The Catholic bulletin., 1913-02-15
DOMAIN OF TEMPERANCE.
PUBLIC HEALTH.
A Question of Alcoholic. Dsseneraox..

A. Question of Alcoholic Degeneracy..
A. wave of degeneracy lis sweeping
the land-a- degeneracy so appalling
in magnitude that it staggers the.
mind and threatens to- destroy this
republic, numbering more victims
than have been slain in all the wars
and in all the epidemics of acute dis
eases that have swept the country
within two hundred years, writes T.
A. MacMicholl, M. d!
The application of modern scientific
methods have reduced the mortality
from acute diseases such as typhoid,
yellow fever and the plague. The
sources and the carriers of those in
fectiOns have been discovered. BY
abolishing the sources and extermi-
mating the fly, the mosquito and the.
rat, the average length of life has
been increased. With what marked
contract, do we deal with alcohol
that most potent source and carrier of
chronic disease!
Degeneracy is; shown in the iRcreas-
ing rate of mortality resulting from
the spread of chronic diseases. Pres
1dent Rittenhouse of the Provident
Savings Life Assurance society, shows
that within thirty years the mortality
from chronic diseases has doubled, and
today chronic disorders of the lungs,
Kidneys, heart and other organs are
responsible for more than half the
deaths no So&i
the United States for 1911, and the
United States Census Bureau in it's
decennial reports present an alarm
ing array of facts that demonstrate
national degeneracy Within a period
of fifty-three years the population Of
the United States, according to these
reports, increased three hundred and
thirty per centum, while the number
of insane and feebIe-minded increased
nine hundred and fifty-ffve per CEN
tum.
This shows a net increase in the
rate per million of two hundred and
ninety-one per centum.
In an address to the Bayyiew As
sembly, last winter, DR.. J. III. Kellogg
presented alarming statistics cover
ing the birth rate of the United
States. According to this authority
during the past five years, the birth
rate in the United States has fallen
off thirty-three and one-third per cen
tum. This means the loss of a mil
lion babies year. Let this degen-
eracy continue at the same rate for
one hundred years and there will not
be native-born child five years old
in the United States.
What is the cause of this degen-
eracy?
Three out of five school children
are afflicted with some functional or
organic disease. (This percentage has
been verified in reports of the New
York superintendent of schools.) If
this percentage holds good over the
entire country, there are thirteen mil
lions of children of school age who
are afflicted with functional and or
ganic diseases, and less than two and
half millions of these are free from
hereditary alcohol taint.
A nation half diseased and half we'll
can not live but here we have three
fifths of the rising generation mental
ly and physically diseased.
For every child Of total abstainers
that dies under two years of age, five
children of drinking parents die If
this percentage holds good through
out the United States, then we are
confronted with the fact that since
the dawn of the twentieth century to
the first of January, 1912, one million
babies, under two years of age, died
as the result of the drink habit of
their parents. This is race suicide on
colossal scale.
1t is significant fact that during
the past five years we have registered
the highest per capita consumption
of alcoholic liquors in the history of
the country; and during this same
period the mortality among children
under five years of age has increased
lat per centum.
My studies during the past twenty
years, continuous to date, indicate a
steadily increasing degeneracy among
drinkers children. One out of every
FIVE children, born to drinking par
ents, will be insane. One out every
three children born to drinking par
ents will suffer from epilepsy and
hysteria. At this rate of insanity
among drinkers children, and with
an increased per capita consumption
of alcoholic liquors, we must expect
very largely increased number of
insane among the children of the
next generation.
In England, few years ago, of
twelve thousand men examined at
Manchester, nine thousand were re-
jected as physically unfit for army
service. DR.. Bollinger estimates that
half of the young men in Germany
between eighteen and twenty-five
years of age are incapable of bearing
arms. Not long ago call was issued
for young physicians to enter the
United States army. Eighty per cen
tum of those examined were rejected
as physically unfit
When four-fifths of the most rep
resentative men in America are pro-
nounced unfit for war, what shall we
say of their fitness to father the next
generation?