The Richmond palladium and sun-telegram. [volume] (Richmond, Ind.) 1907-1939, 1922-06-17

THE
birth rate of all countries and all
races.
1t is not generally realized that what
happened to Frances birth rate as a
result of the war. happened also in
greater or less degree to nearly all of
the rest of the white part of the human
race. The lowering of birth rate, add
ed to abnormal death rate due to war
conditions among recently born chill
dren, was universal. Although there
are no figures available, 1t was prob
ably worst of all in the largest of the
white countries-Russia.
Whites Impaired
Few realize how seriously the flu
ture military and economic strength of
the white part of the human race was
impaired by the war. The rest of the
human race, the yellows, browns and
blacks, suffered hardly at all, they have
gone ahead at their normal rate of in
crease. One way to picture the result
would be to consider the military
strength of the white part of the hui
man race at a period about Is or 90
years hence-about, let US say, the
year 1888.
The military strength of the white
part of the human race at that ime will
be composed obviously of the male
children who were born between,
roughly. the year 1915 and the year
1926 1t is possibly not too much to
say that the number of white children
who will have been born into the world
during these 10 years, and who will
have survived and come to normal
strength through the vicissitudes of
famine, under-feeding, and the other
chaos of war and its aftermath-the
number may turn out to be something
less than three-fourths, and possibly
not much more than one-half of what
! it would have been if the war had not
happened.
| 1t has been said, and it is probably
approximately correct. that if the re-
cent war should be fought over again
in the year 1888 by all the European
nations who took part in it, the total
number of soldiers involved would be
only about half of the number who
were available in the recent war.
That is a startling but probably cor
rect statement. But in another way
the total military strength of the
white part of the human race, even
including the United States, will be,
in 1888. something less than three
+: fourths, and possibly not greatly
more than one-half of what it was
when the recent war broke out.
Speculate on Conflict
/ There are some who speculate on
the idea that there may be ahead OF
us great worldwide conflict between
the whites, on the one side, and the
non-Whites on the other. There may
or may not be anything in it. But il
there is enough in it to speculate
about, and if one could imagine some
! great Bismarck of the non-white races
Hooking forward to such conflict, and
! trying to bring it about at the time
of the greatest disadvantage to the
white race that time would be some
where about 1888.
The subject is much too big to be
i treated with the faintest adequacy II
so brief an article as the present one
Not much more can be done than tc
set down few of the more arresting
facts and speculations. In the long
run, relative birth rate is the greatest
single factor in the future history Of
the world. 1t has the power of force
Eof nature. 1t will overcome fortresses
and creep around boundaries. 1t is
superior in its potency to any League
of Nations or to any conference or dip
lomatic arrangement
In the course of time, whenever the
discrepancy goes far enough, the ma
ton or the race whose mothers are
willing to bear and bring up the mos
children will prevail over those whose
women are less fecund An official O.
California once said to the presen
writer. with some excitement, that tn,
japanese women in the state have al
average of more than seven children
while the white women average les
than three. q quote the figures from
: memory. The official said this il
some alarm about the future of tn
state, coupled with something like in
dignation. | felt like asking hin
whether his indignation was directet
against the Japanese women for hav
ing too many babies, or the whites 70
: having too few
However. it is a complex question
with many more angles than can eve
be attended to in the present article
which aims only to call attention an,
provoke thought.
Copyright, 922, by the New YorI
Evening Post, Inc.)