Iowa County democrat. [volume] (Mineral Point, Wis.) 1877-1938, 1904-02-18
WIVES RECEIVE THE BLAME.
Australian Commission Says They are
Responsible for Race Suicide.

Australian Commission Says They are
Responsible for Race Suicide.
Some time ago the government OF
New South Wales, Australia, appoint
ed commission to investigate the de-
clining birth rate in that state, condi'
ton which has been brought into sharp
relief by the figures of T. A. Coghlan,
the government statistician.
The commission decided as soon as
it had been organized to take testl.
mony and to perform its other work in
camera. This rule it has adhered to-
1t Is yet sitting, and when 1t will com.
plete its task does not at present ap.
pear.
The results have caused not little
surprise. 1t seems that most Of the
members of the commission began
their task with well defined idea that
it was prominently economic causes
that limited the birth rate. This was
the burden OF most of the letters which
were printed by the newspapers. 1t
was the popular notion that owing to
the hard times consequent upon the
drouth and the wild and weird financ.
ing of the New South Wales govern
ment Of the last few years, it was the
fatherhood of the state which was re-
sponsible.
But the commissioners were amazed
to discover, so it Is said, that 1t is not
the fathers, but the mothers, who are
opposed to any or to large families. 1t
is said further that the commissions
report will demonstrate that the
pounds and the pence are not really
the factor in the problem that they
are generally thought to be. Further
more, the objection to large families
is found among upper and middle class
wives rather than among women
lower in the social scale.
The testimony of the doctors who
have been before the commission is
that it is the pain and the physical
discomfort attendant upon child bear
ing-the curse of Eye-which most
move women to avoid maternity. The
next strongest motive, according to
these witnesses, Is the purely social
one--that motherhood interferes with
their other feminine interests and with
their pleasures.
! Possibly the knowledge that deaths
following Continemnt are frequent or
increasing Is another element in the
case. Coghlan's next to latest Stats
tipg chow that in tho Inno1n 1QT0-Ql
the ratio of deaths to confinements
was .004.S91 per cent; in the period of
lSSl90 the ratio was .004, 309, and in
lS91-l900 1t was .006,509 which goes
to prove, so far as figures at least are
concerned, that the fear has a basis.
1t is said further that the same sta
tistics show that the women here are
now less capable. physically, Of child,
bearing than formerly, and that the
admittedly frequent practice of physi-
clans in Sydney and elsewhere in the
state of certifying equivocally in cases
of death in childbirth makes the re-
turns under this head less tina they
really are.
Although required by law to de.
scribe deaths in childbirth as being
such. doctors use the term "blood
poisoning" and heart failure" in.
stead; and they persistently omit the
words "puerperal' in fatal cases of
septieaemia and peritcnitis, So Mr.
Coghlan charges, and so doctors have
stated, when questioned by the COM
mission.
! Testimony has also been taken
which indicates that the mortality
among infants is larger than it should
be, Artificial feeding of infants,
doctors have told the commission,
limits the population.
The commission will point out in its
report with as much force as it Is cap
able Of that whatever may be the rea-
sons the birth rate in New South
Wales Is indisputably falling off and
the decline has been most marked dur.
ing the last few years. It will point
out that this condition is not an ac.
cidental one, not due to the drouth nor
to hard times, but one of intention.
It is said that it will even go further
and declare that the decline bears an
unmistakable relation to intellectual
status and to pCstponement of mar
rage