ToC
In every nation individual capacity varies within wide limits. We have men and women of brilliant attainments, and of all grades of intelligence ranging downwards to the mentally defective. There is no doubt that all grades of intelligence can be improved by education, but there appears to be a limit to the capacity of development of each individual. Lower intelligence, therefore, is not only due to lack of opportunity, but to an inborn constitutional defect.
Further study has shewn this defect to be hereditary—the parents or grandparents of such people shew defective intelligence, and their offspring are likely to do the same; indeed, if two mentally defective people marry it is fairly certain that their children will all be mentally defective.
There are, however, no sharply defined classes of intelligence; just as the mentally defective are in many grades, so ordinary men and women vary from low or average intelligence up to outstanding cases of genius or capacity.
By the newer methods of mental testing it has been shewn that children of various classes of the community, as well as men and women of different races, can be grouped according to their intellectual capacity, and that no educational facilities will develop that capacity beyond a certain point.
Professor W. McDougall, F.R.S., in his most useful and interesting book onNational Welfare and National Decay, reaches the important conclusion "that innate capacity for intellectual growth is the predominant factor in determining the distribution of intelligence in adults, and that the amount and kind of education is a factor of subordinate importance." He claims that the evidence is overwhelming as to the validity of the results obtained by mental testing.
A few examples of experimental work given in Professor McDougall's book will suffice to show the trend of these results.
Tests of intelligence were carried out on recruits for the American Army, white and coloured, and they shewed marked superiority of the white race.
A special test was carried out in Oxford by Mr. H.B. English, who compared the capacity of boys in a school attended bychildren of the intellectual classes with that of boys in a very good primary school, whose fathers were shop-keepers, skilled artisans, etc., coming from homes which were good, with no sort of privation. The result showed marked superiority of the sons of intellectual parents. Mr. English concludes that the children of the professional classes, between 12 and 14 years of age, exhibit very marked intelligence, and he is convinced that the hereditary factor plays an altogether predominant part.
In another experiment, Miss Arlitt, of Bryn Mawr College, tested 342 children from primary schools in one district, who were divided into four groups:—
Group 1Professional.Group 2Semi-professional and higher business.Group 3Skilled labour.Group 4Semi-and unskilled labour.
Marked differences between the groups were shewn. The intellectual capacity was represented by figures as follows:—
Group 1125Group 2118Group 3107Group 492
A further research of 548 children, grouped according to the occupation oftheir father, gave its results in terms of the percentage of children in each group who scored a mark higher than the median for the whole 548. They are as follows:—
Professional group85%Executive group68%.Artisan group41%Labour group39%
In the "Journal of Educational Psychology," Vol. IX, 1916, Mr. A.W. Kornhauser gives evidence from the examination of 1,000 children drawn from five schools in Pittsburgh.
Schools A and B were attended by children of unskilled manual workers.
Schools C and D by children of skilled artisans and small shopkeepers.
School E by children of parents in very comfortable circumstances.
The results are tabulated as—
Retarded,i.e., below average.
Normal,i.e., average.
Advanced,i.e., above average.
Retarded.Normal.Advanced.A Manual workersB45.236.747.155.97.77.4C Artisans, etc.D29.428.850.250.220.719.5E Most comfortable12.762.724.6[A]
[A]I am indebted to Professor McDougall's book for information here given.
[A]I am indebted to Professor McDougall's book for information here given.
These experiments all shew the trend of intelligence (and with it will power or power of concentration, and what we may call general capacity) to be more concentrated in the so-called higher grades of society, and to be less and less evident as we descend in the scale from skilled to unskilled workers. It would, of course, be clear to all that the children of mentally deficient parents can only be a burden on the State or can rarely contribute anything of value to the common weal.
Now the teaching and advocacy of methods of conception control is most easily assimilated and practised by the intelligent classes; indeed, we may say with certainty that such methods can only be used effectively by the intelligent members of the community, such as leisured, professional and mercantile classes, skilled artisans and better class workers, whereas the lowest type of casual labourers whose home conditions render the use of preventive methods difficult or impossible, and the mentally deficient and criminal classes, are unaffected by such teaching.
The result in a few generations must be a marked decrease in the numbers of theintellectual and efficient workers, while the hopelessly unfit continue to produce their kind at the same rate as before.
The figures given do not suggest that individuals with marked ability are to be found in the upper classes only, but they do indicate that there is a larger proportion of boys and girls in the more comfortable classes whose inherited ability is above the average, though this may be partly due to the more intellectual atmosphere in which their early childhood has been passed.
The provision of education for all, with facilities for children of every class to pass on to higher grades of work, is essential if the latent powers in all, whatever they may be, are to be developed to the utmost.
The point for our consideration at the moment, however, is that if the production of all capable workers, whether mental or manual, is to be curtailed and the numbers of the population maintained in greater proportion from the mentally deficient or criminal classes, the result must be national disaster. For in a very short time there will not be enough leaders of real capacity to occupy positions of initiative andresponsibility in the various activities of the country at home and abroad, nor will there be an adequate supply of good practical work: a lowered standard of efficiency must result. From a national point of view, therefore, we regard the propaganda in favour of conception control to be a real and increasing danger.
The problem of the mentally deficient is of another order. In this case another kind of control is urgently needed, but it is one which can only be undertaken by the State, and not by the individual. It is to put in force such a method of compulsory segregation as would ensure the comfort and contentment of the mentally deficient, and safeguard them and the nation from the reproduction of their kind.
The problem also of the insane and criminal classes in relation to heredity is one which demands careful consideration by those competent to give it.
ToC
1. There are certain women who for medical reasons should be prevented from bearing children.
2. There are couples with undesirable inheritance who rightly decline to bear children.
3. There are many women of the poorer classes in whom child-bearing is sometimes the last straw in circumstances all of which tend to destroy health and vitality.
4. Public teaching on contraceptives, like medical advice advertised in newspapers, is generally applied to cases for which it is unsuitable and applied in the wrong way.
It is therefore detrimental to public health as well as being detrimental to public morality.
5. A public opinion in favour of small spaced families does not serve the best interests of the children or of their mother.
6. Married love should express itself at once in the usual way without the use of artificial contraceptives.
7. The diminishing fertility of the more capable classes is a national peril.
To counteract this tendency every encouragement should be given to the intelligent and efficient classes of the community to bear healthy children.
The study of problems which give rise periodically to a propaganda in favour of the practice of conception control reveal the fact that excessive child-bearing is found in those classes who suffer the greatest privation, and in whom large families are a real hardship, while many couples among the well-to-do are childless though greatly desiring children.
Such facts suggest that the true remedy for the general problem lies in raising the standard of living among working-class mothers and advising a more simple life to the more richly endowed.
8. It is desirable that the Government should make provision for methods which will arrest the propagation of the mentally deficient, insane and criminal classes.