is irretrievably committed to some other idea,\ngenerally an older and discredited one. It is the universal rule,\nparticularly in Anglo-Saxon countries, to regard sex-relationships as\nso sacrosanct that merely to mention them is to outrage modesty and\nshock morality. Fortunately or otherwise we have had to overcome this\nsilly secretiveness. The horrible white-slave traffic, the loathsome\nincrease of venereal diseases, the frequent revelations such as the\nThaw case forced on the public, the necessity for protecting children\nfrom outrage--all these and other things have made not only possible\nbut obviously desirable that decency, wisdom and humanity should make\ntheir voice heard. The time has come when we will not tolerate the\ndaily scandal of having our newspapers polluted with details of sexual\nabnormalities while we are refused the opportunity of educating the\npeople in the direction of purity, health, and efficiency in the\nsexual relation. Eugenics is concerned primarily and materially with\nthe normal sex relationship, which in modern civilised lands means the\nordinary legal monogamic marriage. It is perfectly true that there\nhave been pioneer reformers, to whom the world owes much who have\nlinked their ideals of race improvement to an advocacy of freer sex\nrelationships. Modern eugenists have no such divided council. They\naim at encouraging the best births and discouraging the worst, and\nall details of their propaganda must be subordinate to this great\naspiration. Seeing then that through monogamic marriage the Anglo-Saxon\nrace must overwhelmingly flow now and in all the sighted future, we\nresolutely direct our attention to this institution as we find it.\nOn the lines of which the race has approved we shall proceed for our\nreforms. The United States great in a thousand ways, although often the\ndespair of the reformer, offers the most promising field of the whole\nworld in the direction of Eugenics. Comprising within her catholic\nembrace many varieties of monogamic marriage she possesses contrasts,\ncomparisons, examples and warnings, which will be of infinite use in\nthe Eugenist's laboratory. Well may we be content to show from these\ndifferences how on the present basis of marriage a nobler race may be\nreared. It is of course only one aspect of marriage that interests\nEugenists, but as according to the teaching of most Churches and the\ntheory of most governments the origin, basis and reason of marriage is\nprocreation, it will be seen that race improvement does not look on the\nleast important side of marriage. In other words it is in its public\nand universal relations that marriage will be regarded by Eugenists. In\ncomparatively socialised States like ours where education and a hundred\nother concerns of every child are the constant care of representative\ninstitutions it would be retrogression if we did not now begin to\nconsider the child as having from its birth a public interest. Seeing\nthe advance being made in our understanding of some of the laws of\nheredity it must not be considered wonderful that this public interest\nin the future citizen should begin even before birth. For this purpose\nit is not at all necessary, I hold it to be eminently undesirable, that\nthe State or any outside authority should attempt the ridiculous task\nof organising who shall marry and mate, or dictate by law or force\nthe conditions of marriages which satisfy the contracting parties.\nBut this laisser faire doctrine obviously has no applicability to the\nmuch more disputable proposition that the State has no right to deal\nwith the source of its future responsibilities, the root by which may\narrive human wrecks for which the State must provide in the days to\ncome. This brings me to a further protest. It has been suggested that\nEugenists are anarchists, tearing up the roots of government, blindly\nstriking at civilised institutions, putting a bomb to the foundations\nof Church, State, and Family. Let it be said here and now in such\nclear phrase as may be that Eugenics is the antithesis of anarchy.\nIt means order. Eugenics opposes chaos in the interests of the race.\nIt is the most profoundly patriotic proposition ever laid before the\npeople of these United States. Its conception is for the national\ngood. American Eugenists will never rest until our race becomes the\nfittest on earth. Other nations shall teach us if they can, we will\nbetter their instruction. Monarchical old world peoples, restrained by\ntraditions, tied down by red tape, drugged by the dread of progress,\nmay justify their own inertia, we cannot sink with them. We are leaders\nand pioneers. In the United States respect is still accorded to those\nwho have new truths to teach for the benefit of the race. If \"national\nefficiency\" has to some extent failed in its appeal, if the answer\nhas been an admission of unaccomplished desires, the reason must be\nascribed to the limited scope of the inquiry. The nation has to take\nitself seriously in hand. We need to get beyond the citizen of to-day,\nwe have to consider the citizen of to-morrow.\n\nAs to religion, I appeal both to those who love God and to those who\nlove their fellow-man. It is futile at this time of day to quote\nagainst the living race the dictates of a dead age. It is monstrous\nalso to slander the noble men and women who are at present engaged in\nthe secular activities of our Churches by pretending to believe that\nthey are not most keenly anxious to aid in any uplifting work for the\nregeneration of the world. Every institution which is teaching, feeding\nor otherwise helping children is a nucleus for Eugenic enterprise.\nThe neglect of Eugenics in the last generation has clogged the wheels\nof progress in this generation. We cannot and must not forget the\nvictims of our national neglect, but we can do greatest honour to\nour philanthropists and workers for the general uplift by seriously\nendeavouring to eliminate from the coming generation the hopelessly\nunfit and by encouraging the multiplication of the efficient.\n\nThere is no immorality in our proposals, as a glance at these pages\nwill abundantly prove. The Family of the future is going to be sweeter,\npurer and nobler. It may even be more numerous, for while Eugenists\nresolutely set themselves to discourage the national burdening by\ndebt, danger and decay which inevitably follow in the footsteps of\na deteriorating race, we have nevertheless no opinions whatever as\nto whether a numerically large or small family is best. Race suicide\nis no worse than race murder. We cannot imagine a nobler sight than\nan enormous and increasing race of the vitally fit. A temporary\nand deliberate discouragement of certain unwelcome elements may be\nmomentarily embarrassing, but this is only half the story. Our ports\nof entry are firmly closed in the face of undesirable aliens, not for\nthe purpose of reducing our population, far from it. Our stability,\nour greatness, our very existence depend on the success with which we\nhave attracted to our shores those immigrants whose children to-day\nare our boast and pride. Eugenics, it cannot be too often said, is no\nmere phase of Malthusianism. It is not _a_ population question it is\n_the_ population question. It dismisses Malthus as a spent force, as a\nprophet whose message was only half delivered, as a Jeremiah who would\nhave deprived the world of its saviours as well as of its betrayers.\nOf Malthus it may truly be said that in forbidding those who would\n\"wade through slaughter to a throne\" he \"shut the gates of mercy on\nmankind.\" No philosophy to-day can meet the needs of to-day if it\nindiscriminately decreases both. Both methods are evil. We must weigh\nas well as count. The Sphinx of civilisation sits waiting our answer to\nher riddle. We have mingled the seeds of evil with the seeds of good.\nMere mechanical multiplication only accentuates the evil because weeds\nare always of quicker growth than the flower plants which they deprive\nof their due share of light and air. Patient division of the seeds,\ncareful sorting, subtracting as far as possible the contaminating\nelements, and giving all the needful attention to the sturdy but\nperverse, encouraging those seeds which in various ways will one day\ngrow into perfect trees so as to show flower; to bear fruit, give\nshade, make timber or in any other way serve the multifarious needs of\nthe nation.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II\n\nHEREDITY AND ENVIRONMENT\n\n\nEugenics is not committed to the Darwinian doctrine of evolution,\nalthough it would probably never have reached the stage of practical\npolitics but for the encouragement given to all systematic scientific\nstudies by Darwin's magnificent generalisations. Eugenics takes its\nstand on the ascertained fact of heredity, and it owes an immense debt\nto the patience with which Lamarck, the Darwins, Weissman and others\nhave piled instance upon instance to illustrate the fact that \"the sins\nof the fathers are visited upon the children unto the third and fourth\ngeneration\" and \"the fathers have eaten sour grapes and the children's\nteeth are set on edge.\" The doctrine of heredity has never been more\nresonantly expressed than in these words although they show only one\nside and that not the better side of heredity. We are indeed \"begotten\nnot made.\" Nurture, or environment, has its place, and an important\none, in race improvement, but the overwhelming fact remains that\nmore than three-fourths of the elements which build up a human soul\nare in its nature, not its nurture. The formative factor of greatest\nimportance in the making of human life and character is heredity.\n\nMankind has hitherto failed to grasp the full significance of this\nadmission. Horticulturists have made it the starting point of their\nexperiments until to-day the Luther Burbanks can almost create\nwhat they will in plant life. Cattle-breeders, dog-fanciers, and\nhorse-farmers, are able to raise the value of their breeds to a\nwonderful degree. Ornithologists have been equally successful; from the\noriginal stock a hundred varieties come at the touch of the scientific\nmagician's wand. In each case even where at first quantity was\nconsidered of no importance compared with quality, there has been a\nsteady and unmistakable increase in the effective numbers side by side\nwith a gigantic development of those elements of strength or beauty\nwhich have been arrived at. Race suicide is a metaphysical phrase not\neasily open to definition, but two things may be said about it at this\nstage. Race improvement is utterly inconsistent with any intelligent\nconception of race suicide. An increasing birthrate is not in itself\na guarantee of progress and may indeed be the means of a nation's\nretrogression. Experience and logic lead to the confident conclusion\nthat increased vitality means increased fecundity.\n\nTo acknowledge the law of heredity with its concomitant scientific\nimplications, must inevitably change our mental outlook in many\ndirections. Accordingly as we relatively place heredity or environment\nfirst, our views on social politics will be fundamentally sound or\nunsound. Taking a large view of society it must make an abysmal\ndifference whether we think the race can or cannot be improved\n(not merely polished or even enlightened but really changed) by\n_modifications of environment_. We can no longer pursue the same and\nby the same means if we come to the conclusion that the individual is\neither born a potential asset to society or \"damned into existence,\"\na permanent drain on his fellows' comfort and wealth, even a possible\nmiasma of infectious criminality.\n\nI am a Eugenist because I believe that the nature we have received from\nhereditary sources transcends in effectiveness all the nurture which\nfollows birth. Eugenics means seeking for facts and applying them to\nsolve the greatest of all problems--looking for light by which the race\nmay control its destiny. Heredity in the animal and vegetable world may\nbe considered dispassionately enough. Geology and astronomy are only\nhereditary studies affecting the birth of worlds. But from human birth\nand sex, the mysteries of creation in their divinest form, from _these_\nbranches of the study of heredity the flaming sword of prudery warns\nus away. The subject of human sex has been the play-ground of neglect,\nignorance, bigotry, superstition, persecution and every other foe to\ninquiry. It has been the object of worship but not of explanation, of\nromance but not of science, of abuse, mutilation, misunderstanding,\nbut not of study, reason and generalization. Eugenics of course aims\nat expressing the scientific side of the process of which love is the\nartistic. The rare handful of brave men and women who against unique\nopposition have forced this question to the front are not to be blamed\nif up to now Eugenics can hardly be said to exist as a systematised\nscience. It is in the nature of things that as a philosophy Eugenics\nis hardly more than a guess, a probability, an hypothesis. Doubt,\nuncertainty and half-heartedness inevitably accompany a movement so\nundeservedly discredited as this has been. Without the means to collect\nthe enormous body of facts required to justify national action the\nEugenists have been content to rely upon personal experiences, isolated\nfamily histories and the normal and abnormal facts which newspapers,\nbiographies and daily life presented to them. Eugenists have wrestled\nagainst difficulties like Hercules in the Augean stable or Paul in\nthe Ephesian arena. In fact the stable and the arena throw more light\non Eugenics than any at present available from the human animal. The\nexistent biology of Eugenics means a study of non-human life. There\nis a sufficiently extensive literature and digest of experiments\nrelating to animal and plant life to serve as the stock in trade of\na fairly complete system of Eugenics--if only fuschias were men or\nmen were mules. External observations of animal and plant life cannot\nuniversally apply to man even passively, while the active interference\nof the human botanist in the affairs of the unprotesting plants\nseparates these from men by an unpassable chasm.\n\nThe first need then for Eugenic study is some systematic collection of\nthe ascertainable facts as far as they relate to human beings. This\nimplies sufficient scientific interest in the phenomena of parentage\nto encourage widespread earnest patient desire to exchange information\nand to steadily accumulate enough knowledge to justify experiment in\npositive and negative Eugenics. No sane Eugenist advocates universal\nState action based on the existent records, but it would be against\nall good precedent if the absence of sufficient knowledge on a vital\nsubject were allowed to stultify the efforts of those who seek for\nfuller information. Nothing but good will ensue if positive experiments\nare boldly labelled as such, instead of pretending that our twilight\nof investigation is the full light of perfect knowledge. Experiments\nin positive Eugenics will take various forms. They began with the\nmost ordinary baby-shows; they proceeded through municipal prizes for\nthe healthiest offsprings. An important stage arose when premiums in\nsome cities began to be offered to all parents whose babies survived\nthe critical first year of life. These were elementary experiments,\nbased on the right motive but ignoring the element of heredity. The\nexperiments of the future must be on a surer foundation. The current\ncriteria of judgment are sound enough as far as they go, they encourage\ncareful nurture, but the limitations of the experiments are those of\nan unscientific age. Obviously the next step in the same direction\nis to discriminate. The haphazard chance that of fifty children\nproperly nourished one may be distinguished by its superior physique\ndoes not materially help us to solve our problem if we stop at this\nphase. Having found our healthiest child we might at least try to\ndiscover the hereditary history of its progenitors and take steps\nto encourage further offsprings from so promising a source. Imagine\na scientific cattle-breeder possessing a perfect bull, contented\nthat one of its offsprings should take a single prize! Not to unduly\nstrain the analogy we might with all decorum and wisdom circulate\nwhat knowledge we can glean of those facts which have made perfection\npossible. Are we to be everlastingly contented with news of the\nromantic, sensational, abnormal and criminal phenomena of sex while\nour newspapers and official records are silent concerning ordinary and\ndesirable experiences, their causes and their results? Heredity as\nthe basis of legislation is never dreamt of, while our statute books\nare crowded with laws passed in a panic, laws which bear no ratio\nto essential facts, and laws which look at the elementary passions\nof mankind through the refractory media of prejudice, ignorance and\nwell-meaning misconception. It rarely if ever occurs to legislators\nthat a scientific system of society demands an acquaintance with\nthe recently accepted conclusions of our greatest thinkers. We are\nsuffering to-day from a pre-Darwinian government in almost all our\nStates. \"Authorities\" of all kinds are quoted in support of and against\nany given proposal, but the \"authorities\" are seldom the fittest. In\nearlier days latin tags were considered a worthy conclusion to a speech\nin Senate or Legislature. Nowadays poetry or literature is called\ninto requisition. Darwin, Spencer and Galton should at least have\ntaught us to take trouble to learn all about the subject in hand and\nwhat bearing the scientific discoveries of our generation have upon\nparticular problems. It is a disease of the age that we are conscious\nof our national short-comings in only the vaguest possible way. We are\nignorant of the full extent of our misfortunes and we do not apply to\nthem the time, trouble and money which are a preliminary necessity to\ndiscovering a remedy, and we forget the dynamic difference which must\nbe made in our treatment of race problems as soon as we accept heredity\nas the controlling factor. But the preliminaries must be insisted\non. Investigation, collation, classification, generalisation, and\nlegislation, must be taken in their right order.\n\nThe difficulties in the way of investigating the laws which govern\nheredity have as usual led to shirking the issue altogether. Even\nwhen we look the difficulty straight in the face, we pass it by. We\nhave made a god of environment. Our best social efforts hitherto in\nlegislation, social conventions, conduct and educational ideals (and\nin modern times even our religions), have come to consider environment\nas of paramount importance. But take environment at its highest it can\nonly be the best soil for the best seed. _That_ is a Eugenic ideal\nalso but it cannot convert a disease germ into a desirable citizen.\nOver-emphasis of reform dependent on improved environment implies that\na deadly upas tree, if transplanted and properly watered and \"given a\nbetter chance,\" will reward society with a plentiful harvest of edible\nnourishing fruit. The heartless school which on principles hates all\nreform derives its chief support from the fact that the reform which\nregards only environment too often descends to veneering vice with\nrespectability or dissipates itself in futilities of a grandmotherly\nkind. The reformer of the future must study causes as well as\nphenomena. The skilled physician regards symptoms as of importance\nonly to the extent that they assist the diagnosis of disease. Accurate\nanalysis must consider hereditary causes as well as local symptoms.\n\nEnvironment when properly subordinated to and illuminated by heredity\ndoes not cease to be important. Environment may provide wings to\nfly with and an atmosphere capable of sustaining weight, even when\nit cannot provide the will to fly. To return to our agricultural\nsymbolism: environment cannot make or change the nature of the seed, it\nis the soil, the sunshine and the succulence, but it has to take the\nseed as it is. Heredity is inside the seed and goes behind the seed to\nthe mother plant. Heredity is what our ancestors meant when they said\npredestination, necessity, destiny.\n\nPhilosophers of pre-Darwin days have lured mankind into the pleasant\nbut dangerously untrue belief that human nature is essentially and\nuniversally good. This crude generalisation of Rousseau's gospel\ndoes some injustice to that great man's philosophy which represented\na necessary revolt from the soul-destroying perversion of heredity\nwhich described man as uniformly \"born in sin and shaped in iniquity.\"\nExperience has revolted against both extremes. The Heavenly father is\nno longer a Fiend who destines \"one to heav'n and ten to hell,\" and\nthe Earthly Parent emerges from his ancient unimportance. Man is in\nneither case fortuitous, his nature, potentiality and destiny are writ\nlarge in the study of his heredity. We are all, like poets, born not\nmade; as we are: we remain: we develop on lines long ago laid down for\nus by other forces than those environment can control and it is still\nimpossible to make a silk purse out of a sow's ear. This consideration\nputs into proper perspective the things which matter, and warns us\nto cease vain expenditure on unscientific philanthropy. The efforts\nwasted on watering weeds might have made the garden smile with fragrant\nflowers. Environment means opportunity. We shall understand better how\nand why environments need reconstruction when we recognise the superior\nimportance of heredity. We shall begin to realise the uselessness of\nforcing qualities into the human organism, and become all the more\nanxious to afford opportunity for developing whatever utilisable\nqualities are already there existent. We shall learn to educate, in\nthe old sense of the word. We shall bring out the maximum of the good\nwithin. We will no longer tolerate the cruelties and crudities of\nabortive attempts to instil properties and qualities of character which\nnot being inherent can never be successfully inoculated.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III\n\nTHE CHILD AND ITS HERITAGE\n\n\nThe previous chapter suggests that unless due regard is given to\nheredity an increased population will merely aggravate the existing\nsocial problems. It is necessary also to emphasise the importance\nof watching our death statistics as well as our birth returns.\nObviously a nation with a low percentage of births compared with its\npopulation may be increasing the latter much more largely as well as\nmore healthily than a nation with a much larger percentage of births.\nThe pulse of each hand must be felt. Infant mortality is as easily\nascertainable and is of at least equal importance. Infant efficiency\nis unfortunately less easily ascertainable statistically. Subject to\nthese qualifications the Eugenics school welcomes Mr. Roosevelt's\nprotests against Race Suicide, and gladly identifies itself with any\nreligious, political or social effort to bring to our citizens a sense\nof what we owe to the commonwealth. It is not a matter to be dismissed\nwith a speech or a magazine article when we see almost every career\nin the world glorified, and parentage alone sneered at. Believers in\nEugenics regard with a horror based on a certainty of evil consequence\nwhen they contemplate a State in which the noble task of motherhood is\nleft to the poor while the rich evade their duties. It is stupid as\nwell as abominable to reproach heroic but uninstructed mothers of the\nless wealthy classes. Year after year they think they are fulfilling\ntheir destined purpose in life by adding to their families a burden\ndifficult to bear. In the long run, after Nature has exercised a cruel\nelimination, this burden of the individual becomes the glory of the\nrace, the very bloom and blossom of the future. Neither can reproach be\ngiven to the parents in the slums. Nature here seems to be prodigal\nindeed. The children come, only the doctors know the terrible tale\nof them. To the registrar they are but a name, to the statistician a\nnumber, but to the City and the State they mean cemeteries, hospitals,\nprisons, asylums, as well as barracks. But I am not dealing here with\nthe whole problem of poverty. Eugenics aims at breeding the fittest\nfrom the fittest and it sees\n\n  \"How many a gem of purest ray serene\n  The dark unfathom'd caves of ocean bear.\"\n\nEven in the most unpromising surroundings one sees noble sparks of life\nnot to be quenched by poverty or any other vital enemy. The Christ\ncontinues to be born in a stable.\n\nIt is when we reach the exclusive circles of the rich that we see how\nthe race is decaying. Children are at a discount. Parentage is coming\nto be considered a waste of time. A man cannot spare his wife from\nsocial functions. Dressmakers agree that the coming of a child destroys\nsymmetry and prevents fashionable tight-lacing. Besides there are\nother pastimes to consider. Neither the State nor the individual will\nmake the public believe that the production of healthy children is as\nimportant as baseball, horse-racing or stamp collecting. Millions of\ndollars are spent on securing the best breeds of horses. Seven thousand\ndollars recently was the price of a single four-cent stamp. Dogs, in\nthe highest circles, have luxuries of food, clothing and housing which\nthe servants who feed them never possessed. Dog-cemeteries exist where\nmore money is spent on the tombstone of a dead dog than would keep a\nlive human family for a year. \"Foxes have holes, the birds of the air\nhave nests\" but the children of the poor starve and the rich prefer the\npastime of the moment to the permanent interests of the race.\n\nDegeneracy is not a disease by specific intention, it is an attribute\nto our social neglect, it is the result of our inattention to vital\nissues, it is a sign that we are no longer keenly anxious to elevate\nthe race. Race improvement requires, under modern conditions of life,\neternal vigilance and deliberate aim. The prolific character of the\ndegenerate type has often been remarked. It finds expression in the\nhomely proverb \"Ill weeds grow apace.\" But the \"growth\" is in the\nundesirable direction--they do not grow better. If it were not for the\nwasteful cruelty of it all one would see some gleam of satisfaction\nin the admitted fact that many of these breeds of degenerates are\nalmost as short-lived as they are prolific. The handsome villain of\ncontemporary romance, healthy in physique and mentally alert is a\nmisleading picture entirely at variance with fact. The degenerate child\nis neither beautiful, robust nor mentally sound. While the number of\nchildren per family is four on the average, Dr. Tredgold tells us\nthat the average of births in a degenerate family is over seven, in\naddition to the still-born who in the case of the degenerates amount\nto about fifteen per cent of the children born. Almost every prison in\nthe civilised world bears record to the direct injury inflicted on the\ncommunity by the degenerate class. The feeble-minded alone amount to an\nappreciable percentage of the ordinary population of our prisons, and,\nif to these are added other victims of hereditary degeneracy, there\nwill be left only what may be described as the \"Criminals by accident.\"\nI am not claiming too much for the science when I say that Eugenics is\ncapable of revolutionising these terrible conditions. The hereditary\nnature of the taint of criminality is proved by the history and bodily\ncharacteristics of its unhappy victims. Eugenists as such have no\nspecial remedy for the present day criminality. Their work is to point\nto the breeding of the criminal and to urge the importance of stopping\nhis multiplication. As soon as society begins to take steps towards\ncutting off the supply of the degenerate there will be no object in\nperpetuating cruel punishments whose only object was deterrence.\n\nAlcoholism may be treated as a separate phase of this great question\nor it may be regarded as but a manifestation of feeble-mindedness. In\neither case it can be shown that the children of degenerates are those\nmost often prone to the drink evil. It is not a fact that a drunkard's\nchildren necessarily grow up drunkards. This assertion which is\nsometimes met with in Temperance literature is based on a misconception\nof what heredity is and a misunderstanding of what alcoholism is.\nAlcoholism tends to eliminate the alcoholic. The children of the\ndrunkard may not be drunkards but they may exhibit weaknesses,\ncravings for destructive media or absence of self-control which at\nlength terminate their generation. There is only one final cure for\nnational intemperance and that is a more humane imitation of Nature's\nown plan. Nature seems cruel in its work because its effectiveness is\nnot hindered by moral or humane considerations. Man cannot and must\nnot imitate Nature's ruthlessness even if the process of elimination\nbecomes a slower one. We can imitate Nature's methodical incisiveness\nwithout following Nature's murderous indifference. In some directions\nwe may even accelerate Nature's processes, not by increasing the pains\nand penalties which she inflicts on a gradually disappearing progeny,\nbut by narrowing the circle of the victims; by declining to longer\ntolerate the procreation of a hopeless generation.\n\nI do not deny that temperance and similar effort at moral suasion\nform a valuable buttress against the worst phenomena of alcoholism.\nIt serves the same purpose of help that bread does to the starving\ndestitute, it does not solve the problem but it is a necessary work all\nthe same, a valuable adjunct to a radical cure, and only objectionable\nif it stands in the way of prevention which is better than cure.\n\nThere is a heritage for children worse, perhaps, than criminality,\nfeeble-mindedness or a tendency to alcoholic excess. I refer to\nvenereal diseases. Painful or otherwise the subject must be discussed\nin this connection sooner or later. Like alcoholism, this disease\ncontributes to its own elimination, its victims do not survive\nmany generations. It is impossible to obtain statistics reasonably\ncomplete of the depredations wrought by these diseases. Professor\nFournier regards them as social danger (1) By the individual damage\ninflicted, (2) The damage inflicted on the family, (3) The hereditary\nconsequences, especially the infant mortality which is terrible, (4)\nThe race deterioration and depopulation entailed. Public opinion is\nripe for Eugenic treatment of this subject for one good reason, namely\nthat every other remedy has either failed after trial or is in the\nnature of things incapable of adequate enforcement. State regulation\nof vice, with its corollary, State examination of women, is nowadays\nopposed by medical authorities because of the illusory security from\ninfection which it implies, and is bitterly resented by all reformers\nas an intolerable tyranny applicable only to a single sex.\n\nIf I have emphasised the evils which are the heritage of so large a\nnumber of our children, it must never be forgotten that great as is the\nproportion of the unfit, we have not yet reached the stage when there\nare more unfit than fit. The heritage of evil represents the need for\nEugenics in its negative aspect. We are perfectly well aware of the\ncharacteristics which we desire to eliminate, and this is of very great\nimportance, not only because of the active harm which a decadent type\nrepresents in our civilisation, but there is the further consideration\nthat ninety-nine per cent of the reformative effort of our legislative\nand social crusades, and of the philanthropic side of our religious\nlife, is concentrated on this appalling problem. The release of much\nof this effort would tend towards enlightening the nation in other\ndirections. It is not at all wonderful that we should recognise our\nnational agreement about the types we would gladly eliminate while we\ndisagree very widely about the types we would most value. This arises\nlargely from the fact that our attention for many years has been\nriveted on \"the submerged tenth,\" on \"degeneracy\" on \"the criminal\nclasses\" and on the various other descriptions of the undesirable.\nWhat a little share in our organised study of man has the best type\nhad. We have fed the unfit and left the healthy unheeded. Actually\nwhile we have been discussing the problem of improvement we have seen\nthe destruction and disappearance through war, disease and poverty\nof representatives of types which stood in no need of improvement but\nonly of perpetuating. But in the main if we do not agree as to the most\ndesirable heritage a child should have there is very much common ground\nbetween us all. We believe that every child has the right to a good\nconstitution. We regard as a misfortune every obstacle which renders\nhealthy parents unwilling or unable to add their contribution to the\nwelfare of the State by increasing the number of happy children growing\ninto efficient men and women. Why wonder at the anti-social elements\nto be found in every city? What claim has the State on its children\nwhen the State has neglected the duty of a parent. To be a citizen is\ntoo great an honor to bestow on the hopeless children of degenerate\nparents. These children's heritage is sorrow, the nation's remorse is\nunavailing, Nemesis overtakes the neglectful State.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV\n\nMARRIAGE\n\n\nForty years ago it would have been possible to say that all\nencouragements to marriage necessarily meant increasing the birth\nrate. Economic and other causes contribute to the decline of both\nmarriage and birth-rates. In this chapter I am not concerned with\nthe discouragements to race increase. I remark elsewhere on the\nabsence of national inspiration to race improvement. I am at present\nconcerned only with marriage as the medium for procreation, no other\naspect of marriage is the concern of Eugenists. To encourage those\nmarriages which will tend to produce a noble race might well befit the\nconsideration of a great people. The views uttered here, while I think\nthey would be largely shared by Eugenists as a whole, are more or less\npersonal to the writer who alone is responsible for their statement.\nThe legitimatisation in some way of the illegitimate seems to me a\nnecessary, urgent duty of the State. The stigma, implying moral blame\nand sometimes meeting with actual ill-treatment on that account, is as\nunjust and undeserved as anything that can be imagined. To overcome\nthe difficulty by making the marriage of the parents the sole method\nof removing the reproach seems to me as unjust as it is illogical.\nThere is no sense in making a child suffer unnecessarily. The\nabsence of a home with a pair of loving parents is often the natural\nsufferings inflicted on a \"natural\" child. We ought not to encourage\nany discrimination between the adopted and the unadopted illegitimate\nchild. Public opinion must learn to regard all children from the moment\nof their birth as having an inherent right to the best possible welcome\nand the treatment best fitted to make them desirable citizens. Eugenics\nstudies the parents and on occasion challenges their right to produce\nseed, and one of its basic reasons for doing so must inevitably be that\nthere can be no post-natal challenge to the child's right to exist.\n\nIllegitimacy however greatly deprecated morally has justified itself\nhistorically. It has produced some of earth's chosen heroes. It\ncan be condemned ethically because it so often inflicts hardship,\nprivation and misery on the unhappy mother and the innocent child. That\nsubsequent marriage of the parents should bring into the family records\nthe acknowledged previous offspring is obvious common sense, but the\nchild whose father refuses to do its mother the sometimes doubtful\n\"honour\" of marriage should be regarded in this respect as a child\nwhose father is dead. As our records demand a name for the father,\n\"Anon\" should serve where paternity is doubtful and the real father's\nname should be acknowledged in every official document in every case\nwhere paternity orders are obtained. In other words illegitimacy\nshould be abolished and, marriage or no marriage, every child should be\nduly entitled to every right of inheritance, etc., which the laws at\npresent confine to the fruit of wedlock. It is not the form of marriage\nor its absence but the racial result with which Eugenics is concerned.\nMorality, religion, or the law which holds society together may have\nits reproach, its deprecatory warnings, and even its punishments for\n_parents_ who transgress its conventions, but humanity demands that no\nstone shall be thrown at the _child_.\n\nEugenics is so seriously concerned with the race that it cannot accept\nthe pretentious puerilities which so often masquerade under the title\nof marriage-law reforms. The mere refusal of a marriage certificate\nto couples who cannot pass certain medical shibboleths, while their\noffspring is unconsidered (except in so far as it demands immediate\npublic assistance) seems to be a mockery of a serious subject. The\nmarriage of the unfit is the concern of the Eugenists primarily\nbecause deception on either side may lead to terrible evil. Physical\nexaminations and medical certificates before marriage are an urgent\nnecessity--not as a bar to marriage but as a hindrance to deceit. Wives\nmust know the man they are marrying. Men must be informed what kind\nof wife is hidden beneath the attractive dress. A danger of marriage\nis that a perfectly capable healthy person may unsuspectingly marry\nan impotent, barren or deformed consort. Love capable of conquering a\nwholesome physical repulsion is one thing; love, blinded by custom,\ndelivered bound into the hands of disease is a vile thing incapable\nof defence. Partners for life can even now demand a certificate on\nthe portal of marriage, but public opinion and legislation must make\nsuch certificates an essential preliminary to the marriage contract.\nAll legal barriers to breaking an engagement on grounds of physical\nand mental ill-health must be swept away, and the enlightened public\nmust be led to learn that some promises are better broken than kept.\nIf these ante-matrimonial conditions are observed Eugenists will look\nwith a charitable if discouraging glance at marriages of the unfit.\nMarriage between two \"unfit\" persons can be defended on very many\ngrounds so long as children are not born. It is, generally speaking,\nimprobable that the unfit at their worst will either be drawn to each\nother or that they will wish to enter on any career which may tend\nto deprive them of what vitality they still possess. Most often such\nunions would be inevitably fruitless whatever vain attempts were made\nto make the dry bones live. Such unions would in nearly every instance\nsimply mean that to prevent scandal a form of marriage is gone through\nand thereafter two weaklings give each other the comfort of communion;\ntheir common diet is suited to their needs, they live (as far as\nthey can afford it) in an atmosphere adapted to their complaint. I do\nnot envy the state of soul of their critics who would mar the placid\nsatisfaction of mutual comfort which would solace their declining\nchildless days.\n\nThe union of the fit and the unfit is a calamity or a catastrophe in\ncases of knowledge, it is a crime where the victim is deceived into\nignorance. The union of two unfit persons entered into in complete\nknowledge will be an infinitely smaller evil.\n\nTo make marriage attractive we must very greatly increase the\nfacilities for unmaking it, and we must lay down some general\nprinciples for its healthy continuance. The absolute right of a woman\nto her own person, and her prerogative to refuse to bear children, seem\nelementary conditions of civilised wedlock. Woman must be protected\nfrom outrage, be she wife or not. A married woman must have the same\nright over her own person and her own children that an unmarried woman\nhas over hers. It is an unmistakable slight on marriage to compel a\nwoman to relinquish any of the legal or social rights she would enjoy\nif unmarried. We cannot afford to throw these obstacles in the way of\nmarriage, we want the best women to marry and not to abstain on account\nof the altogether unnecessary and unnatural disabilities which laws and\nmen have made.\n\nEugenists are willing to concede that divorce should be cheap, easy and\nfree from shameful scandal. This can only be done however without grave\ninjustice to women and the race if, apart from religious and moral\nconsiderations, the family is made the first consideration. The problem\nis largely an economic one. It is not likely that the State willingly\nintends to take upon itself the burden of maintaining thousands of\nwives unable to maintain themselves discarded by husbands wealthy\nenough to incur new responsibilities and expense. Whether marriage\nshould be regarded as giving a claim to equal shares in the property\nand income of either partner is worthy of discussion. It is likely\nenough that the thinking woman of the present day and her successors\nwill insist on wages for wives, wages for motherhood, and wages for\nhousekeeping, and that these stipulations will receive the sanction\nof State law wherever they are reasonably scheduled and definitely\napproved. The children of divorced parents occupy an onerous position.\nMr. Henry James, in \"What Maisie Knew,\" has touched convincingly on\nthis point. It cannot be dismissed as unimportant for there is hardly\na single good environment in children's lives so potent as that of\na happy home in which the two parents' love for each other is only\nrivalled by their united love for the young lives their love has so\nmiraculously created. But there is no worse condition for children than\nthe home of hate. Divorce may be horrid, but the atmosphere of love\nturned to indifference and hate is hell for all who breathe there.\n\nWhile marriage does not exhaust all the possibilities of increasing\nthe race it may be said to be not only the best but the only socially\ndesirable way. Preventing divorce, or railing marriage round with\ndifficulties not only encourages illicit relations outside marriage,\nit inevitably tends to prevent marriages being as fecund as the\ninterests of the race demands. There is no need to sigh for a uniform\nmarriage-law. If the ideal rule could be discovered it would be a pity\nnot to make it universal. States which have experimented under present\nconditions become valuable examples or warnings, and the only need is\nthat the least enlightened (or the least speculative) State should\ncome into line with the most advanced without undue delay. Fortunately\nalready there has been a number of very interesting enterprises by\nindividual States, and the time is ripe for the more general adoption\nof those marriage laws which have given general satisfaction where\ntried.\n\nThe \"age of consent\" and the age of marriage must be brought to a\ncommon minimum. If a girl is mature enough for one she is mature enough\nfor the other. The condition of parental consent seems at first glance\nan anachronism, but may have some Eugenic value if modified to mean\nthat the age of consent can be pre-dated in exceptional cases.\n\nNo husband or wife should be tied for life to a person who develops\nsymptoms of such diseases as tuberculosis, syphilis, chronic alcoholism\nand the like. Felony and even incurable laziness or incapacity should\nbe good grounds for divorce. There is no necessary connection between\nSocialism and Eugenics but neither is there any essential antagonism.\nEugenics recognises the responsibilities of parenthood and to that\nextent is individualistic; it claims also that the children born to\nall men, rich or poor, are bound to be born as healthy as advancing\nscience can make them. That is why Eugenics is sometimes regarded as\nsocialistic, but we have long ago decided that health is a national\nconcern and therefore the State builds hospitals, passes sanitary laws\nand insists on the notification of certain diseases. In a Republic it\nought not to be necessary to say that classes should not exist. At\nthe risk of accentuating the socialistic accusation it has to be made\nplain that matrimonial selection must ignore distinctions of wealth\nand class and creed. The fit must wed the fittest, that is the keynote\nof Eugenics. Eugenics speaks with no uncertain voice on the \"Colour\nquestion\"--every race must work out its own salvation, and in the\ninterests of each race there must be no intermarrying. It is a healthy\nand natural objection which causes a white woman to shudder at the idea\nof a mixed marriage. The mating of a black woman with a white man is\nseldom a wedding, it generally means degradation to both and excessive\nsuffering to the victims--the woman and the child.\n\nAfter we have done all we can to make marriage a more perfect\ninstitution we are only beginning the ideal of Eugenic life. We have\nto know more than we know at present of what characteristics are best\ncombined with what others, and to know which unions are fraught with\ndangers both to the partners and still more to the offspring. The\nold Stirpiculturists have very much to say on the subject of \"likes\nand contrasts\" from the days of Byrd Powell up till the time when\nscientific Eugenics under Sir Francis Galton gave new light to the\nstudy: Phrenology, freed from its showman and charlatan element, may\nyet help us in our quest. For there is no divorce law which can ever\ncure the ills of ill-assorted marriage. Our ignorance may not be\ncriminal, it is nevertheless deplorable. Science gathers increasing\ninformation about all other things and we spend our millions on\ninvestigating the prevention of utilisation of waste, shall we not\nhope that this great institution of marriage may too in its turn be\nthe subject of our scientists', philosophers' and statisticians'\nconcern. Marriage has its origin in the profoundest needs of social\nman. The _raison d'etre_ of marriage is human happiness now and in the\ngenerations to follow. Throwing legislative obstacles in the way of\nmarriage has never had any effect except the increase of illegitimacy.\nThe scientific remedy here as elsewhere is enlightenment. We have\nto safeguard the race and educate the present generation. We cannot\ntell those who would marry more than we know ourselves, but every\nascertained fact and every reasonable probability about marriage\nshould be at the disposal of every candidate for the \"holy order.\" The\nmere necessity of systematising our knowledge ready for distribution\nwill be a gain, the sum of actual fact about the mating of various\ntemperaments and characteristics may be larger than we think. Anyhow\nit offers a promising field of research. Eugenics will encourage the\nendowment of such knowledge, it will seek subsidies from the State\ntowards its acquisition, it will strive to popularise it in every way\nuntil it will be much rarer than it is to-day unhappily to hear the\ncomplaints \"If youth but knew,\" and \"It might have been.\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER V\n\nPOSSIBILITIES OF RACE IMPROVEMENT\n\n\nIt is unnecessary to argue the desirability of race improvement.\nIt is the avowed ultimate object of every religious, moral, social\nand individual reform. In the light of history we know that race\nimprovement is possible. Degeneration is the scientists' formula for\nthe theologian's \"fall from grace,\" evolution is the Darwinian phrase\nfor\n\n\"That far-off divine event To which the whole creation moves.\"\n\nThe Eugenist does not say that religion, morality, and education are\nineffective, he only claims that these great forces should apply to\nthe foundations of society instead of being spent and dissipated in a\nthousand less important directions.\n\nEugenics is not a step in the dark. The theory is based on observation\nand its practice on a selection of the innumerable experiences of\nmankind. Since the first man married the first bride mankind has been\nunconsciously offering an accumulation of experiments in improvement,\ndeterioration and stagnation of the race. It is only inexplicable\nreticence which has diverted man's study from these phenomena. Failure\nto appreciate relative values, the prejudice arising from a debased or\nimmature morality, the bigotry of misunderstood religion and the dread\nof wounding prudish susceptibilities have led competent writers to\ndevote to pigs and sheep volumes which should have had man for their\nsubject. \"The noblest study of mankind is man,\" but our naturalists\nhave not advertised it sufficiently. Charles Darwin, whose powers of\nminute observation are admitted to have been supreme even by those\nwho dispute his conclusions, recognised the racial bias against \"the\nnoblest study.\" Writing to A. R. Wallace in 1857 he said: \"You ask\nwhether I shall discuss 'man.' I think I shall avoid the subject, as so\nsurrounded with prejudice; though I admit it is the highest and most\ninteresting problem for the naturalist.\"\n\nThe old attempts to divide mankind into good and bad have failed beyond\nrecall. The first lesson we can learn from a study of the past is to\nrecognise the probably infinite variety of type which exists, not only\nin the attainments, but in the potentialities of various types of man\nand woman. We no longer wonder at differences of mentality when we\nknow the variations in bodily form and structure. We see that some are\ncapable of endurance, some are physically weak, some are almost leonine\nin strength. Each variation in strength may be united with differing\ndegrees of other qualities, of sight, of motion, of temperament--there\nis no end to the combinations. We are well on the road to the\nelements of Eugenics when we have grasped two facts, the analysable\ndistinctions between individuals, and the fact that broadly speaking\na child is endowed with its essential characteristics from birth. The\nqualifications of the hereditary principle need not be set forth here.\nDarwin's theory is being modified in our day on important but not vital\ndetails. Eugenics is only interested in so far as we admit this broad\ngeneralisation to which no scholar of to-day would substantially demur.\n\nWe cannot in every case disentangle human characteristics with\nsufficient precision to warrant us in saying which combinations are\ndesirable and which are undesirable. We can, however, get into our\nminds the idea that one good quality may be happily supplemented by\nanother, or that certain characteristics might prove irreconcilable\nin combination. For instance strong sexuality allied to moral\nresponsibility would prove an admirable combination, but the former\nquality in conjunction with weak mentality would work for certain ill.\nThe marriage of near relations has been demonstrated to stereotype\nexistent combinations, the evil is not as was once feared that the\nact was in itself categorically immoral and therefore followed by\nNature's punishment. It amounted to the same thing in many cases\nbecause Nature's law is progress or retrogression; to stand still is to\nstultify the law of the universe. The highest and noblest physically,\nmorally and mentally are the most complicated, and there is little\ndanger that they will find their match amongst those with whom they\nare likely to marry. The risk of like marrying like is more inherently\nprobable amongst the commonplace and mediocre. The danger becomes a\nterrible one when the lowest rung of the ladder is reached and it is\nhere that intermarriage is most common if not invariable. The lowest\ndegenerates, the most vulgar criminals the absolute failures, the\n\"creatures who once were men\" rarely have sexual unions of any sort\nor kind outside their own degraded circle. The unfit breed more of\ntheir kind and do not improve. The commonplace may by happy chance or\non wise information mingle just those characteristics which raise the\nrace to a higher level. The highest like those in the last category,\nmay in the next generation lead to still higher heights or they may\nmaintain their standard of efficiency, or their caste may sink to lower\ncircles. In any of these cases of course there is the alternative that\ntheir race may be extinguished. All this is merely to state the case\nas it stands. There are few who dispute the facts, the Eugenic remedy\nis either not appreciated or it is ignored. It cannot be a subject of\nindifference whether the best types increase or the worst. It must\nmatter to the race, it must seriously affect the present generation,\nit must be of increasing importance to each generation. Cruel, harsh,\nsevere, repressive laws have been discarded as ineffective and inhuman.\nWe cannot go back to an abortive policy which failed even a Torquemada.\nOn the contrary we have repressed natural checks to population and must\nincreasingly continue to do so wherever we discover new methods of\nfoiling Nature's indiscriminate destructiveness. The stream of tendency\ncannot be dammed, we must adapt our social mill-wheels to the new\nchannels which the river of time has cut in the fields of experience.\n\nWe must discard the old unscientific view of existence as an\ninexplicable riddle, of marriage as a lucky bag, of crime as a mere\nchance occurrence, of genius as a \"sport,\" of events as casualties\nor accidents and of goodness as accessible to all and badness the\ndeliberate choice of the wilful. A few years ago a well-known publisher\nexposed a huge poster advertising his encyclop\u00e6dia. It was called \"The\nChild; What will he become?\" Two series of pictures were given, the\ntop line indicating the gradual ascent of the child fortunate enough\nto read the encyclop\u00e6dia. By easy stages he passed through the Sabbath\nschool, emerged into the business office where he accumulated wealth\nand a cheerful countenance, he ascended into the paradise of benevolent\nbaldness and appeared in the final picture a happy patriarch breathing\nout blessings and probably platitudes at every pore. Contrasted with\nthese series, the bottom line pictorially followed the awful fate\nof the child who did not read this wonderful work. He deteriorated\nrapidly, first a pickpocket, then a forger, finally a murderer, and\na drunkard all the time. This is the classic exaggeration of the\nunscientific view actually held by some well-meaning reformers. And\nif we ridicule this discredited theory of life why do we not frankly\ndisavow the hopeless \"reforms\" which are the natural product of this\nhaphazard view? We accept the doctrine on which Eugenics is based\nbecause all the facts conform it, but we continue to spend our time\nand money on methods of reform which have lost their root and now only\ncumber the ground.\n\nThe \"points\" of an animal have for ages been the subject of the\nbreeders' successful efforts, but they are not more certainly inherited\nthan are the form of a man's head, his stature, the colour of his\neyes, and the length of his life, all of which are hereditary like the\ncolour of a horse, the scent of a flower and the shape of an apple.\nNaturalists no more than farmers can with exactness predict that 173\nlive lambs will be born on one farm, that every flower of the same\nclass will give equally abundant perfume, or that every fruit on the\nsame tree will weigh just the same to an ounce. We are still more\nignorant or at least equally ignorant about the exact results in a\nparticular instance of the character of the individual offspring\neven when we are reasonably well acquainted with all its antecedents.\nWe can say with certainty, however, as Dr. Karl Pearson says that\n\"of all the children of a definite class of parents like A and B we\ncan assert that a definite proportion will have a definite amount of\nany character of A and B, with a certainty as great as that of any\nscientific prediction whatever. I am not speaking from belief or from\ntheory but simply from facts, from thousands of instances recorded\nby my fellow-workers or myself. Here is a great principle of life,\nsomething apparently controlling all life from its simplest to its most\ncomplex forms, and yet, though we too often see its relentless effects\nwe go on hoping that at any rate we and our offspring shall be the\nexceptions to its rules. For one of us as an individual this may be\ntrue, but for the _average_ of us all, for the nation as a whole, it is\nan idle hope. You cannot change the leopard's spots, and you cannot\nchange bad stock to good; you may dilute it, but until it ceases to\nmultiply, it will not cease to be.\" (National Life from the Standpoint\nof Science.) The reformer sees in these facts the basis of his highest\nhopes as certainly as he sees therein the condemnation of all attempts\nat reform which ignore these bed-rock truths. Permanent maintenance\nof good standards, gradual elimination of the hopelessly bad stock,\nand experimentation designed to utilise all the good elements on the\nborder line between the desirable and the undesired--this is the\nEugenist's programme in the immediate present. His ideal goes beyond\nthis practicable programme, for the Eugenist aims at some final\njustification of Nature. Without worshipping Nature he desires to\nunderstand her processes and walk in harmony with her tendencies.\n\nThe most potent of all the beneficent influences in the organic world\nhas been the law of Natural Selection. By \"Law\" of course we merely\nmean the observed invariable sequence of events, and whether or not\nthis universe has a guiding Intelligence behind it, the \"survival of\nthe fittest\" has taken its course by means of this particular law or\nprocess. It is impossible to deny that this selection has more often\nbeen instinctive than conscious. It is easy to predict that conscious\nintelligent selection may produce as real an improvement in the human\nrace as has been obtained in the animal and vegetable kingdoms where\nman has so long directed the survival of the desired or elimination of\nundesired \"points.\"\n\nPatience, study, discrimination and courage are the principal weapons\nin the Eugenic armoury. With these qualities assured Eugenics may be\ntrusted in the long run to outdistance all other competitors in the\nfield of race improvement. Study is a _sine qua non_, because Eugenics\nmeans Probability based on Experience, and the more extensive our\nresearches the safer our generalisations will be. Patience is needed\nbecause unlike other cures Eugenics will help the individual less than\nit will assist society, and it will always place the interests of the\nrace first and foremost. Accordingly its cures will not be apparent in\nthe current generation. This may discourage the unthinking, it will\ntire the hand-to-mouth reformer, the superficial will dismiss the\nwhole thing as useless. Wisdom in discrimination will be essential\nbecause sometimes \"the stone which the builders reject\" has a way of\nbecoming \"the headstone of the corner.\" But when we have ascertained\nbeyond reasonable doubt the qualities we want to preserve and the\ncharacteristics we desire to eliminate we must be courageous in the\napplication of our remedy.\n\nWe look not only at the worst but also at the best when we ask\nourselves can the Race be improved? The highest type of man known to\nmen must be our model. We must constantly and actively believe that\nwhat man has been man may be. If mankind be truly one we are linked to\nthe Grants as well as to the Guiteaus, to the saviours as well as to\nthe assassins of society. Our kinship with the lowest must make us more\nmerciful, our kinship with the highest may make us more ambitious to be\ncontented with nothing short of the best.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VI\n\nEDUCATION AND EUGENICS\n\n\nA healthy wave of reaction seems setting in against the old ideal\nof \"cramming\" which once masqueraded as education. Already signs\nare apparent that in order to have a healthy mind a healthy body is\nnecessary. A sentiment in favour of physical education is slowly\narising and may some day be translated into statutes and administrative\nrule. At present the sentiment is a vague one and is not wholly free\nfrom the suspicion of ulterior motives connected with national defence.\nIt cannot be gainsaid that the army and navy will gain in strength\nand efficiency by the improvement of the racial physique but the same\nforces might be equally increased by some new discovery in aviation,\nsome new invention in machinery or some new combination in explosives\npeculiar to America. Methods of education must justify themselves\nfirst and last by their conformity to the physical, and moral and\nintellectual needs of the human basis of society. They must not be\ndevoted to the development of a healthy manhood only, the interests\nof the race demand that healthy womanhood shall be the care of any\ntruly national system of education. Until we have built up the body\nwe are little likely to succeed in creating a race of pure-thinking,\npure-living men and women. This is the universal need. Higher\neducation, the highest intellectual culture is for the few, not for\nthe wealthy few--but for the proved fit, for those whose antecedents\nand character show that their brain is capable of receiving and their\npowers are capable of using a fully developed education which would\notherwise be a ridiculously wasted acquisition.\n\nThe intellectual education of the future will probably average a\nhigher standard than at present but we must revise our criterion of\njudgment. We must realise that our current ideals tend rather towards\nmaking a nation of priggish inefficients than of happy, healthy home\nbuilders.\n\nIf our teachers have aimed in the past at cramming comparatively\nuseless knowledge into every brain independent of individual capacity,\nit is not strange that our educational faults have been to neglect\nthe physical side and to ignore the vital teaching which might have\nled our scholars in the direction of their own physical development.\nThese two things must inevitably stand or fall together. If you neglect\nphysical training it will be because you do not realise its importance.\nIf you realise its importance you will not only devote your principal\neducational efforts towards its universal practice in the schools\nbut you will see that nothing is left undone to induce the young to\nadopt in the privacy of their own lives the principles which make for\nphysical perfection.\n\nHeredity and environment alike teach this lesson. The child is father\nto the man, the parents of to-morrow are now being made. The weak\nshould learn early their limitations, the strong should be taught how\nbest to economise their strength. No Eugenist believes in over-emphasis\nof sexual knowledge, but every Eugenist believes in the absolute\nimportance of early familiarity with the essential information of\nsex-life. To emphasise this knowledge would mean being guilty of the\nsame _kind_ of error as is at present prevalent. A knowledge of the\nlaws of sex should never be separated from other physiological and\nmoral education, its acquisition should be gradual, its full meaning\nshould be so well prepared for that its physical manifestations in the\nyouth of both sexes would be understood, without the necessity of a\nsudden jump from abysmal ignorance to overwhelming experience.\n\nCo-education, the schooling together of boys and girls until puberty,\nis a step in the right direction. It familiarises children with each\nother in quite the best and most innocent manner; it is no more likely\nto create evil results than the daily life at home of the perfect\nfamily of boys and girls meeting under the protection of their own\nparents.\n\nCo-education renders unnecessary that departing into separate schools\nwhich is so mysterious in early life. It aims at giving girls the\nbenefit of boys' play, encouraging them in the boys' code of honour,\nand tending to prepare them for a citizenship they have to share\nwith the boys whom they may even now regard as \"chums.\" For boys the\nfamiliarity with girls' ways and girls' characteristics will help\nthem to be courteous without being weak and to lose that shamefaced\nsex-consciousness which is the opposite to a healthy knowledge of the\nexistence of another sex.\n\nIn the early years of infancy only the parents can impart information\nabout sex to their own offspring, and generally speaking only the\nmother will be the desirable source of information. This in itself\njustifies the necessity of the Eugenist demand for educationally\npreparing girls for motherhood. In the nursery the time for teaching\nintimate things may be left to date itself. The earliest questions of\na child fix the time when the earliest information must be given. When\na child asks questions you either tell him the truth or a lie. The\ntruth can be told so delicately that no one need blush to repeat it.\nA lie may be directly more indelicate and in its future results may\nbe a source of deadly demoralisation. Children ask about the \"secret\"\nof birth when a baby brother or sister is born. Their questions and\nour answers are a frequent subject for jest, when the only reasonable\nexcuse for our failure to impart accurate knowledge is either our own\nunfitness to teach, or our child's incapacity to understand. If the\nfirst is not incurable it should be the object of immediate study with\na view to reform. The incapacity of youthful intelligence to grasp\nelementary facts is greatly exaggerated, but anyhow it is no excuse for\ndeliberate deception. The immature mind can wait for knowledge, its\ndevelopment need not be prejudiced before it begins to know anything.\nIf we cannot feed it on facts at least do not fill it with falsehood.\n\nOn entering school the children are introduced to a person whose\nprofession is to teach. How easy now it would be to obtain a child's\nconfidence, how easy to lead a child to believe that there is no\nhidden knowledge, no subject which is taboo, no function of a healthy\nbody which is unhealthy, and no process of Nature which cannot be\nmade an interesting and helpful study. To impart an unnecessary sense\nof shame to a child is a shocking outrage from which a sensitive\nsoul never recovers. Exceptional children will require exceptional\ncare but the average child need never know from experience the\nmeaning of sexual shame. Healthy boys and girls will learn that as\ntheir parents made them they will one day themselves qualify for all\nthose joys, pains, excitements and interests which are so intimately\nwrapt round the functions of parenthood. To prepare boys and girls\nto become parents may seem a big proposition. I am convinced it is\npracticable, desirable and in the best interests of the race. The human\nrelationship, the human parentage, the human processes should be the\nfoundation of natural history lessons. Botany and biology should be\ninteresting because of their relation to humanity. Information about\nthe human processes of life and sex should not be made contingent on\nthe possibility of divulging it in scattered fragments incidental to\nremarks on the habits of polar bears or the functions of the stamen\nand pollen of the flower.\n\nOn this subject at least there is no possibility of permanent secrecy.\nThe plan for Eugenic school-teaching is only a plea for the wise,\ndiscreet well-timed truth from a capable and trusted source, against\nindiscreet and often indecently ill-timed half-truth from the worst\nsources. Children need to be informed, warned and helped.\n\nWhy should it be regarded as indecent to give kindly warning against\ndisease? Children are often over sensitive about fancied or discovered\ndifferences between themselves and other children, and about natural\ndevelopments or even small defects which the uninformed mind magnifies\ninto first-class abnormalities. They would often be reassured by\nlearning of the enormous varieties which can exist within the average\nand the normal. Children should neither be frightened by the well-meant\nexaggerations which sometimes are used to warn children and growing\nyouth from the very real evil results of self-abuse, nor should such\nevils be encouraged by a prudish ignoring of the possible danger.\nMasturbation can be shown to stand in the way of all that youth rightly\nvalues in its present happy school life and play, it can be proved\nto prevent the accomplishment of what every healthy school ideal\ndemands as the future functions of maturity. Restraint is impossible\nbecause onanism is essentially a secret vice, and therefore when\nthese appeals to reason, idealism, self-respect, and self-interest\nfail everything fails. Fear is opposed to the very basis of school\nhonour. If the nobler motives are inadequate the physician is required\nrather than the teacher, for there is a pathological reason for such\nabnormal minds. The danger of contracting sexual diseases must be very\ncarefully taught. The body must be saved but the soul must not be\nsimultaneously lost. Sexual disease problems must not be mixed up with\nsexual morality, or we shall pervert the noblest part of youth. Sexual\ndisease should be referred to, like all other sexual questions, as\nincidental to the whole subject of the body and its functions, abuses\nand diseases. The idea that any disease may justly be regarded as a\nfitting \"punishment\" for any particular crime, is as evil in its effect\nas it is vicious in its principle. To encourage the notification of\nevery disease, especially the worst, is a public duty we can only evade\nat enormous cost in innocent lives. Grappling with the sexual scourge\ncalled syphilis is horribly hindered by the reticence, concealment and\nshame, directly or indirectly to be traced to a mistaken ethic about\nNemesis.\n\nTo prepare children for parenthood involves finding a reasonable regard\nfor fatherhood as well as for motherhood. No system of economics that\nrelegates fatherhood to unimportance is good for the State. The boy\nmust learn that the father has responsibilities, different from the\nmother's but worthy of his own very best. Fortunately the pages of\nhistory teem with illustrations of this theme for those who desire\nexamples and warnings from the past, it may even be necessary to point\nout that the father's function has been over valued in our annals as\ncompared with that of the still more important but less praised mother.\nInasmuch, however, as the mother's function is so much more continuous\nthan the father's, the perpetuation of such degree of perfection as a\nboy is endowed with must be secured by constant vigilance, lest he fail\nin the one great act which earns the right of giving his name to his\noffspring.\n\nThe Eugenic education of girls is generally easier than that of boys\nfor many reasons. Girls see more than boys of the management of a home,\nthey are used to children younger than themselves, they are fond of\nbabies and will nurse dolls for an amusement, deriving much pleasure\nfrom a pastime fraught with Eugenic suggestiveness. Later on certain\nsigns of adolescence precipitate explanations and stimulate inquiry.\nThere is no need for any restrictions of the facilities women enjoy\neducationally. As with boys the best education should be given to those\ngirls who show capacity for using it. It has never been claimed that\nculture should be withheld from a man, as inconsistent with fatherhood;\nmotherhood must not be made an excuse for denying education. The safest\npolicy is to make preparations for Life independent of preparations\nfor a Career. The don and the bluestocking have to live, so have the\ncowboy and the cook. All must have the universal knowledge whereby\nthey may serve their race as healthy parents of healthy children, even\nthough the college, the study, the ranch and the kitchen have their own\nparticular technicalities to be mastered by the interested individuals.\n\nOf study in general Eugenics will find much to say. It is impossible\nto neglect any branch of knowledge. The human will no less than human\nnecessity presses forward in every direction. We may be like King\nSolomon surrounded by material wealth and possessions, but, like him,\nif we are forced to choose between them and knowledge, the noblest\nthing within us will cry for knowledge. We must learn to discriminate\nbetween knowledge-values, and endeavour to frame our study-time so\nthat even the least of us may be encouraged to learn all that we\ncan. For those who can rapidly digest huge continents of study the\nprizes of scholarship are assured. It is not in the interests of\nEugenics that knowledge should be acquired with this rapidity by those\nconstitutionally unfitted for the strain. An educational system devised\nfor men may not necessarily be suited to women equally anxious to\nknow and willing to give as long a period to study. It may be found\npracticable on Eugenic grounds to give more facilities than we do for\nbroken studies, for studies which go slower and last longer, and for\nstudies where the honours are not given to those who can cram most in\nthe least time.\n\nIt is impossible for any view of Eugenics in relation to education to\nignore the terrible danger of child-labour. Economic consideration of\nthis subject is common enough; it is time that Eugenics made its voice\nheard in denunciation of a system which cannot fail to demoralise the\nrace if persisted in. The energy of a growing youth is required for\nbuilding up his own constitution, and if his early labours are spent\nin occupations inconsistent with physical development he becomes a\nstunted weakling from whose loins we cannot expect the issue of a noble\nrace. In the case of girl-labour the trouble is intensified, partly\nbecause the occupations of young girls are mostly of a description\nrequiring a bodily posture which works untold evil in their future\nhealth and fitness. Needlework, laundry-work and typewriting are cases\nin point. Housework, with which every young girl should be familiar at\na reasonably early age, becomes an intolerable check to womanly growth\nwhen overdone. Factory life and \"home\" labour are equally objectionable\nwhere children are forced by parental pressure, or the exigences of\neconomic circumstance to earn bread for themselves or to contribute to\nthe family sustenance.\n\nI close this chapter abruptly, fully realising that Eugenic zeal has\ncarried me beyond any narrow view of elementary education, and will\ninevitably lead the nation into economic controversy. The history\nof all reform encourages us to persevere. Neither fears of expense,\nnor metaphysical considerations of parental duty, nor sentimental\nobjections to State intrusion have prevented a nation (when faced with\na foreign foe) pledging all its resources, taking sons from mothers and\nhusbands from wives, and using land, railways and stores to prosecute\na war deemed necessary for national defence. I am convinced that we\nhave only to realise the national danger and we shall heartily follow\nthe Eugenic lead, even if it costs us the price of a fifth-rate war.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VII\n\nEUGENICS AND THE MODERN FEMINIST MOVEMENT\n\n\nEugenics is not essentially concerned with the right to vote nor\nis Eugenics specially interested in such abstract questions as the\nrelative voting qualifications of the sexes. If these things really\nweighed at all Eugenics would naturally favour fitness instead of sex\nas the qualification for electoral enfranchisement. At present Eugenics\nviews the feminist movement from the point of view of political power\nas a means to national efficiency. This standpoint is the more natural\nbecause there is every reason to believe that while the objective\nof the feminist is nominally Votes for Women it is actually an\nassertion of woman's all-round equality with men. I believe it will\nbe a perilous enterprise, fraught with grave danger to the State if\nwomen successfully organise as a sex-party, prepared to study every\nquestion from the special interests or supposed interests of women.\nHowever much this definite policy may be repudiated it is a genuine\ndanger, to which a prolonged suffrage agitation is bound, ostensibly\nor unintentionally, to contribute. It is to the interest of all who do\nnot take a sex-party view of citizenship to abbreviate this struggle.\nIt seems illogical, unnatural and undesirable that there should be\na sex-basis of citizenship rights. All deprecation of anything even\nremotely approaching a sex-war is an argument for the acknowledgment of\nWomen's claim to electoral equality with men. It is incredible that the\nmere extension of the franchise can create a revolution; a revolution\nis historically rather to be expected from refusing the suffrage to a\nclass containing intelligent, capable law-abiding adults.\n\nLet us not deceive ourselves, however, as to the real meaning of\nthe claim for women's electoral emancipation. Whether that demand\nis granted or not the moral and intellectual driving-force of the\nagitation comes from a genuine reforming spirit, which will succeed\nwith or without the vote in elevating woman to a position more worthy\nof civilisation than she has hitherto occupied. So much is certain to\nthose who recognise in Mrs. Chapman Catt, Dr. Anna Shaw and the English\nSuffragettes the inspiration of Mary Woolstonecraft, the radical\npioneer who first said \"Woman must be free.\" A conspiracy of men to\nhinder women's emancipation might provoke a sex-war, the granting of\nsuch freedom as women claim can only end in mutual honour. Women will\nlearn to realise and respect the differences between men and women when\nthose differences do not wear the unmistakable taint of inequalities.\nThe Eugenists' hope is for a peaceful solution, for the peace of the\nhome is the hope of the child. The child is apt to be forgotten when\nmen and women quarrel.\n\nThere are undoubtedly many property questions mixed up with the\nelectoral claim, and the former have a genuine Eugenic side to them.\nIt is not in the interests of the race that mothers should be in any\ndoubt as to their immunity from financial worry during child-birth\npains, or that they should have to consider any merely sordid question\nin deciding whether or not a perfectly healthy mother should increase\nthe nation's stock of perfectly fit citizens. The position of a wealthy\nman's wife in the present day is often an anomalous one. Where the\nhusband was rich at the time of his wedding, marriage-contracts usually\nprotect the wife's interests to some extent. In the much commoner\ncases of gradually increasing wealth, of wealth coming unexpectedly\nor as the result of years of protected operations, the wife depends\nabsolutely on her husband's good will. Often enough her exertions have\nhelped to find this fortune. Her influence on his life is frequently an\nindispensable asset. Her care of the children she has borne give her a\nsentimental claim which justice cannot ignore. It is intolerable that\nhusbands becoming rich men should be entitled to speculate and gamble\nwith the whole of what should be considered the joint capital of the\nfamily, without obtaining the consent of the actual working partner.\nHe should be at liberty neither to \"deal\" unauthorisedly with what\nmight be considered the family's share of his fortune, nor to alienate\nby testamentary legacy anything beyond a fair proportion away from\nthose who have the first claim upon his goods. In order to defraud his\ncreditors or for less criminal reasons a man has often used his wife\nas a convenient banker. It will be easier to check this species of\ncheating when the wife herself becomes a creditor.\n\nIn the poorest circles where man and woman are equally destitute\nof worldly wealth this woman's property question is too inseparably\nmixed with the whole economic problem to be stated solely in terms of\nEugenics. Eugenics does not profess to point out the lines on which the\nproblem of poverty is to be solved. Eugenics only says that certain\nconditions (inconsistent with destitution) have to be observed if we\nwant the race to improve and to save the nation from absolute decay. It\nis up to our politicians to find the means by which these conditions\ncan be observed. A nation converted to the gospel of Eugenics will not\nboggle at providing the means for saving itself.\n\nMiddle-class women have a genuine grievance which is becoming\narticulate. The women-workers claim equal wages for equal work, and\nmarried women claim wages for the work they perform as housekeepers,\nnurses or cooks, or all three. If there is anything at all in the idea\nof attracting the best workers by high wages the women will win. It\nwill be a misfortune to Eugenics if for any monetary reason the best\nwomen are attracted to commercial careers rather than to domestic\nduties, but women-workers will succeed by combination while wives will\nwin only if legislation favours them. Legislation must and will be\nforthcoming to prevent the comparative attractiveness of motherhood\nfrom sinking still lower in the scale than at present.\n\nThe most important question which many suffragists are preparing to\nface is to whom shall women look for their support. There is of course\nfor the daughters of the rich an inheritance which places them above\nthe vulgar struggle which ninety per cent. of our women have to face.\nFor this great majority the alternatives to State-maintenance are\ngenerally speaking marriage or the labour-market. There is much to be\nsaid for the State-provision of maintenance for motherhood, which is\nelsewhere referred to. The principle is neither new nor revolutionary.\nMost States make some provision of the kind, and this State-provision\nis often excellent in efficiency but frequently quite demoralising in\nthe restrictions with which it is hedged. Obviously with no Eugenic\ninspiration State-helps of the kind can never be anything but a\nstop-gap which self-respecting women will not seek voluntarily and\nwhich will always be given grudgingly. Its conditions will no longer\ndegrade but will tend towards race improvement by encouraging the fit\nand warning the weak and diseased. For this double purpose the State\nwill employ ladies to visit poor mothers so as to make sure that at\nleast no mother shall want for food, shelter and the best medical\nattention, while she is assisting in what will be universally regarded\nas the highest and best interests of the nation. If State-subventions\nof this kind are beset with restrictions, what are we to say to\n\"charitable\" enterprises. Some few are ideal institutions, the vast\nmajority are only justifying their existence by doing badly what\nwould be otherwise left undone. Some exist merely because medical\nstudents must have some experience of maternity cases, sometimes the\naccommodation for mothers is so scanty compared with the number of\nstudents that many score of students attend a single mother, whose\nexperience in such a case is not an enviable one.\n\nNeither charity nor the present limited State-aid touch the larger\nquestion. It would almost seem as if the State and the charities had a\ngrudge against motherhood. It is as if some monstrous misunderstanding\nof Malthusianism had led these authorities to believe that the\ninterests of the race demanded the accentuation of the primal course.\n\"In sorrow,\" indeed, do the poor \"bring forth children.\" There is a\nprejudice too against the noblest emotions of motherhood. Cases are\ncommon where the relieving authorities, public or voluntary, faced\nwith the absolute inability of a parent to contribute towards a child's\nkeep, undertake the child's care under conditions which exclude\nthe parents' continued interest in the child's welfare. A mother\nunexpectedly widowed is \"relieved\" of her four young children who are\nsent sometimes to different orphanages, often at a distance from the\nmother who loves them and who would be their very best guardian. She\nhas to find work amongst strangers to support herself, while losing\nmoney every \"visiting day\" if she can anyway get to see her children,\nwhose aggregate keep costs actually more than would comfortably\nmaintain them and their mother under ideal conditions. It is this\nalmost fiendish masculine administration of the maternal functions of\nthe public authorities which women most vehemently protest against.\nThere seems no remedy for it except a recognition that a man cannot be\na mother, not even a step-mother.\n\nApart from the maternal side of woman's life there is her individual\nlife to consider, and while this is of enormous importance to herself\nits chief interest to Eugenists (as such) is that only out of healthy\nand happy conditions of womanhood can a noble motherhood be expected to\ngrow. Slave-mothers are apt to breed slave-children, and still worse\nfor the race slave-women are disinclined to become mothers. It is of\ncourse unfair to see no distinction between slavery which professes\nno fine sentiment towards its chattel objects, and the refined system\nwhich places woman on a pedestal and worships her but denies her the\nelementary rights of citizenship. The Eugenist ideal of marriage is the\nunion of equality, two citizens joining together in love and wisdom\nand with such sanction of the State and the Church as may be, with\nresultant harmony of life and its fruit in an increase of the truest\nwealth any State can possess, namely well-conceived, well-formed, and\nwell-matured men and women.\n\nIn the Eugenist State there will be a determined enmity to the\nincreased generations of the criminal, the weak-minded and the\ndiseased. But if reform is forced on women by men, instead of being\nthe spontaneous decision of a genuine democracy, the grossest tyranny\nwill be perpetuated (however wise its object, humane its methods and\nEugenic its result). A benevolent despotism might be endured in its\ndisposition of the issues of war, the production of wealth, or the\ndistribution of honours, nothing but the sovereign will of the people\ncan be tolerated in the Eugenic field, and here if nowhere else woman\nbeing essentially concerned must have an equal voice with man. Where\nwomen cannot be convinced that Eugenic reform is in the interests of\nthe race we must trust to personal persuasion, individual example and\nsuch public opinion as we are capable of influencing. The powers of\nthe State must not be invoked in the face of popular protest, it will\nbe to the interests of Eugenists that such protest shall be able to\nexpress itself in the ballot-box instead of by surreptitious evasion or\nmob-law.\n\nThe double standard in morals must go. Whatever our standard may be\nit must be colour-blind as regards sex. The modern feminist movement\nis in harmony with Eugenic science, in insisting on this point being\nmade clear. For ages past masculine hypocrisy has been able to exact\nfrom the opposite sex a crushing worship of Mrs. Grundy, by the simple\nexpedient of ruling men out of the conventions they dictated to women.\n\nThe time has come for a candid reconsideration of moral problems on\nthe basis of sex-equality. It may be that some fine sentiments will\nvanish, perhaps women will descend from the dizzy height where they are\nsupposed to dwell. Truth at least will gain, pretence will give place\nto reality and we shall be capable of postulating a new and better\nmorality based on the essential facts of life. To the consideration\nof the best possible life for men and women must be added the Eugenic\nclaims of the race. We live and die but the race continues, heirs of\nour perfection, inheritors of our defects. We pass, but we must think\nof those to whom this heritage passes. The strong woman mated to the\nstrong man is proud of a posterity which will do them honour. The\nwoman-movement aims at removing the obstacles to this endeavour. The\ntragedy of the woman's life is when either her own or her husband's\nunfitness to bear anything but a tainted stock is disregarded by law,\ncustom and the brutality of lustful bestiality. She who might be, as\nshe desires to be, the guardian of the nation's truest interests, is\noverpowered and compelled to be the medium of national pollution. This\nknowledge strengthens the women's agitation; the determination to end\nsuch a shameful degradation makes the women's movement irresistible.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VIII\n\nPOSITIVE AND NEGATIVE EUGENICS\n\n\nThis little volume would sadly fail to convey its author's meaning if\ndogmatism stood in the way of persuasion, or authority seemed to be\nclaimed for the tentative suggestions herein outlined. There is no\nimmediate danger that Eugenic principles will suddenly rush society\ninto extreme action. The probabilities are quite in the opposite\ndirection. We shall continue to see what has always been observed\nby thinkers, namely, \"Decency and custom starving truth, and blind\nauthority beating with his staff the child which might have led him.\"\nValuable experiments are delayed by prejudice, and Eugenists have\nonly too good ground for complaint that the scientific spirit is\nthwarted by prejudiced opposition to new ideas. The very absence of\ndogmatism which characterises the genuine thinker serves as the basis\nof opposition in his experiments. Because he does not glibly guarantee\nuniversal success like a patent-pill advertiser nothing whatever is\ndone to obtain a criterion of judging how far his reasonable proposals\ncan succeed. The failure of all other attempts to improve the race may\nforce upon the public the necessity of Eugenic experiments. As has been\nsaid more than once, philanthropy has failed, politics has failed,\nrescue work has failed, perhaps Eugenics may not fail, for it is based\non the impregnable rock of science, it proceeds on the sound lines of\nprevention, it aims to start at the beginning of things, to build up a\nnew race if not of supermen at least of sound healthy human beings.\n\nThe lethal chamber is _not_ a Eugenic remedy. It is the last\nheart-broken despairing cry of the old unscientific system. It is\nthe only final alternative to Eugenics. It means that man has failed.\nIt has neither sense, sentiment, nor science for its justification.\nIt substitutes murder for moral method. Eugenics on the other hand\nstarts out with the principle that there is nothing so sacred as life.\nThat the lethal chamber for the aged, diseased, infirm, and unfit is\nbarbarous and immoral, that it is utterly indefensible, and would be\nabsolutely ineffective if not ridiculously impracticable. There is\nnot much need to waste further consideration on a project from which\nevery healthy citizen naturally revolts. It has to be categorically\nrepudiated lest it should be mistakenly regarded as a Eugenic proposal.\n\nAbortion and infanticide are equally condemned by Eugenists, although\non different grounds. Infanticide is murder. It destroys the life of an\nactual human being. Infanticide, though doubtless less reprehensible in\ndegree than the lethal chamber idea, is in principle indistinguishable\ntherefrom. It is the antithesis to the idea of Eugenics. The state\nwhich can contemplate child-murder without horror is far indeed\nfrom being a humane State. Sensitiveness to suffering is a sign of\ncivilisation. Wherever we find a live human being, however hopeless\nits condition may appear, universal experience has shown us that man's\nadvance from savagedom depends on his using all his resources to save\nthe final spark of life which remains. \"While there's life there's\nhope\" is a maxim which is based on the greatest need of mankind.\nEugenics deplores waste of effort that this entails, but there can be\nno doubt about its rightness or its justification by the universal\nconsensus of progressive races. Abortion may be condemned on religious\nand moral grounds, but the overwhelming weight of medical opinion\nagainst it is based on physiological reasons. No woman can be guilty\nof this practice without the greatest risks of physical damage.\nShe jeopardises her life immediately and she generally deteriorates\nher capacity for future usefulness. Eugenics will find a sphere of\nusefulness in the spread of this piece of saving knowledge. Unmarried\nmothers and mothers in all spheres of society are terribly ignorant\nof the dangers of this common death-trap. The mere fact that the sale\nand procuration of drugs and use of means for purposes of abortion are\ncriminal acts is not sufficient. The idea is prevalent that it is only\nthe police who have to be evaded. Our laws are not empiric, but their\nreason is seldom apparent to those who are expected to obey them. A few\ndrugs, or a few pills--how easy it all seems--and how fatal. Eugenists\ndo not want the law altered, but they want the added deterrent of\nreason. There may be a chance of evading the law, there is none of\nevading the bodily injury which inevitably accompanies abortion.\n\nI have already shown that Malthusian arguments do not appeal to\nEugenists. This is not to say that Malthusian methods are also\ncondemned. Malthusian prognostications have not been fulfilled, its\nstatistics have been superseded, and its conclusions modified by the\nprocess of the suns. The world does not contain too many people, it\nonly contains too many of the wrong sort of people. Production has not\nonly kept pace with population, it has raced it. Intensive cultivation,\nnew treatments of the soil, scientific rotation of crops and scientific\nagriculture rendering rotation unnecessary, new economic inducements\nto cultivate hitherto waste lands, discoveries and inventions of\nall kinds have taken away from Malthusianism the unduly pessimistic\nphilosophy with which it once tried to frighten the race. Malthusianism\nwill always be remembered with gratitude, however, for its practical\nmethods and for its refusing to confuse marriage with procreation. That\ndistinction still needs to be borne in mind because otherwise half\nour Eugenic efforts will be wasted by directing ourselves to a problem\nwhich does not exist. It is impossible to assail the proposition\nthat a moral married life is consistent with a prudential check on\nincreased population. This prudential check need not necessarily be\na material one. Even a Tolstoyan may be a married man. Abstinence in\ndue season in the case of normal adults is or may be Nature's plan for\nincreasing virility at other seasons. The most prolific parents may be\npardoned for resting occasionally from their protracted persistency of\nrace-production. Eugenists object to weakening virility by sacrificing\nfitness for mere numbers, but it is in the essence of their demand\nthat the race shall, \"increase and multiply and replenish the earth.\"\nThe objection (which Eugenists share with the majority of the American\npublic) to anything remotely resembling infanticide must have some\ndefinite proof of its sincerity. Eugenists denounce the New Decalogue\nof current morality which says:\n\n  \"Thou shalt not kill,--but needs not strive\n  Officiously to keep alive.\"\n\nThe Eugenist does not desire to detract from the responsibility of\nparenthood, but rather to increase it. On the other hand whatever\nsteps may be taken against neglectful, vicious or unnatural parents,\nthe race interests demand that the child shall not suffer. A new\nresponsibility must be added to parentage--the parent of the race is\nthe State, which must be vigilant to protect the child from the faults\nand follies of fathers who fail in their most essential duties. A child\nshould be guaranteed loving parents or failing these a never failing\nfoster-parent, in a paternal State.\n\nIn the recognition of its duties as Step-mother, the State will in\nself-defence protect its maternal arms from the influx of undesirables.\nThe universal endowment of Motherhood may be a socialist dream\nrather than a Eugenic practical proposal, but even the Eugenists'\ndemand for the State to act as step-mother involves an expenditure\nwhich will probably amount to the cost of a national war. It is part\nof our case that the money spent is an investment certain to pay big\ndividends in the shape of increased national efficiency. It is in\nany case inevitable. Public sentiment cannot tolerate this idiotic\nwaste of the noblest of all raw material. It will be not the least of\nits advantages that the State will at length be directly interested,\nfinancially and therefore most deeply, in stopping the supply of the\nunfit--a bad investment at the best, requiring a maximum of trouble,\nand a continuous source of damage. The sterilisation of the unfit has\nbecome a regular experience in a number of States. It has outlived its\ndetractors wherever it has been practised. It remains necessary now\nonly to convert its objectors in other States, and to gradually extend\nits beneficent operation and the sphere of its activities. Naturally it\nbegins with the habitual criminal. Of absolute success in the States\nwhere it has been tried it will be far more effective when it is\napplied in the more populous centres and when it becomes impossible for\nthe permanently criminal to escape its attention. Sterilisation as now\nrecommended and performed by our highest scientific authorities is in\nno sense cruel, it is not even painful. It must not be confounded with\nthe mutilations of earlier centuries, it leaves the person operated\non possessed of every faculty for use and capacity for happiness, it\nonly takes away the power of reproduction. The first extension of\nthe plan has been to the certified hopeless idiot. These two classes\nand the inmates of homes for incurable drunkards represent a very\neasy definition of those who should be treated to this operation.\nIn the case of the criminal it will enable very great mercy to be\nextended. Sterilisation will not be a mere added infliction of a\ndegrading punishment, it will substitute an awful warning for a long\nimprisonment. Only those criminals will be sterilised whose chronic\ncriminality is proved after repeated convictions and form a study of\nwhat facts are ascertainable as to their hereditary history. They\nwill leave the jail knowing that society regards them as unworthy to\nbe parents, or if they themselves are also too dangerous to be let at\nlarge their close confinement will be rarely necessary.\n\nThe Eugenist does not propose to extend the operation of sterilisation\nbeyond the classes above mentioned. It does not, however, regard these\nas exhausting the categories of undesirable procreators. Already\nthere are numerous suffering and semi-cured adults whose children\nwould inherit the diseases, weaknesses, and evil tendencies of their\nancestors. Tuberculosis, syphilis and St. Vitus's Dance sufferers\nare specimens of this class. As Eugenics advances we may learn more\nof the racial poisons, and a scientific black-list may be drawn up\nof those hereditary taints which inflict most harm on the community.\nDoctors should have to notify the authorities of these diseases\nand the patient should be encouraged to frankness and helped to a\ncure. In all such cases kind but firm warning must be given against\nprocreation. The failure to heed such warning should inevitably result\nin imprisonment--a very short term will suffice, for with Eugenics\nestablished as a rule of society, the State could afford to be patient.\nThe elimination of the unfit would make rapid strides, and the\noffspring of tainted parents evading the law in one generation would be\nless and less likely to escape in the next generation.\n\nIt may be that the State will be contented with the negative side of\nEugenics. It may be that it is the more important because we are\ndaily increasing the elements which if not checked will destroy our\ncivilisation. Negative Eugenics is as imperative a necessity as the\nprotection of our coasts from invasion or the destruction of potato\nblight.\n\nPositive Eugenics represents the attempt to encourage breeding from\nevery healthy stock. Its methods will vary with the views of society\nfrom time to time. Its machinery will be by State-interference or by\nprivate experimental enterprise according as socialist or individualist\nideals are current. I do not wish to commit Eugenists who are by no\nmeans agreed on this point, but my personal view is that individual\nexperiments cannot possibly go far beyond public opinion, whereas, \"the\nState can do no wrong\" if it endows, undertakes and is responsible\nfor experiments limited in extent but far reaching in principle, so\nlong as such experiments are based on scientific probabilities and\nare supported by enlightened competent judges and do not outrage the\nhumane sentiment of the race. Drastic individual experiments, involving\nhowever few people, will always be subject to interference at critical\nmoments by mobs, governments, vigilance societies, etc. It is not wise\nto ignore this factor; it is not necessary even to deprecate it; nay,\nit has its advantages. The omnipotence of the State rests not merely in\nits power of arms; a State experiment, even though not initiated by the\npeople, can be stopped by the people. The electors' power ultimately to\ninterfere makes for tolerance.\n\nWhile drastic experiments must be left to democracy acting through its\nelected governors, there is ample scope for other features of positive\nEugenics. One of these is the endowment of worthy young couples too\npoor otherwise to marry. The ideal of celibacy stands self-condemned.\nWhere successful it means race-suicide, where unsuccessful it means\nhypocrisy and a thousand other horrors. What then can we think of the\nfact that millions of dollars have been spent in endowing monasteries,\nnunneries, brotherhoods and all the other ancient and modern forms of\ncelibate stultification of probably perfectly potential parents. Add\nto these millions the other millions spent in endowing the worst and\nleast capable in prisons, asylums and in often demoralising charities.\nThen bear in mind that the endowment of the healthy for Eugenic\npurposes, for the regeneration of mankind, is absolutely unknown. A\nmillionaire who loves his kind could scarcely do better with his money\nthan the establishment, under proper supervision, of a fund which would\nencourage human efficiency. There is no fame so lasting as the glory\nwhich would attach to such a fund. It would be greater than a Nobel\nname, its prizes would be more keenly competed for than for \"Marathon\"\nor \"America\" cups. Its winners would become a new aristocracy, and\nfor the first time in the history of the world noble families would be\nfounded on a blending of ancestral and personal merit, aristocratic,\nindeed, because the best become personally powerful, but absolutely\ndemocratic in that neither class, caste nor creed are allowed to\ncount in the selection. From this aristocracy a new knighthood might\nbe formed. Degeneration would mean exclusion. Improvement would mean\nincreased honours. New standards of efficiency, mental, moral and\nphysical, would be evolved for the guidance of the race. An American\nmodel of this kind would speedily find imitators abroad. The real\nstruggle for race supremacy would be concentrated on the Eugenic\ngroups. Competitions, challenges and contests between national\ngroups might eclipse in interest all the other exhibits in future\nInternational Expositions.\n\nThe daily work of Eugenic education is independent of these short\ncuts to the Eugenics millennium. The dissemination of ascertained\nfacts about heredity is urgently necessary. It may be news to many\nthat there are hundreds of institutions throughout our land where\naccurate information has been carefully collected for many years.\nThe antecedents of inmates of prisons, asylums and \"homes\" have\nbeen patiently scheduled, classified and studied. Only money and\npublic interest are wanted to make this vital information known.\nInvestigations of this kind need also to be made universal. It is\nnot enough that institutions should relieve the present sufferers.\nThey can only justify their existence by contributing to our desire\nfor the eradication of suffering. It should be made a condition of\npublic support that the most useful kind of inquiries should be\nmade, and be placed at the disposal of all who are interested. It is\nuseless throwing pages of undigested statistics at the public, this\nis mere waste of effort. With the facts and figures in existence and\naccessible, centres of scientific study such as a Eugenics laboratory\nshould be, will be able to present to the public the living issues\nwhich those dead figures mean. It would, however, be contrary to\nthe spirit of Eugenics to confine attention to the sadder side of\nstatistics. It is of infinite importance that we should understand and\ncultivate fitness, and therefore we want the systematic collection of\nfamily histories relating to our noblest, best and worthiest. Here\nState-interference is out of place. Voluntary work on the part of\nenthusiastic Eugenists would soon succeed in obtaining information\nof great value. Few families would refuse to impart through private\nchannels ancestral facts, particularly as the mere inquiry would\nimply a compliment. The Chinese worship of ancestors would have a\nmodern scientific interpretation, in the honour which would be won by\nthe founders of fine families, a study of whose history would be an\ninspiration and a help to the race.\n\nThe advocates of Eugenics are prepared for small beginnings but\nthey have enormous faith in its future. There is no desire and no\nneed to exaggerate the present tentative claims. To the many it is\nstill necessary to ask for the intellectual hospitality of impartial\nconsideration. Even to the convinced we only appeal for judicious\nexperiment. To the religious our work comes as a harmonious exercise of\nthe best with which the Eternal Will of the Universe has endowed us.\n\nTo the evolutionist Eugenics represents the study and expression of\nNature's plan. To the humane our work appeals as it assures mankind of\na curtailment of human suffering. We lay new laurels on graves of the\nhonoured dead and write new epitaphs glorifying the ancestors of the\nworthy living. We reverence the cradle containing the hope of the race,\nwe think of past and present as the womb of the future.\n\n\n\n\nAPPENDIX A\n\n_Maternity Maintenance, or State Subventions to Mothers_\n\nMEDICAL ATTENDANCE\n\n\nFirst and foremost comes the need for qualified medical and nursing\nattendance on the mother and the newly born infant. At present many\nmothers go almost unattended in their hour of need; many tens of\nthousands more have attendance that comes too late, or is quite\ninadequately qualified; hundreds of thousands of others fail to get the\nnursing and home assistance that is required to prevent long-continued\nsuffering and ill-health to mothers and children alike. The local\nhealth authorities ought to be required to provide within its area\nqualified medical attendance, including all necessary nursing, for all\ncases of child-birth of which it has received due notice. There is no\nreason why this should not be done as a measure of public health, free\nof charge to the patient, in the same way as vaccination is provided\nfor all who do not object to that operation; and on the same principle\nthat led to the gratuitous opening of the hospitals, to any person\nsuffering from particular diseases quite irrespective of his means.\nWhat is, however, important is that the necessary medical attendance\nand nursing shall _always_ be provided. If the community prefers to\nrecover the cost from such patients as can clearly afford to pay--say,\nfor instance, those having incomes above a prescribed amount--instead\nof from everybody in the form of rates and taxes, this (as with the\npayment for admission to an isolation hospital) may be an intermediate\nstage. In one way or another, there must be no child-birth without\nadequate attendance and help to the mother.\n\n\n_Pure Milk_\n\nAt present many tens of thousands of infants perish simply from\ninanition in the first few days or weeks after birth. In town and\ncountry alike many hundreds of thousands of families find the greatest\ndifficulty, even when they can pay for it, in buying milk of reasonable\npurity and freshness, or in getting it just when they require it, or\noften indeed in getting it at all. The arguments in favour of the\nmunicipalisation of the milk supply are overwhelming in strength. But\nan even stronger case can be made out for the systematic provision\nby the Local Health Authority, to every household in which a birth\nhas taken place, of the necessary quantity of pure, fresh milk, in\nsealed bottles, delivered every day. Whatever else is left undone, the\nnecessary modicum of pure milk, whether taken by the mother or prepared\nfor the child, might at any rate be supplied as the birth-right of\nevery new-born citizen.\n\n\n_Maternity Pensions._\n\nThe next step must be the establishment of a system of maternity\npensions free, universal, and non-contributory. If they be not\nuniversal, they will come as of favour, and be open to the objections\nrightly urged against all doles, public or private. A contributory\nscheme could only exist as part of a universal sick fund. If the\ncontributions were optional the poorest mothers would get no pension\nat all. If they were compulsory on a fixed scale, the scheme would\nstill further impoverish those it is intended to benefit. If the\ncontributions were on a sliding scale, the pension would be smallest\njust where it is most necessary. To work out a pension scheme on the\nbasis of compensation for loss of the mother's earnings would at once\ninvolve a sliding scale such as is in force in Germany and Austria,\nwhich would be unfair in the working, and benefit the poorest least.\nMoreover, the theory is fallacious, inasmuch as it views the woman as\na worker and not as a mother. Let the pension be regarded rather as the\nrecompense due to the woman for a social service, second to none that\ncan be rendered. The time will come when the community will set a far\nhigher value on that service than it does at present. But at present\nthe main point is to tide the mother over a time of crisis as best we\nmay.\n\nHow long should the pension last? The average duration of a maternity\ncase inside a hospital appears to be a fortnight. The normal period\nduring which upper class mothers keep their beds is three weeks, but\nfor some time after leaving bed, the mother is incapable of any active\nwork without harm to herself. Many internal diseases and nervous\ncomplaints as well as a good deal of the drinking among women, have\ntheir origin in getting about too soon. For some weeks at least,\nwhether the mother nurses her baby or not, she requires much more than\nordinary rest and nourishment. These considerations apply also, though\nin a less degree, to the period preceding confinement.\n\nUnder the law of Great Britain, the period of enforced cessation from\nfactory work is four weeks. The same period is prescribed in Holland\nand Belgium. In Switzerland the period is eight weeks.\n\nThese laws, though of great value, are often cruel in the working, as\nthey deprive the woman of wages without compensation just at the time\nshe needs money most. The result is they are often evaded. Germany\nand Austria have recognised this. In Germany women are forbidden to\nwork for six weeks after confinement. But the insurance law of Germany\nprovides women with free medical attendance, midwife and medicine,\nand in addition with an allowance not exceeding seventy-five per\ncent of her customary wage for the six weeks. There is further a\nprovision that pregnant women unable to work should be allowed the same\namount for not more than six weeks previous to confinement. A similar\ninsurance system exists in Austria and Hungary. In some parts of\nGermany, the municipality still goes further. In Cologne, the working\nmother is given a daily grant to stay at home and suckle her child,\nand visitors see that this condition is fulfilled. The Cologne system\nhas been adopted by some municipalities in France. In Leipsic, every\nillegitimate child becomes a ward of the municipality, which puts it\nout to nurse with certified persons who must produce it for inspection\non demand.\n\nThese provisions enable the government of Germany to enforce the\nlaw against the employment of women in the last period of pregnancy\nwithout hardship to them. The compensation given to German mothers is\nalready felt to be insufficient, but there is a difficulty in making\nit more generous arising from the fact that the system is a scheme\nof insurance; the benefits cannot be increased without a rise in the\ncontribution. In a free pension scheme, this difficulty will not occur.\nA small beginning might be made by way of experiment to familiarise the\npublic with the advantage of caring for maternity, with a knowledge\nthat its scope could be extended indefinitely without dislocation of\nthe scheme. But the period like the amount must be substantial even at\nfirst. If the pension is to have any permanent value it should extend\nover a period of at least eight weeks: about two weeks before and six\nweeks after the date on which the birth is expected to take place.\n\nThe above is a brief resum\u00e9 of the essential features of the British\nFabian Society's scheme for the Endowment of Motherhood. In \"Fabian\nTract No. 149\" (from which these extracts are made) $2.50 per week is\nsuggested as a reasonable maternity allowance.\n\n\n\n\nAPPENDIX B.\n\n_Sterilisation of the Unfit._\n\n\nThe State Legislatures of California, Pennsylvania, Oregon, Indiana\nand Connecticut have already passed measures to secure this object. On\nFebruary 10th, 1907, Indiana passed the following act:--\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\n\"An Act entitled an Act to prevent procreation of confirmed criminals,\nidiots, imbeciles, and rapists--providing, that superintendents or\nboards of managers of institutions where such persons are confined\nshall have the authority, and are empowered to appoint a committee\nof experts, consisting of two physicians, to examine into the mental\ncondition of such inmates.\n\n\"Whereas heredity plays an important part in the transmission of\ncrime, idiocy, and imbecility, therefore, be it enacted by the General\nAssembly of the State of Indiana, that on and after the passage of\nthis act, it shall be compulsory for each and every institution in the\nState entrusted with the care of confirmed criminals, idiots, rapists,\nand imbeciles, to appoint upon its staff, in addition to the regular\ninstitution physician, two skilled surgeons of recognised ability,\nwhose duty it shall be, in conjunction with the chief physician of\nthe institution, to examine the mental and physical condition of such\ninmates as are recommended by the institutional physician and board of\nmanagers.\n\n\"If in the judgment of this committee procreation is inadvisable and\nthere is no probability of improvement of the mental condition of the\ninmate, it shall be lawful for the surgeons to perform such operation\nfor the prevention of procreation as shall be decided safest and most\neffective. But this operation shall not be performed except in cases\nthat have been pronounced unimprovable.\"\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nIn August, 1909, the Connecticut State Legislature enacted the\nfollowing:--\n\n  \"An Act concerning operations for the prevention of Procreation.--Be\n  it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives in General\n  Assembly convened:\n\n  \"Section 1.--The directors of the State prisons and the\n  superintendents of State Hospitals for the insane at Middletown\n  and Norwich are hereby authorised and directed to appoint for each\n  of said institutions, respectively, two skilled surgeons, who, in\n  conjunction with the physician or surgeon in charge at each of said\n  institutions, shall examine such persons as are reported to them by\n  the warden, superintendent, or the physician or surgeon in charge, to\n  be persons by whom procreation would be inadvisable.\n\n  \"Such board shall examine the physical and mental condition of such\n  persons, and their record and family history so far as the same\n  can be ascertained, and if in the judgment of the majority of said\n  board, procreation by any such person would produce children with an\n  inherited tendency to crime, insanity, feeble-mindedness, idiocy,\n  or imbecility, and there is no probability that the condition of\n  any such person so examined will improve to such an extent as to\n  render procreation by such person advisable, or, if the physical or\n  mental condition of any such person will be substantially improved\n  thereby then the said board shall appoint one of its members to\n  perform the operation of vasectomy or o\u00f6phorectomy, as the case may\n  be, upon such person. Such operation shall be performed in a safe\n  and humane manner, and the board making such examination, and the\n  surgeon performing such operation, shall receive from the State such\n  compensation, for services rendered, as the warden of the State\n  prison or the superintendent of either of such hospitals shall deem\n  reasonable.\n\n  \"Section 2.--Except as authorised by this act, every person who shall\n  perform, encourage, assist in or otherwise promote the performance\n  of either of the operations described in Section 1 of this Act, for\n  the purpose of destroying the power to procreate the human species:\n  or any person who shall knowingly permit either of such operations\n  to be performed upon such person--unless the same be a medical\n  necessity--shall be fined not more than one thousand dollars, or\n  imprisoned in the State prison not more than five years, or both.\"\n\nIn California, in 1909, the legislature passed a statute which provides\nthat whenever in the opinion of the medical superintendent of any State\nhospital, or the superintendent of the California Home for the Care and\nTraining of Feeble-minded Children, or of the resident physician in\nany State prison, it would be conducive to the benefit of the physical,\nmental or moral condition of any inmate of such home, hospital or\nstate prison, to be asexualised, then such superintendent or resident\nphysician shall call into consultation the General Superintendent\nof State Hospitals and the Secretary of the State Board of Health,\nand they shall jointly examine into all the particulars of the case,\nand if, in their opinion, or in the opinion of any two of them,\nasexualisation will be beneficial to such inmate, patient, or convict,\nthey may perform the same.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThe British Commissioners in Lunacy in their 63rd Report to the Lord\nChancellor, 1909, briefly reviewing the Report of the Royal Commission\non the care and Control of the Feeble-minded, say:\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\n\"The Royal Commission devoted much attention to the causation of\nmental defect, and arrived at the conclusion that feeble-mindedness is\nlargely inherited; that prevention of mentally defective persons from\nbecoming parents would tend to diminish the numbers of such persons\nin the population; and that, consequently, there are the strongest\ngrounds for placing mental defectives of each sex in institutions where\nthey will be detained and kept under effectual supervision as long\nas may be necessary. Public opinion would not, the Royal Commission\nthink, sanction legislation directed to the prevention of hereditary\ntransmission of mental defect by surgical or other artificial measures,\nand they regard restrictions on the marriage of persons of unsound mind\nas inadvisable, in view of the fact that this form of mental disability\nis often of a limited or temporary character. As respects, however,\ncongenital and incurable forms of mental defect, no such considerations\napply, and the only remedy is to place persons so suffering under such\nrestrictions as to make procreation impossible. The Royal Commission\nwere evidently much impressed by the evidence they received, which we\ncan from our own experience amply corroborate, of the large number of\nweak-minded women and girls to be found in the work-houses throughout\nthe country, who go there to be delivered of illegitimate children,\nand they invite your Lordship and the Secretary of State for the Home\nDepartment to consider whether the existing law provides adequate\nprotection for mentally defective persons against sexual crime and\nimmorality....\n\nSterilisation of men can be effectively achieved by simple vasectomy or\nsection of the vas deferens, and of women by the almost equally simple\nand harmless method of ligature of the Fallopian tubes (Kehrer's method\nas advocated by Kisch). It would appear that both these operations may\nbe effected by skilled hands in a few minutes with a minimum of pain\nand inconvenience, and they possess the immense advantage that the\nsexual glands are preserved, and no organ removed from the body.[1]\n\n(1) It is probable, also, that the method of sterilisation by X-rays\nmay some day acquire practical importance. In this case there is no\noperation at all, though the effects do not last for more than a few\nyears. This might be an advantage in some cases. See _British Medical\nJournal_, August 13th, 1904; ib. March 11th, 1905; ib. July 6th, 1907;\nib. August 21st, 1909.\"\n\n[Footnote: 1] (Havelock Ellis in the \"Eugenics Review,\" London, Eng.)\n\nAccording to Dr. Havelock Ellis Swiss alienists are unanimously in\nfavour of the sterilisation of the mentally degenerate classes and hold\nthat this matter should be regulated by law. Switzerland is the first\nEuropean State which has adopted sterilisation as an alternative to the\n\"indeterminate sentence\" in the case of confirmed abnormalities and\nprisoners convicted of serious sexual offences against children. At\nWil in Berne, two women and two men were incarcerated in the cantonal\nasylum. All were defectives but not strictly speaking insane. Children\nhad already been born in each case. To prevent further procreative\ndegeneracy sterilisation was suggested and agreed to by the four\npersons who welcomed the operation as an alternative to detention. The\nresult has justified the experiment. According to the _Eugenics Review_\nthere has actually been a marked change in the characters of the\nindividuals and there is certainly no danger of their weaknesses being\nreproduced at the expense of the coming generation.\n\n\nTHE END\n\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\n\nTranscriber Notes\n\nThere is a quotation which begins on page 133 but there is no endquote\nin the text. It is assumed that the quotation ends on page 136 after\nthe date August 21, 1909.","title":"Race Improvement; or, Eugenics: A Little Book on a Great Subject","tradition":"philosophy-ethics","translated_text":null,"word_count":20647}