Applied Eugenics Part 27

functions, and as far as possible (mainly on the basis of skin-color) the amount of white blood in the colored pupils was determined. Four cla.s.ses were made: full-blood Negro, 3/4 Negro, 1/2 Negro (mulatto) and 1/4 Negro (quadroon). It was found that "the pure Negroes scored 69.2% as high as the whites; that the 3/4 pure Negroes scored 73.2% as high as the whites; that the mulattoes scored 81.2% as high as the whites; and that the quadroons obtained 91.8% of the white score." This confirms the belief of many observers that the ability of a colored man is proportionate to the amount of white blood he has.

Summarizing a large body of evidence, Dr. Ferguson concludes that "the intellectual performance of the general colored population is approximately 75% as efficient as that of the whites," but that pure Negroes have only 60% of white intellectual efficiency, and that even this figure is probably too high. "It seems as though the white type has attained a higher level of development, based upon the common elementary capacities, which the Negro has not reached to the same degree." "All of the experimental work which has been done has pointed to the same general conclusion."

This is a conclusion of much definiteness and value, but it does not go as far as one might wish, for the deeper racial differences of impulse and inhibition, which are at present incapable of precise measurement, are likewise of great importance. And it is the common opinion that the Negro differs in such traits even more than in intellect proper. He is said to be lacking in that aggressive compet.i.tiveness which has been responsible for so much of the achievement of the Nordic race; it is alleged that his s.e.xual impulses are strongly developed and inhibitions lacking; that he has "an instability of character, involving a lack of foresight, an improvidence, a lack of persistence, small power of serious initiative, a tendency to be content with immediate satisfactions." He appears to be more gregarious but less apt at organization than most races.

The significance of these differences depends largely on whether they are germinal, or merely the results of social tradition. In favor of the view that they are in large part racial and hereditary, is the fact that they persist in all environments. They are found, as Professor Mecklin says, "Only at the lower level of instinct, impulse and temperament, and do not, therefore, admit of clear definition because they are overlaid in the case of every individual with a mental superstructure gotten from the social heritage which may vary widely in the case of members of the same race. That they do persist, however, is evidenced in the case of the Negroes subjected to the very different types of civilization in Haiti, Santo Domingo, the United States, and Jamaica. In each of these cases a complete break has been made with the social traditions of Africa and different civilizations have been subst.i.tuted, and yet in temperament and character the Negro in all these countries is essentially the same. The so-called 'reversion to type' often pointed out in the Negro is in reality but the recrudescence of fundamental, unchanged race traits upon the partial breakdown of the social heritage or the Negro's failure successfully to appropriate it."

Again, as Professor Ferguson points out, the experimental tests above cited may be thought to give some support to the idea that the emotional characteristics of the Negro are really inherent. "Strong and changing emotions, an improvident character and a tendency to immoral conduct are not unallied," he explains; "They are all rooted in uncontrolled impulse. And a factor which may tend to produce all three is a deficient development of the more purely intellectual capacities. Where the implications of the ideas are not apprehended, where thought is not lively and fertile, where meanings and consequences are not grasped, the need for the control of impulse will not be felt. And the demonstrable deficiency of the Negro in intellectual traits may involve the dynamic deficiencies which common opinion claims to exist."

There are other racial and heritable differences of much importance, which are given too little recognition--namely, the differences of disease resistance. Here one can speak unhesitatingly of a real inferiority in respect to the environment of North America.

As was pointed out in the chapter on Natural Selection, the Negro has been subjected to lethal selection for centuries by the Negro diseases, the diseases of tropical Africa, of which malaria and yellow fever are the most conspicuous examples. The Negro is strongly resistant to these and can live where the white man dies. The white man, on the other hand, has his own diseases, of which tuberculosis is an excellent example.

Compared with the Negro, he is relatively resistant to phthisis and will survive where the Negro dies.

When the two races are living side by side, it is obvious that each is proving a menace to the other, by acting as a disseminator of infection. The white man kills the Negro with tuberculosis and typhoid fever. In North America the Negro can not kill the white man with malaria or yellow fever, to any great extent, because these diseases do not flourish here. But the Negro has brought some other diseases here and given them to the white race; elephantiasis is one example, but the most conspicuous is hookworm, the extent and seriousness of which have only recently been realized.

In the New England states the average expectation of life, at birth, is 50.6 years for native white males, 34.1 years for Negro males. For native white females it is 54.2 years and for Negro females 37.7 years, according to the Bureau of the Census (1916). These very considerable differences can not be wholly explained away by the fact that the Negro is crowded into parts of the cities where the sanitation is worst. They indicate that the Negro is out of his environment. In tropical Africa, to which the Negro is adapted by many centuries of natural selection, his expectation of life might be much longer than that of the white man.

In the United States he is much less "fit," in the Darwinian sense.

In rural districts of the South, according to C. W. Stiles, the annual typhoid death rate per 100,000 population is:

_Whites_ _Negroes_ Males 37.4 75.3 Females 27.4 56.3

These figures again show, not alone the greater intelligence of the white in matters of hygiene, but probably also the greater inherent resistance of the white to a disease which has been attacking him for many centuries. Biologically, North America is a white man's country, not a Negro's country, and those who are considering the Negro problem must remember that natural selection has not ceased acting on man.

From the foregoing different kinds of evidence, we feel justified in concluding that the Negro race differs greatly from the white race, mentally as well as physically, and that in many respects it may be said to be inferior, when tested by the requirements of modern civilization and progress, with particular reference to North America.

We return now to the question of intermarriage. What is to be expected from the union of these diverse streams of descent?

The best answer would be to study and measure the mulattoes and their posterity, in as many ways as possible. No one has ever done this. It is the custom to make no distinction whatever between mulatto and Negro, in the United States, and thus the whole problem is beclouded.

There is some evidence from life insurance and medical sources, that the mulatto stands above the Negro but below the white in respect to his health. There is considerable evidence that he occupies the same relation in the intellectual world; it is a matter of general observation that nearly all the leaders of the Negro race in the United States are not Negroes but mulattoes.

Without going into detail, we feel perfectly safe in drawing this conclusion: that in general the white race loses and the Negro gains from miscegenation.

This applies, of course, only to the germinal nature. Taking into consideration the present social conditions in America, it is doubtful whether either race gains. But if social conditions be eliminated for the moment, biologists may believe that intermarriage between the white and Negro races represents, on the whole, an advance for the Negro; and that it represents for the white race a distinct loss.

If eugenics is to be thought of solely in terms of the white race, there can be no hesitation about rendering a verdict. We must unhesitatingly condemn miscegenation.

But there are those who declare that it is small and mean to take such a narrow view of the evolution of the race. They would have America open its doors indiscriminately to immigration, holding it a virtue to sacrifice one's self permanently for someone else's temporary happiness; they would equally have the white race sacrifice itself for the Negro, by allowing a mingling of the two blood-streams. That, it is alleged, is the true way to elevate the Negro.

The question may well be considered from that point of view, even though the validity of such a point of view is not admitted.

To ensure racial and social progress, nothing will take the place of leaders.h.i.+p, of genius. A race of nothing but mediocrities will stand still, or very nearly so; but a race of mediocrities with a good supply of men of exceptional ability and energy at the top, will make progress in discovery, invention and organization, which is generally recognized as progressive evolution.

If the level of the white race be lowered, it will hurt that race and be of little help to the Negro. If the white race be kept at such a level that its productivity of men of talent will be at a maximum, everyone will progress; for the Negro benefits just as the white does from every forward step in science and art, in industry and politics.

Remembering that the white race in America is nine times as numerous as the black race, we conclude that it would be desirable to encourage amalgamation of the two races only in case the average of mulattoes is superior to the average of the whites. No one can seriously maintain that this supposition is true. Biologically, therefore, there is no reason to think that an increase in the number of mulattoes is desirable.

There is a curious argument in circulation, which points out that mulattoes are almost always the offspring of Negro mothers and white fathers, not of Negro fathers and white mothers. Therefore, it is said, production of mulattoes does not mean at all a decrease in the number of white births, but merely subst.i.tutes a number of mulatto births for an equivalent number of pure Negro births. It is therefore alleged that the production of mulattoes is in the long run a benefit, elevating the Negro race without impairing the white race.

But this argument a.s.sumes that most mulatto births are illegitimate,--a condition which eugenists do not sanction, because it tends to disintegrate the family. Rather than such a condition, the legitimate production of pure-blood Negroes is preferable, even though they be inferior in individual ability to the illegitimate mulattoes offered as a subst.i.tute. There are not at the present time enough desirable white fathers in the country. If desirable ones are set aside to produce mulattoes, it would be a great loss to the nation; while if the mulattoes are the offspring of eugenically undesirable white fathers, then the product is not likely to be anything America wants.

From whatever standpoint we take, we see nothing good to be said for miscegenation.[141] We have discussed the problem as a particular one between the blacks and whites but the argument will hold good when applied to any two races between which the differences are so marked that one may be considered decidedly inferior to the other.

Society,--white society,--long ago reached the instinctive conclusion, which seems to us a correct one, that it must put a ban on intermarriage between two such races. It has given expression to this feeling by pa.s.sing laws to prohibit miscegenation in 22 states, while six other states prohibit it in their const.i.tutions. There are thus 22 states which have attempted legally to prevent intermarriage of the white and black race. While in 20 states there is no law on the subject, it is needless to say that popular feeling about it is almost uniform, and that the legislators of New England for instance would refuse to give their daughters in marriage to Negroes, even though they might the day before have voted down a proposed law to prohibit intermarriage on the ground that it was an expression of race prejudice.

In a majority of the states which have no legislation of this kind, bills have been introduced during the last two or three years, and have been defeated through the energetic interference of the National a.s.sociation for the Advancement of Colored People, an organization of which Oswald Garrison Villard is chairman of the Board of Directors and W. E. B. DuBois, a brilliant mulatto, is Director of Publicity and Research. As this a.s.sociation represents a very large part of the more intelligent Negro public opinion, its att.i.tude deserves careful consideration. It is set forth summarily in a letter[142] which was addressed to legislators in various states, as follows:

"The National a.s.sociation for the Advancement of Colored People earnestly protests against the bill forbidding intermarriage between the races, not because the a.s.sociation advocates intermarriage, which it does not, but primarily because whenever such laws have been enacted they have become a menace to the whole inst.i.tution of matrimony, leading directly to concubinage, b.a.s.t.a.r.dy, and the degradation of the Negro woman. No man-made law can stop the union of the races. If intermarriage be wrong, its prevention is best left to public opinion and to nature, which wreaks its own fearful punishments on those who transgress its laws and sin against it. We oppose the proposed statute in the language of William Lloyd Garrison in 1843, in his successful campaign for the repeal of a similar law in Ma.s.sachusetts: 'Because it is not the province, and does not belong to the power of any legislative a.s.sembly, in a republican government, to decide on the complexional affinity of those who choose to be united together in wedlock; and it may as rationally decree that corpulent and lean, tall and short, strong and weak persons shall not be married to each other as that there must be an agreement in the complexion of the parties.'

"We oppose it for the physical reason that to prohibit such intermarriage would be publicly to acknowledge that black blood is a physical taint, something no self-respecting colored man and woman can be asked to admit. We oppose it for the moral reason that all such laws leave the colored girl absolutely helpless before the l.u.s.t of the white man, without the power to compel the seducer to marry. The statistics of intermarriage in those states where it is permitted show this happens so infrequently as to make the whole matter of legislation unnecessary.

Both races are practically in complete agreement on this question, for colored people marry colored people, and white marry whites, the exceptions being few. We earnestly urge upon you an unfavorable report on this bill."

Legislation on the subject of marriage is clearly inside the province of government. That such an argument as is quoted from William Lloyd Garrison can still be circulated in the United States and apparently carry weight, is sufficient cause for one to feel pessimistic over the spread of the scientific spirit in this nation. Suffice it to say that on this point the National a.s.sociation is a century behind the times.

The following policy seems to us to be in accordance with modern science, and yet meet all the legitimate arguments of the National a.s.sociation. We will state our att.i.tude as definitely as possible:

1. We hold that it is to the interests of the United States, for the reasons given in this chapter, to prevent further Negro-white amalgamation.

2. The taboo of public opinion is not sufficient in all cases to prevent intermarriage, and should be supplemented by law, particularly as the United States have of late years received many white immigrants from other countries (e. g., Italy) where the taboo is weak because the problem has never been pressing.

3. But to prevent intermarriage is only a small part of the solution, since most mulattoes come from extramarital miscegenation. The only solution of this, which is compatible with the requirements of eugenics, is not that of _laissez faire_, suggested by the National a.s.sociation, but an extension of the taboo, and an extension of the laws, to prohibit all s.e.xual intercourse between the two races.

Four states (Louisiana, Nevada, South Dakota and Alabama) have already attempted to gain this end by law. We believe it to be highly desirable that such laws should be enacted and enforced by all states. A necessary preliminary would be to standardize the laws all over the Union, particularly with a view to agreement on what a "Negro" legally is; for in some states the legislation applies to one who is one-sixteenth, or even less, Negro in descent, while in other states it appears to refer only to full-blood or, at the most, half-blood individuals.

Such legislation, and what is more important, such public opinion, leading to a cessation of Negro-white amalgamation, we believe to be in the interests of national eugenics, and to further the welfare of both of the races involved. Miscegenation can only lead to unhappiness under present social conditions and must, we believe, under _any_ social conditions be biologically wrong.

We favor, therefore, the support of the taboo which society has placed on these mixed marriages, as well as any legal action which can practicably be taken to make miscegenation between white and black impossible. Justice requires that the Negro race be treated as kindly and considerately as possible, with every economic and political concession that is consistent with the continued welfare of the nation.

Such social equality and intercourse as might lead to marriage are not compatible with this welfare.

CHAPTER XV

IMMIGRATION

There are now in the United States some 14,000,000 foreign-born persons, together with other millions of the sons and daughters of foreigners who although born on American soil have as yet been little a.s.similated to Americanism. This great body of aliens, representing perhaps a fifth of the population, is not a pool to be absorbed, but a continuous, inflowing stream, which until the outbreak of the Great War was steadily increasing in volume, and of which the fountain-head is so inexhaustible as to appal the imagination. From the beginning of the century, the inflow averaged little less than a million a year, and while about one-fifth of this represented a temporary migration, four-fifths of it meant a permanent addition to the population of the New World.

The character of this stream will inevitably determine to a large extent the future of the American nation. The direct biological results, in race mixture, are important enough, although not easy to define. The indirect results, which are probably of no less importance to eugenics, are so hard to follow that some students of the problem do not even realize their existence.

The ancestors of all white Americans, of course, were immigrants not so very many generations ago. But the earlier immigration was relatively h.o.m.ogeneous and stringently selected by the dangers of the voyage, the hards.h.i.+ps of life in a new country, and the equality of opportunity where free compet.i.tion drove the unfit to the wall. There were few people of eminence in the families that came to colonize North America, but there was a high average of st.u.r.dy virtues, and a good deal of ability, particularly in the Puritan and Huguenot invasions and in a part of that of Virginia.

In the first three-quarters of the nineteenth century, the number of these "patriots and founders" was greatly increased by the arrival of immigrants of similar racial stocks from Ireland, Germany, Scandinavia, and to a less extent from the other countries of northern and western Europe. These arrivals added strength to the United States, particularly as a large part of them settled on farms.

This stream of immigration gradually dried up, but was succeeded by a flood from a new source,--southern and eastern Europe. Italians, Slavs, Poles, Magyars, East European Hebrews, Finns, Portuguese, Greeks, Roumanians and representatives of many other small nationalities began to seek fortunes in America. The earlier immigration had been made up largely of those who sought escape from religious or political tyranny and came to settle permanent homes. The newer immigration was made up, on the whole, of those who frankly sought wealth. The difference in the reason for coming could not fail to mean a difference in selection of the immigrants, quite apart from the change in the races.