The Parker post., 1914-08-15
Copyright. 1914. by A. S. Cray
EUGENICS.

| Lester Ward declares that aversion
! In the relations between man and
woman means that their union will re-
suit in some defect or imperfection in
the offspring. And our knowledge OF
the laws Of heredity and Of environ.
ment prove this must be true.
! Environment counts for fully 10 per
cent in the development Of the indi.
vidual, and family distraught by
pickering, misunderstanding, and the
lack Of mutual consideration and for.
bearance, cannot well be considered
| favorable environment in which to de-
! velop normal children.
| Sex selection and the survival of the
f1ttest appears to have been response
BILE Tor the course of human evolution
up to the time of the ancient Greeks
and il the fragments Of that early civil
lization indicate anything, obviously
they indicate plane of pure and log
! ical thought we have yet to attain.
| Sex selection means the choice OF
superior mates, and therefore the pro
terity. Free, natural selection has
been the uplifting power that has de-
veloped and conserved the race. The
primitive selection inspired by natural
instinct and maintained by strong
arms and a stone club undoubtedly
bred men and women relatively superb
or to many Of today, and vastly superb
or to those certain to result from like
number of generations with choice
largely governed by the power OF
property accumulated through more OF
less devious methods.
What is there in all recorded his
tory that we can point to N evidence
of our ability to improve on the forces
that brought US from the primal cell
to Thales, Anaximander, Hippocrates
and Euclid, intellects that still actuate
the minds of men after more than
twenty centuries?
Granting that beings vary among
themselves generation after genera
ton, granting only the At survive
granting the survivors tend to trans
nit their qualities, then it follows that
evolution is now going on and that we
are either ascending or descending
We know it to be within our power
to go in either direction, and therefore
that we can develop a vastly superior
and happier race in few genera
tions If we will to do SO. But what
rational steps are being taken to this
end? We laugh at the childish eff
forts to stay natural forces by inn
perial or legislative edict recorded in
earlier ages; but are. recent legisla
tive enactments in the name of eN
genics any more logical or do they
promise to be any more effective than
Emperor Caligula's command that the
tide cease to rise?
The simple and disagreeable truth
Is that modern business has destroyed
the fundamental principle of natural
selection. Making women economic
ally dependent on men eliminates the
lifting power of woman's choice-and
there can be no choice without free
dom and no freedom except it be
grounded in economic independence
Because of woman's dependence and
humanity's mental, sympathetic and
social refnements, the fundamental
principles of natural selection and the
survival of the f1ttest'' through the
struggle for existence have been
forced into the background, creating an
artificial condition certain to be cor
rected by self-destruction Hence
this cry for eugenics.
Eugenics cannot become a vital
power in any nation until sufficient
body of the people become imbued
with the true principles, and this is
condition impossible to attain through
legislation, and is only to be achieved
by individual effort and mental and
physical development. No sane par
ents will knowingly deliberately con-
denim their children or their chtldren's
children to poverty, the insane asy'
lum or worse; and the means Of pre-
vention lie in knowledge.
If every child were given a prac'
teal working knowledge Of physics,
chemistry and biology, studies that
furnish material for true thought and
fundamental understanding, the pres
ent unhealthy condition would auto
matically correct itself, and there
would be no more talk Ct eugenics.
English Lord Bars Labor Union.