The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1913-09-02
Exclusive Service The Survey Press

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 BJ1reau.)
 Our legislation which aims at safe-
 guarding our native stock against
 the degeneration of it's racial or ma
 tfona1'' type has recently been review
 ed in an interesting way by Dr. Al
 essandro C1erici, writing in the Rivista
 CoIoniale of Rome. The article though brief is notable not merely from the Interesting manner in which it treats the subject but because of its
 calm and unbiased attitude towards the subject of injury-an attitude things American by Italian writers
 pr. CIeriei points out how the ques- tions of racial hygiene in North ATl- erica present themselves in a more complicated form than in Europe where the native stock of each coun- try is well fixed and where economci changes and the evolution of customs are relatively slow. In Europe, there fore the forces which may affect a given nationality can be easily con trolled by proper legislative measures. With us, instead, immigration is so heavy that it may modify in essen tial clements the parent stock and especially that part of it which directs social movements. So, likewise, there is no doubt that customs with us are unstab1e and our ideas of individual and polit1caI'' morality most uncertain.
 In the dangers 1nc1OenC 10 the NIO- lent changes that take place among us, Pr. CIericf finds justification for many of the radical measures which our legislators have resorted to, though they appear excessive and in opportune to many socio1ogists and political men of Europe. Among i these measures may be cited our inn migration laws, the legislation aiming at Negro separation and disfranchise- 1 ment and the sterilization of cTim- | inals.
 The problem of protecting our na- tiona1 stock is further accentuated by two factors: our falling birth rate and the numerical insufficiency of the na- tive stock to develop our lands or to protect them for military purposes. 1 While a falling birth rate is observ- 1 able also among European nations, yet in those countries (with the pos sible exception of F'rance) there is an | excess of population in relation to soil resources; with us instead the native | stock is not only scarce in relation to the possibilities of land exploitation but it has become so specialized in in duserial and business pursuits as to be now incapable of undertaking on a sufficiently effective scale that work of improving and exploiting tour land resources which constituted the great ness of power of our forefathers. |.
 A decreased birth rate among Am ericans as ethnologists agree, does not reflect decrease in physiological ca pacfty, for the Yankees as the au- thor tells us, are physically inferior to no race" Yet, despite such de- crease, our population is in constant increase owing to average annual immigration to our shores of nearly one million persons. It is this alien element which gives us an index of births which is supernorma1. The restrictive measures of 1907t against undesirable though applied with no very definite tests, represent a fair selective principle working on this rough alien mass in justifable re- sponse to certain civic and hygtenic dmeands of the country. But the se- verity of the application of such selec- tive process is automatically tempered by the need of the country for sup plying the scarcity of the native stock. severe is the physical, men tai and economic examination of inn migrants from certain parts of Eu- rope either because of an especially low cultural level of the applicants or because of their especially efficient bor productivenesS which would create a dangerous competition with native labor. Such restrictive 1egis- lation is also prophylactfc in charac ter excluding as it does certain alleged contagious diseases. So that in gen araI it may be said that such legisla- ton quite effectively meets the ob- feet of preventing the immigrant ele- nent from lowering the hygienic level 0f the native stock
 Closely connected with the inrnigra- ion problem is that of the Negro. Ne groes, like immigrants, Dr. Cleric1 9olds are Indispensable as labor ma chines and are likewise more or less undesirable as elements of manhood - To deal with this situation, Americans Ire pursuing a policy not unlike that in the case of immigrants a policy of tolerance mixed with hostility This is evil fenced by legislation in the southern 5tates, keeping whites and blacks sep Lrate in all stages of life from the el- 1 9mentarX schools to maExiasA This