East Oregonian : E.O. (Pendleton, OR) 1888-current, 1913-08-20
Love WILL LAUGH
AT LAWS He SAYS
S'Bin of Health Proposal Does Not
Work out in Practice. Says
DIR. Paul 5. Hunter.

DENVER, Colo, Aug 20.-1f such
law as that recently passed in Wis
consin forbidding the marriage of dis
eased persons and compelling the
sterilization of detectives had always
been enforced. three fourths of the
worlds greatest geniuses would never
have been born, This was the opin-
saa expressed today by DR.. PAUL. S.
state board of health, as an answer
TO the statement of Surgeon General
Blue in which the surgeon declared
that this country must stem the prop
ogation Of detectives and that the
Wisconsin law is the only correct an
swer DR.. Hunter declares that love
viii laugh at laws just as he has
laughed at locksmiths. Following is
Or. Hunters statement
theoretically 1 am heartily in ia
vor of prohibiting the marriage of all
men and women who cannot show a
clean bill of health. but it does not
work out in practice. The strongest
parents bring forth puny children:
the most moral produce immoral off
spring. The old joke about the min
lster's son" is founded on history.
"On the other hand, many of the
weaker fathers and mothers. while
transferring their weaknesses such as
drunkenness. insanity. perversion and
all the traits Surgeon General Blue
says would be eliminated by law. also
pass on the divine spark" that has
lighted the path of progress since
Time began.
In fact genius nine times out of ten
is very closely allied with i'll health,
Criminality, insanity or drunkenness.
There are very few of our greatest
poets, musicians. painters. authors and
other artists who were not afflicted
with some weakness which was inher-
tied from the parents.
Wagner, Dean Swift and Charles
Lamb were insane; Keats and Robert
Louis Stevenson died of inherited tu-
oerculosis; Coleridge and De Quincy
were opium fiends: Pope was a dwarf
and Herbert Spencer was an invalid:
Edgar Allen Poe was mentally unbal-
anced and an inveterate user of drugs
and drink; Goldsmith was called the
inspired IDIOT Rousseau and oscar
Wilde were moral and mental perverts
of the lowest order Shakespeare was
highly immoral in that he had an IL
legitimate daughter. 1t is hardly ne
cessary to refer to Byron and Robert
Burns. for their drunkenness and the
open immortality of Byron are too well
known. s.
1T is true that all these ills come
with them come that thing which has
compelled every advancement in the
world of literature. art, science and
Snvention. The question of why great
talent seldom accompanies physical
health has never been answered.
THE present agitation over eugen-
les is not new. 1t began in Sparta be-
fore the time of Christ. when, in or
der to attain physical perfection as a
race, all cripples or weak or deformed
babies were exposed on the mountain
Ttops to die or receive strength from
Ttne gods None but the strongest were
allowed TO marry. This system pro-
iuced the greatest physical giants OF
history the most perfect animals OF
all time, but mentally the race be-
came dwarfed; their brains went to
seed. They produced no really great
men, and distinguished themselves
only in war and feats of strength.
IF the plans of the eugenic enthu-
siasts were carried out in the one
matter OF prohibiting marriage of per
sons who drink, sixty per cent of tht
American people would be old maid.
and bachelors. 1t is evident from this
now long it will be before such Law
becomes general.
''And if the nation does get a Law
compelling every man and woman tC
produce physicians certificate, it will
not accomplish the desired results. fo1
doctors certificates are cheap thes'
days. Any couple intent upon getting
married could get fifty certificates il
a day despite their state of health i
they had the price.
"Only by training young men int
a complete knowledge of the sin com
nitted against the next generation b.
marrying diseased persons, can tn
race be strengthened. Laws contrar.
to the fundamental instincts Away
have been violated and always viii
oe. The instinct to have strong, heal
thy children must be cultivated. Mar
riage will then occur only between
men and women capable of becominI
parents of the right kind of children.
zpuIr ntrI DrIA pREPARING