Evidence of a Feeble MindFrom "The Village of a Thousand Souls," Gesell, American MagazineEvidence of a Feeble MindA dirty shack in a mud hole in the country is merely another reflection of the same condition that causes the slums of the city. In our glowing spirit of humanity we cry out to raise up "the submerged tenth." Rather, should we not stamp them out of existence—treat them as a menace, and not as a thing of pity?Men, in general, rise; their minds are subjectively or objectively educated to their mental limit. They cannot go beyond it. "The submerged tenth" exists because its mental limit is low—often close to the upper margins of feeble-mindedness—and because it is mentally incapable of rising to anything else.
From "The Village of a Thousand Souls," Gesell, American Magazine
A dirty shack in a mud hole in the country is merely another reflection of the same condition that causes the slums of the city. In our glowing spirit of humanity we cry out to raise up "the submerged tenth." Rather, should we not stamp them out of existence—treat them as a menace, and not as a thing of pity?
Men, in general, rise; their minds are subjectively or objectively educated to their mental limit. They cannot go beyond it. "The submerged tenth" exists because its mental limit is low—often close to the upper margins of feeble-mindedness—and because it is mentally incapable of rising to anything else.
Evidence of a Vigorous MindFrom "The Village of a Thousand Souls," Gesell, American MagazineEvidence of a Vigorous MindThe family that is vigorous, healthy in mind and body, "up and coming," reflects itself in a hundred different ways. Small matter whether or not it is "an old family," has wealth, social position, a college education. A daughter's or a son's happiness, the real, deep-down-inside happiness that is worth while, may be more certainly insured by marrying with an eye to mentality and stock than by a marriage into a so-called "first family."Eugenics hath its reward.
From "The Village of a Thousand Souls," Gesell, American Magazine
The family that is vigorous, healthy in mind and body, "up and coming," reflects itself in a hundred different ways. Small matter whether or not it is "an old family," has wealth, social position, a college education. A daughter's or a son's happiness, the real, deep-down-inside happiness that is worth while, may be more certainly insured by marrying with an eye to mentality and stock than by a marriage into a so-called "first family."
Eugenics hath its reward.
Under an ideal system of education the child would be left absolutely free until the age of seven. We do not believe that the physical apparatus of the mind is prepared for educational interference before that age, and we know that the growth of the brain, physiologically and anatomically, is not complete until after the seventh year.
The greater portion of a child's education necessarily depends upon its environment. Heredity and environment, therefore, are the two factors which determine the characters of any living thing. Heredity gives to the child its potential greatness,—its promise of greatness. Whether these potential qualities ever become real depends upon environment. A child may have the hereditary (innate) ability to become a Shakespeare, but if his environment is not suitable to the development of this potential greatness, he will never realize his hereditary promise. In other words, the innate qualities which he has, and which will make of him a Shakespeare are never "drawn out" or educated. Hence he can never become great until environment furnishes the means to him.
Environment, including education, does not add to the potential qualities of inheritance. Education can only educate what heredity gives; it can give or add nothing itself; it simply educates what is there already. There is plenty of material, but it is not the right material. What educators want is the right kind of material—the material which the eugenists will eventually supply. Or as Mr. Havelock Ellis has expressed it:
"Education has been put at the beginning, when it ought to have been put at the end. It matterscomparatively little what sort of education we give children; the primary matter is what sort of children we have to educate. That is the most fundamental of questions. It lies deeper even than the great question of Socialism versus Individualism, and indeed touches a foundation that is common to both. The best organized social system is only a house of cards if it cannot be constructed with sound individuals; and no individualism worth the name is possible unless a sound social organization permits the breeding of individuals who count. On this plane Socialism and Individualism move in the same circle."
Education, then, as an exclusive factor, cannot achieve our ideal of race-culture. In order that education may achieve a large measure of success, it must have the proper material, and the right material can only come as a result of the working out of the eugenic principle. Then—in the aftertime—our educational efforts will not be wasted and misdirected, as they are almost wholly to-day.
If we could transmit our acquired characteristics, education would have a relatively smaller, and a much more fixed function in the "general scheme," but we cannot. We can only transmit what was inherent in us when created. This simply means that, at the moment of conception, the child is created,—it is a completed whole,—what it is to be is fixed at that moment, its inherent capacities are formed. Nothing can affect it, in this sense, after that moment. No act of either parent can have any influence on it. Whatever ability the father or mother possessed of an innate character is transmitted to the child at the instant of conception and that innate legacy constitutes the working instrument of the child for all time. It cannot be added to by education, or by environment, but both of these may have a large influence in deciding whether it will be developed to its highest possible limit of attainment.
Education, mental, moral and physical, is limited by this inability to transmit acquired character to the persons educated. Each generation must, therefore, begin, not where their parents left off, but at the point wherethey began. The same difficulties and the same problems must be met at the beginning of each generation.
The True Province of Education.—Education may justly be the instrument, however, which will educate public opinion to a true appreciation of the function of race culture. In this way the cause of the eugenist will greatly prosper, and the race will profit through the effort which will further the conservation of the best and most fit specimens for parenthood. So also may education, through the molding of public opinion, create sound opinion,—when each individual will be a center of eugenic enthusiasm. Especially does this responsibility fall upon parents and those who are in charge of childhood. The young must be taught the supreme sanctity of parenthood. They must be instructed in eugenic principles in a way that will impart to them the definite knowledge that it is the highest and holiest science. The eugenic education of children is the real beginning at the beginning, the indispensable necessity, if race culture is to assume its transcendent role in modern civilization. It is urgently necessary for both sexes but more especially for girls. "Urgently necessary," because, though Herbert Spencer wrote the following criticism nearly fifty years ago, the conditions are much the same to-day:—
... "But though some care is taken to fit youth of both sexes for society and citizenship, no care whatever is taken to fit them for the position of parents. While it is seen that, for the purpose of gaining a livelihood, an elaborate preparation is needed, it appears to be thought that for the bringing up of children, no preparation whatever is needed. While many years are spent by a boy in gaining knowledge of which the chief value is that it constitutes 'the education of a gentleman'; and while many years are spent by a girl in those decorative acquirements which fit her for evening parties; not an hour is spent by either in preparation for that gravest of all responsibilities—the management of a family. Is it that this responsibility is but a remote contingency? On the contrary, it is sure to develop on nine out of ten. Is it that the discharge of it is easy? Certainly not. Of all functions which the adult has to fulfill, this is themost difficult. Is it that each may be trusted by self-instruction to fit himself, or herself, for the office of parent? No; not only is the need for such self-instruction unrecognized, but the complexity of the subject renders it the one of all others in which self-instruction is least likely to succeed."
It must be our highest educational aim to cultivate or create the eugenic sense. In this way, and in this way only, may we feel satisfied that the foundation, upon which shall be erected the generations that are yet to come, will be of an enduring character.
"It is only because we are accustomed to this waste of life and are prone to think it is one of the dispensations of Providence that we go on about our business, little thinking of the preventive measures that are possible."Charles E. Hughes.
"It is only because we are accustomed to this waste of life and are prone to think it is one of the dispensations of Providence that we go on about our business, little thinking of the preventive measures that are possible."
Charles E. Hughes.
The Deaf and Dumb—The Feeble-minded—A New York Magistrate's Report—Report of the Children's Society—The Segregation and Treatment of the Feeble-Minded—What the Care of the Insane Costs—The Alcoholic—Drunkenness.
The Deaf and Dumb—The Feeble-minded—A New York Magistrate's Report—Report of the Children's Society—The Segregation and Treatment of the Feeble-Minded—What the Care of the Insane Costs—The Alcoholic—Drunkenness.
In order to achieve success in eugenics we must strive to encourage the parenthood of the worthy or fit, and to discourage the parenthood of the unworthy or unfit. The unfit are those, as previously explained, who, because of mental or physical disability, are unable to create fit or healthy children.
The Deaf and Dumb.—The condition known as deaf-mutism is due to innate defect in about half of all cases. Deaf children have one or two deaf parents or grandparents. There may be two or three such children in a family. That the deaf should not marry is generally conceded by those who work amongst them. It should be our aim to discourage the intimate association of the adolescent deaf and dumb in institutions. It has been found that such intimate association frequently results in marriage. They should be educated and instructed in the knowledge that they cannot marry. When they understand the eugenic principle upon which this social law is constructed they will be amenable to reason. No process of suasion will be necessary, however, if their intimate association is prevented.
The Feeble-Minded.—This includes the criminal, the imbecile, the insane, and the epileptic. The feeble-minded, technically speaking, belong to the degenerateclass. They enter life mentally deficient, not necessarily diseased. They should, therefore, be regarded as fit subjects for educational modification rather than for penal correction or punishment. It is conservatively estimated that there are five million feeble-minded people in the United States to-day and not one-eighth of them are receiving adequate treatment or education. Recent statistics, from various countries, show that the percentage of deficient or feeble-minded children is decidedly on the increase. According to a bulletin issued by the United States Bureau of Education (August, 1912) there are 15,000,000 school children suffering from physical defects which need immediate attention and which are prejudicial to health. It would seem as though the time had passed for anything other than radical measures in the interest of the race.
Apart from the eugenic fact that these feeble-minded children are not fit subjects for parenthood, they are a constantly contaminating influence on society morally, and are a detriment and a hindrance to social and economic advancement. One illustration of this contaminating process, which is of serious eugenic import, is the presence of these deficient children in our public schools. By reason of their lack of attention and concentration, their mental or psychic insufficiency, their moral delinquency, and uncontrollable instincts and impulses, they are a menace to the well-being and to the progress of the normal or fit pupils; they retard and undermine the discipline of the schoolroom, and they affect the efficiency of the teachers. They are allowed to stay in school because of the indifference of the authorities, or because of the influence and social standing, or political "pull" of the parents, despite the recognition of the injustice done. Many of the parents of these children seek medical advice but, because of absurdly inadequate civic or state provision for such cases, the physician is practically helpless. Most of these irresponsible children are allowed to wander through the years unrestrained and unprotected. They easily become the victims of vice and crime, and eventually they become degenerates and end their lives in insane institutions. Because of the stigmaof degeneration these feeble-minded individuals fall into the hands of the law and are thereby robbed of the medical assistance which society should afford them in the early years when improvement is yet possible.
The following report which recently appeared in one of the daily papers is interesting and suggestive in this connection. One of the New York City Magistrates, in his annual report, said: "There is growing up in this city a menacing army of boys and young men who are the most troublesome element we have to deal with.... From the ranks of these rowdies that are organized in bands, or bound up with chums or pals, come most of the crop of burglars, truck thieves, holdup men, gun-bearers, so-called 'bad men' and other criminals and dangerous characters. Without reverence for anything, subject to no parental control, cynical, viciously wise beyond their years, utterly regardless of the rights of others, firmly determined not to work for a living, terrorizing the occupants of public vehicles and disturbing the peace of the neighborhoods, they have no regard for common decency."
But it is to the records of the Children's Society that one must go for reliable statistics of the potential criminal, as there the only systematic study of their conditions is made and recorded by one of the greatest neurologists in the country, Dr. Max Schlapp, of New York. As a specialist in nervous diseases he has been connected with the Children's Society and the Children's Court, where he has had wide opportunities for observing the relation between delinquence and mental defectiveness. In cases of viciousness or feeble-mindedness exhaustive studies have been made by Dr. Schlapp. And the extent to which society is daily at the mercy of uncontrolled potential criminality is alarming.
"Feeble-minded children and feeble-minded men," says Dr. Schlapp, "are roaming about the streets of New York to-day as free agents. Parents are not compelled by law to put a feeble-minded child in custody. Yet that feeble-minded child unsuspected as such, amiable and care-free as he usually is, is potentially a criminal, and at any moment may commit a crime. That child is permittedto grow up without restraint, except such as the parents exercise, and this has no effect whatever in these cases. The child is allowed to marry and bring forth children of his own kind, more feeble-minded and more dangerous. There is no system designed to pick out from the community persons so afflicted, and no law whatever to prevent their untrammelled movements.
"The city street is a recruiting ground for thegangsterbecause it is full of defective children, mental and moral, who are potential criminals. This question has never been seriously considered. When brought under corrective restraint it has hitherto long been the custom to herd all the cases together while serving time. But in 1894 the German Government woke up to the fact that 3 to 7 per cent. of city children and those of isolated rural communities contain the 'moron,' or intellectually defective type, together with the moral imbecile."
Investigation showed recently that in a reformatory near Berlin 63 per cent. of the inmates were abnormal, while over 50 per cent. were seriously defective or menaces to society. This has since been shown to exist in all the leading nations—England, France, Italy, where, by the way, the Camorrist type is the equivalent for our New York gangster. In the Elmira Reformatory 38 per cent. are, as a rule, feeble-minded and consist of types that repeat their offense against society or commit some other crime.
There is only one way to prevent these types from becoming a menace. Restrain them while they are still developing; keep them from becoming free agents in the community they menace. Types continually come up in the Children's Society and the Children's Court. They are carefully studied. From the actions of the child, from his parents and family history, from the frequency with which he repeats some offense particularly pleasing to him, and by virtue of psychological tests and careful medical examinations the examiners are able to pick out children who should receive scientific care and treatment.
"The characteristics of the feeble-minded are usually deceiving. One expects to find them with low brows and furtive looks and more or less vicious in appearanceafter they develop criminal tendencies. One would expect them to show stupidity at a glance. On the contrary, they are sometimes bright on the surface, amiable, good-tempered under trying conditions, and almost likeable for their external social side. This is particularly true of the high grade defectives. The lower order may be taciturn, gloomy and retiring, and these traits may be noticed almost from infancy. But as they grow up their social nature may be developed, and they too may give the appearance of amiableness. One notable thing about them is their pose of frank innocence. In this they are engaging, and almost convincing.
"The street type that makes a gangster is practically the same if cruder in development. These children usually exhibit absolutely no sign of affection for their parents, no sympathy, and are notably cruel toward animals. One boy we had in the Children's Society persistently killed all the dogs and cats his family kept. Finally, when they ceased keeping the animals he got at the canary cage and killed the bird by pulling the feathers out singly. He had no compunction about lying, and looked you right in the eye when he lied. Otherwise he was charming and natural."
While moral insanity is hereditary, yet it can be produced in one generation. An alcoholic man with clean antecedents may leave tainted descendants. The only way to combat these conditions in the city is to have strict registration of all feeble-minded and insane. The state should discover them, examine them through public officials, and segregate them. Not only physicians, but school teachers and officials in public institutions should detect them. There should be in each state an institution for feeble-minded delinquents.
The history of the average "gangster" shows a taint of alcoholism. This is further aggravated by living under immoral surroundings, where petty crimes like stealing and lying are considered "smart." This is the starting point of the New York "gangster." He is handicapped, and under ancestral disabilities and the disadvantages of environment that is pernicious, he cannot get very far. A boy usually qualifies with a gang on hisown personality and tastes. He will often wander from one gang to another until he has found his particular atmosphere. The best will never find any one gang congenial enough to hold him, and he finally emerges a decent citizen. It is all a process of finding himself. The aim of the police should be to discount as much as possible any swaggering and false hero worship.
The time has come when this great nation should take national cognizance of this problem. There should be a national institution on some isolated island. Civilization is coming to recognize such a necessity. With a close eye on the tide of immigration and a careful segregation of these defective types, we should soon rid ourselves of what is now growing to be a serious menace to the home and the nation.
The Segregation and Treatment of the Feeble-Minded.—Dr. John Punton, of Kansas City, Mo., in an able and exhaustive article on "The Segregation and Treatment of the Feeble-Minded," writes as follows:
"Your attention is directed to a recent report issued by Wentworth E. Griffin, Chief of Police of Kansas City, Mo., in which he claims that recently within six months' time no less than 2,480 juveniles were arrested charged with crimes ranging from vagrancy to murder and that the majority of these boys and girls were not normal children, but degenerates who required medical rather than penal treatment. 'Boys and girls,' says he, 'should not receive correction in the city jails, the work house or reformatories. These should be the last resort. To correct a boy you must have an idea of his mental processes. It is natural that the parents understand something of the child and use that knowledge to make a good boy out of him. Certainly it cannot be done in the reformatories, for although the authorities there are competent, they are hardly medical psychologists. In my opinion, if any progress is to be made it is the parent and the doctor that must do the work, not the police and the courts.'
"That our Chief of Police deserves credit for not only publishing this report, but also for the advanced position he takes in recognizing the appropriate care and treatmentof the juvenile offender, is certain, for he understands the fact that the parents are often the chief culprits in the child's delinquency and that medical rather than penal treatment is more often indicated than is at present allowed or practiced.
"When we come to inquire into the cause of feeble-mindedness, alcoholic heredity, syphilitic heredity, and consanguineous marriages are found to be the chief etiological factors. Bourneville claims that 48 per cent. of the idiots and imbeciles are the offspring of alcoholic parents.... Acute and chronic diseases in the parents, fright, shock, injuries, parental neglect, faulty education, poverty, malnutrition, social dissipation and lack of proper control are all well-known factors in the production of feeble-mindedness.
"Segregation of the feeble-minded is advocated by medical authority the world over, and when this is done they can be made under appropriate medico-pedagogic treatment to become largely self-supporting.
"As an economical as well as a humane measure, the various States can well afford to make such provision, more especially for the large body of feeble-minded who are now without any medical care whatever. Moreover, where it is possible, laws prohibiting the marriage of such as well as all other defectives should be passed and enforced."
What the Care of the Insane Costs.—The total cost of the care of the insane, in this country, has been estimated to be $165,000,000 a year. In estimating the cost of the insane we must take into account the value or worth of each adult to the State. This value has been computed to be $700 a year. If, upon this basis, we count the adult membership of the insane class between the ages of eighteen and forty-five, we find that their worth is roughly about $132,000,000.
The cost of maintenance in the various insane institutions is about thirty-three millions of dollars a year. It would be quite possible to justly increase this total by estimating the worth of the help whose whole time is devoted to the care of the insane. If these individuals worked at some other trade or profession, their timewould. be of value to the state in general—not to a class who should be non-existent. The cost to the state of the potential criminal is not included in this estimate.
From the above figures it may be observed that it costs more to simply maintain the insane each year than it costs to work the Panama Canal; or to pay for the total cost of the Executive, Legislative and Judicial departments of our government. The total cost is more than the entire value of the wheat, corn, tobacco, and dairy and beef products exported each year from this country.
Alcoholic Drunkenness.—Alcoholism is a sign and a symptom of degeneracy and is a distinct indication of unfitness for parenthood. The only cure for alcoholism is to prohibit parenthood. It has been proved that alcohol taken into the stomach can be demonstrated in the testicle or ovary within a few minutes, and, like any other poison, may injure the sperm or the germ element therein contained. As a result of this intoxication of the primary elements, children may be conceived and born who become idiots, epileptics or feeble-minded. It is asserted that 48 per cent. of all the idiots and imbeciles are the offspring of alcoholic parents.
Recent experiments show that parental alcoholism alone can determine degeneration. Mr. Galton quoted the case of a man who, "after begetting several normal children became a drunkard and had imbecile offspring"; and another case has been recorded of a healthy woman who, when married to a drunkard, had five sickly children, dying in infancy, but in a later union with a healthy man bore normal and vigorous children.
Dr. Sullivan found on inquiry that:
.... "Of 600 children born of 120 drunken mothers 335 died in infancy or were still-born, and that several of the survivors were mentally defective, and as many as 4.1 per cent. were epileptic. Many of these women had female relatives, sisters or daughters, of sober habits and married to sober husbands. On comparing the death rate amongst the children of the sober mothers with that amongst the children of the drunken women of the same stock, the former was found to be 23.9 per cent., the latter 55.2 per cent., or nearly two anda half times as much. It was further observed that in the drunken families there was a progressive rise in the death rate from the earlier to the later born children."
Dr. Sullivan cites as a typical alcoholic family one in which the first three children were healthy, the fourth was of defective intelligence, the fifth was an epileptic idiot, the sixth was dead born, and finally the productive career ended with an abortion.
The nervous systems of many children of alcoholic parents are wrecked for life; many die in convulsions as infants. Many, however, who do not die, live as epileptics. This action of alcohol on the health and vitality of the race is the most serious of the evils that intemperance brings on the community. The tendency of all children of alcoholics is toward nervous disorders of a grave type.
Statistics show a very high rate of still-births and abortions among the children of drunken mothers, show that drunken women must not be permitted to become mothers.
Dr. Branthwaite in a lecture stated: "In my judgment, habitual drunkenness, so far as women are concerned, has materially increased, during the last twenty-five years, which I have spent entirely amongst drunkards and drunkenness. These people are not in the least affected by orthodox temperance efforts; they continue to propagate drunkenness, and thereby nullify the good results of temperance energy. Their children, born of defective parents, and educated by their surroundings grow up without a chance of decent life, and constitute the reserve from which the strength of our present army of habitual drunkards is maintained. Truly we have neglected in the past, and are still neglecting, the main source of drunkard supply—the drunkard himself; crippled that and we should soon see some good results from our work."
Dr. Fleck, another authority, says: "It is my strong conviction that a large percentage of our mentally defective children, including idiots, imbeciles and epileptics, are the descendants of drunkards."
Therefore the chronic inebriate must not become a parent.
"The real undermining of health is not seen. It is done in an insidious way. It has to be carefully ferreted out."Dr. Harvey W. Wiley.
"The real undermining of health is not seen. It is done in an insidious way. It has to be carefully ferreted out."
Dr. Harvey W. Wiley.
In the preceding pages we have written about eugenics as a science; it is our intention now to point out briefly in just what way eugenics directly concerns the mothers of to-day. In the first place let us try to appreciate what it will mean to the race if "the fit only are born." "Fit" children, it will be recalled, means children born healthy of healthy, selected parents, parents with a good ancestral history, conveying to their offspring a reasonably adequate legacy. If the "fit only are born" we start with a healthy stock. What a significant and tremendous advantage this is. At once we rid the world of the potential inefficients—the feeble-minded, the insane, the criminal, the deaf-mute, the drunkard. If we are correct in assuming that the reason why all former civilizations have failed and passed away, was because they bred a race of people physically and mentally unfit to survive, the demand of the eugenist that only "fit children shall be born" will strike at the very root of this evil. If we uproot the cause of racial degeneration we begin the building of a race that should not degenerate. If we establish a race that will not degenerate, it must gain strength and virility with each generation.
This assumption is logically correct, but we must do more than breed "fit" children. We must take care of them after they are born. We must furnish them with a good environment (see page3). Heredity without favorable environment counts for very little,—we must never forget that. Heredity and environment are the two important determining factors in the life of everychild born. If eugenics furnishes the heredity by ensuring the birth of the "fit" only, it depends upon the mothers of the race to provide the environment. Every mother must know how to take the best care of herself and of her child. This book is devoted to instructing her in the details of this duty.
We cannot hope, however, to reach this high altruistic plane by simply taking the first step in the right direction. We who are alive to-day must begin the work, and leave it to posterity to carry forward. We must do our part. Every mother must become an enthusiastic eugenist. If she begins to teach, and preach, and practise its principles now, she will contribute to the heredity of unborn generations. To those of us who are alive to-day, environment is the vastly more important consideration, for our heredity is fixed and beyond the power of control. The question of eugenics for the present generation, therefore, is a question of environment.
All our efforts must be directly in developing what heredity gives our children. We are wholly responsible for that. We must feed and clothe them properly; we must provide air spaces and playgrounds for exercise; we must educate them, and protect them from disease; and we must safeguard the birth of future generations by keeping our race stream pure. This is no small task, and the only way it will ever be satisfactorily accomplished is for each mother to realize her individual trust. The average individual does not realize the actual conditions that prevail. When recently the question of the public health was investigated by competent authorities, and the report furnished to the United States Senate, it caused a tremendous sensation. If that is possible in a body composed of men who are supposed to be intelligent and wide-awake to existing conditions, how much more significant and appalling it should be to the average mother whose interest is centered in her own home.
According to the statistics and statements given in that document the annual financial loss from needless deaths and accidents alone amounted to $3,000,000,000.
Acute diseases are held responsible for a large part of the loss. Chronic diseases are responsible for the greatest part of the waste of life, and they are believed to be increasing in their ravages. Minor ailments, believed to be nine-tenths preventable, are now costing the nation many dollars through incapacitation of persons and through leading to serious illness. Industrial accidents, largely preventable, are also exacting a heavy toll annually.
That this great waste of life and health and the national economic loss that results can be modified by national action is asserted. Here are to be found the reasons advanced for a great national department of health. The work of this department would be varied. It would include direct work in promoting health on the part of the government, such as administering the food and drug act; aiding the healing and educational agencies, both city and State; obtaining information concerning the cause and prevention of diseases, and disseminating scientifically proved information on all health subjects.
It is maintained that the movement for the conservation of health is the most momentous of the conservation movements in this country, and that of all the national wastes which are to be condemned, this waste of health is the gravest.
Many startling statements are set forth in the document. Dr. Charles Wardell Stiles, of the United States Public Health and Marine Hospital Services, declares that "The United States is seven times dirtier than Germany and ten times as unclean as Switzerland." He declares that: "Lack of interest in preventive measures against diseases is slaughtering the human race." He takes the position that the real trouble is not so much race suicide as race slaughter, and that it is rather that too many children are allowed to die than that not enough children are born.
It is estimated that tuberculosis, a preventable disease, costs the nations $1,000,000,000 annually. Typhoid fever is estimated by Dr. George M. Kober, dean of the medical department of Georgetown University, to cost over $300,000,000 annually.
In connection with acute diseases this statement is made: "The loss from tuberculosis has been reduced to half of what it was thirty years ago. Nevertheless, of the 90,000,000 people now living in the United States at least 5,000,000 will be lost through this disease because adequate effort is not made to prevent it. Besides the economic waste through deaths from any disease, the waste through sickness from the same disease is also colossal."
Great as are the reductions in the rates of infant mortality by improved milk and water supplies and by educational campaigns, the present rate is still enormous.
"If some witch or wizard could conjure up the unnecessary babies' funerals annually occurring in this country it would be found that the little hearses would reach from New York to Chicago. If we should add the mourning mothers and friends, it would make a cortége extending across the continent."
While the death rates from acute diseases have been greatly reduced, the rates from chronic diseases have been steadily increasing. Cancer is one of the chronic diseases apparently on the increase.
That the annual death toll and the 3,000,000 constant sick beds could be reduced from one-fourth to one-half by proper measures is asserted. In other words, there might be saved every day, as many lives as perished on theTitanic, with the consequent enormous economic saving.
These are surely impressive statements. It would seem as though it should be a simple task to pass a Public Health Bill, establishing a bureau in Washington, with a representative in the cabinet, whose sole duty it would be to preserve the public health. It has proved rather the reverse, however. We have been able to inaugurate various species of conservation,—of lands, of forests, of water,—but the conservation of human life is not important enough. Even though states and empires depend upon their people for their very existence, our statesmen feel that human life is too cheap, too common, to take immediate steps in this direction.
If women—especially mothers—would devotethemselves to the eugenic end of legislation, men would soon obey. The application of eugenics to the human species, coming, almost in the spirit of an inspiration, at the time when women are about to be enfranchised, is significant. It may be that destiny has decreed that the one shall be the complement of the other; it is certainly beyond contradiction that in eugenics the women of the earth have a divine weapon with which to wage a righteous and an awaking propaganda of truth.
A mother should be interested in every phase of the subject. Her daughter's success in marriage should intimately concern her. Her health and her happiness in that sphere should elicit her deepest maternal consideration. She may rightly hope to be proud of her daughter's offspring, and to find pleasure in the society of her grandchildren. She should, therefore, devote all her efforts to ascertain the truth, with reference to the physical and mental equipment of her future son-in-law; his ability adequately to support a family; his sobriety, his disposition, associates, etc., should all be carefully considered and pondered over. This is not going far enough, however; we must know positively that he is not diseased,—that he is not a victim of gonorrhoea or syphilis.
When parents weigh in the balance the possibility of a wrecked life, of destroying the right to have children, or of bringing them into the world blind or diseased; of permanently destroying the hope of happiness, peace, and success, no combination of advantages in a son-in-law is deserving of the slightest consideration. We are treating of the sacred things of life—of life itself. If parents combine to crucify and betray their daughters—to sell them body and soul into bondage for social or other advantages; if they preserve silence when they should speak and thereby take all the sunshine, for all eternity, out of one existence; then, if on their death-beds these daughters should accuse them, the guilty knowledge that they were responsible will be the sting that will blast their hope of peace and forgiveness here and in the worlds to come.
When mothers realize that, every day, in every large hospital in every city in the civilized world some woman(a daughter of some mother) is being unsexed because of these unjustly obtained diseases, surely their voices shall speak in no uncertain way.
Another eugenic suggestion that should deeply concern every good mother is, that the mother's milk is the private property of the babe, and whoever deprives the babe of this, the sole right it possesses, is not only a thief but a scoundrel. A curious and significant fact was discovered by investigators when studying the question of infant mortality a few years ago. It was found from a mass of statistics that there were two recent instances when the death rate of infants decreased suddenly and quite decidedly. The first instance was when the Civil War in this country caused a cotton famine in England. As a result of the famine the factories of Lancashire were all closed and the employees being then without work remained at home. As a large percentage of the workers were married women with children they had the time and the opportunity to nurse their children regularly. Despite the fact that these women were starved and badly clad and deprived of the comforts of home, the death rate of the infants dropped steadily to an unprecedently low mark.
A number of years later, when the German army surrounded Paris during the Franco-Prussian War the besieged inhabitants of the capital suffered from hunger and disease. The death rate of the adult population increased enormously while the death rate of the infants dropped markedly.
The explanation of this curious phenomenon was simply that while times were normal the women labored outside of their homes and as a consequence the babies were not fed regularly and when fed were not fed mothers' milk. It demonstrated a truth that we are apt to lose sight of, that mothers' milk, even the milk from badly-nourished, poverty-stricken mothers is infinitely better than an abundant supply of artificial food combined with neglect. In view of the fact that there is a distinct tendency to evade this maternal duty these facts should be suggestive and important. It is the duty of the mother with any eugenic sense to preach and to practisethis gospel. Paris learned the lesson of the siege because though she has the smallest birth-rate to-day, she nevertheless has the smallest infant death-rate of any large city in Europe.
The writer believes that in eugenics the women of the race have the instrument wherewith to save the world. He is assured that it is the supreme potential agency for the betterment of the race, and that mankind will never be inspired with a holier cause. He believes that through all the ages the human race has been growing better, coming nearer the truth, and that as a result of this patient progress, there has been evolved the eugenic idea that is to solve the problems of the human family. If the "fit only are born" think of the possibilities of education and of environment. Each child is born with a great potential promise, and endowed with a reasonably good heredity, the whole effort of that child will be toward a higher moral attainment. If the effort of the individuals of the race is to achieve a high moral success, the quality of the civilization of future generations will be far superior to the type with which we are familiar.
Eugenics gives to women the supreme civilizing instrument of the future. It places the burden of the morality of the home and of the race on their shoulders. If we deny the writing on the wall it does not render the warning negative. The signs of the times are epochal. The great political parties are realizing, for the first time in history, that new and important issues concerning the family, the home, and the children, in other words the nation's manhood and womanhood, must be considered and included in their platforms. They know that the time has gone when statesmen will exclusively decide what shall be done with the sons and daughters which women bring into the world. They know that the mothers of the race must have a voice in deciding for peace or war since they create every soldier that will lie dead when war is over. Women will help decide the question of taxation by government and by trusts, because they know that it comes out of their incomes and they need it all for their children. Women know that their cause is the cause of freedom, and freedom is thecause of the eugenist. They know that the function of government should be justice and no code of justice can have higher ethics than the ethics of eugenism.
Mothers' Eugenic Clubs.—There should be established in every community a mothers' eugenic club. The object of the club should be to further the eugenic idea. Papers should be prepared, read, and discussed on subjects having a eugenic interest.
One of the main aims of these clubs should be to interest the local Congressman and the member of the State Legislature in eugenics. In all probability they will know nothing specific about race-culture—unless they are exceptional men—in which case it will be the duty of the members of the club to educate them. The object of such education of course would be to ensure that they will act intelligently when any legislative proposal is made having a eugenic interest. Find out what they know about the public health as contained in the report on page48, and if they will vote in favor of a Public Health Bureau. You should know how your representatives stand on the Pure Food and Drugs Act; if they really appreciate the significance of the measure; if they would be in favor of pensioning mothers and widows who have children depending upon them; what their views are regarding compulsory marriage licenses; the reporting of venereal diseases to the local health authorities; if they would favor the segregation of the feeble-minded and their maintenance and treatment by the state; if they endorse the eugenic principle that "the fit only shall be born," and if they really understand just what that means.
If the mothers in every community would take this step, they could control the legislation affecting such subjects in a comparatively short time. If the various States concede to women the right to vote—as they will sooner or later—such mothers' clubs would have a large and intelligent share in educating the women's votes on questions which directly concern their own immediate and remote welfare.
The question of education would concern these clubs and much could be done by mothers to direct the authorities as to just what is needed to educate forparenthood, along the lines suggested elsewhere in this book.
A mothers' eugenic club would rightly become an instrument for good in all local sociological interests. It could maintain a trained nurse to care for the sick and helpless, to teach the people how to live, and how to care for their homes and their children. The members themselves could visit the poor, the needy, and the sick.
There are so many people in the world who are near the brink of failure,—so many who need a little hope infused into their lives,—and so many who are really deserving of help and sympathy and inspiration. The women who do this work for the work's sake are amply repaid by the good they find to do. The doing of such work is a consecration and an education. Life means more, and the whole temperament reflects a truer sympathy and a stronger purpose.
There are many mothers, for example, who are willing to do what is essential in the interest of their children, but they do not know what should be done. These people cannot afford a physician or a nurse to teach them, nor do they even know that their methods are wrong or that they need any instruction. We must carry the information and the explanation to them. We must show them the need for a change of methods. This is the work for those charitably disposed women who desire some worthy purpose in life, who really wish to do some genuine good. All the equipment they need is good common sense. They will explain why it is essential to pasteurize the milk before feeding it to the baby because most of the milk used by the poor is unfit for use as a baby food. They will show how to keep the nipples and the bottles clean, and they will give them lessons on how to prepare the food to the best advantage. They will instruct them how to dress the baby in hot weather, and they will explain why it is necessary to provide the baby with all the fresh air possible. They will gain the confidence of these mothers and they will tell them all they know, in tactful and diplomatic and common-sense language so that they may appreciate the eugenic reasons for everything they do regarding the care and well-being of the baby. In every city in the country this work is needed and iswaiting for the missionaries who will volunteer. To teach mothers the need for boiled water as a necessary drink for baby and older children is alone a worthy avocation. To impress upon one of these willing but ignorant mothers the absolute necessity for washing her hands before preparing baby's food, that she must keep a covered vessel in which the soiled napkins are placed until washed, that she should frequently sponge her baby in hot weather,—and explain thoroughly why these are important details,—is a work of true religious charity. They should be taught to rid their houses of flies, and especially to keep them from the baby and from its food, bottles, and nipples. They should be instructed to discontinue milk at the first sign of intestinal trouble, to give a suitable dose of castor oil, and to put the child on barley water as a food until the danger is passed. They should be taught to know the serious significance of a green watery stool, that it is the one danger signal in the summer time that no mother can ignore without wilfully risking the life of her baby. They should be shown how to prepare special articles of diet when they are needed. If every mother were educated to the extent as indicated in the above outline the appalling infant mortality would fall into insignificance. It is not a difficult task, nor would it take a long time to carry out; it is the work for willing women who have time and who perhaps spend that time in less desirable but more dramatic ways. It is education that is needed, and it is education that is willingly received, as all mothers are ready to devote their time in the acquirement of knowledge that will help them save their offspring. This is the eugenic opportunity and it is an opportunity that should devolve upon the women of the race.
Such a mothers' club would receive the willing financial support of the men of the community. It should be placed upon a sound financial basis because, to be successful, it would have to bestow much material aid. I know of clubs that are self-supporting, however. Each club needs a leader to begin it; will the reader be that one in her Community?
A Mothers' Eugenic Club would of course discussthe practical side of the eugenic question: the proper feeding and clothing of children; hygiene, sanitation, housekeeping and homemaking, and the efficiency and health of each member of the home, and all other topics of interest to every wife and mother. The writer believes that in the very near future we shall have a Mothers' Eugenic Club in every community in the United States; that these clubs will be guided by, and be an instrument of, a National Eugenic Bureau, composed of women, that will coöperate and harmonize the work as a whole, so that the conservation of human life will be effected to its maximum extent; that the excessive infant mortality will be overcome, because ignorant and incompetent mothers—the greatest cause of infant mortality—will be educated and instructed in the rudiments of eugenics and will consequently, to a large extent, cease to be ignorant and incompetent; that the desecration of young wives will stop, and stop forever, because vice and disease will be branded and exposed; that the feeble-minded, the deaf-mute, the imbecile, and the insane, will no longer be allowed to propagate their kind, to the permanent detriment of the race.
When such clubs are established, and when all mothers do their individual duty in the interest of the race, we shall begin to see the dawn of a promise that will achieve its supreme success in the generations that will people the earth in the eugenic aftertime.