4 8o THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



immigration of the poor peoples (in the material sense) of other nations, 

 as such, that we need to fear. Many of our best classes of citizenship 

 have come from this type. These are usually the ones who have been 

 our pioneers — they did not come to America merely to find an easier 

 life, but to obtain greater freedom and scope for development. It 

 required a distinct effort on their part to seek new and better condi- 

 tions under almost certain hardships in a new land; and this very 

 effort marked a virility and fortitude in their make-up which is not 

 manifest in those refugees from justice who seek our shores to escape 

 the consequences of crimes committed or are drifted here along the 

 lines of least resistance. What kind of philanthropist is he who, 

 though he gives his millions to charity (well intentioned but perhaps 

 misdirected) dilutes and contaminates the very structure of our com- 

 monwealth by importation of the scum of Europe to enable him to 

 amass the millions? Cheaper labor may be an economic necessity, but 

 can we afford it at the price ? The danger would, perhaps, not be quite 

 so great if there were not the possibility of the control of affairs falling 

 ultimately into the hands of these undesirables ; but after a short period 

 every man among them is entitled to a vote, and the vote of one man 

 has equal weight with that of another. Furthermore, the political 

 demagogue makes it his business to see that all these votes are polled. 

 Heredity and eugenic principles play no part here ; but if suffrage is to 

 be equal, should we not devote our attention to bettering the quality of 

 the voter? With political control in the hands of the inferior, there 

 will be little chance for eugenic legislation. 



Of late years several nations have been viewing with alarm their 

 rapidly diminishing birth rates. It has not been generally recognized, 

 however, wherein the danger really lies. The fact of a decreasing 

 population may in itself be of serious economic import; and even 

 though the total population is being maintained or is growing on 

 account of immigration, accession from without then means the swamp- 

 ing of the native stock. But immigration aside, the greatest cause for 

 alarm is revealed upon an analysis of the statistics on the decrease in 

 the number of children born. Such analysis shows that the decrease 

 is not proportional for the total population, but that it is greatest 

 among those classes of society which are the more desirable, namely, 

 the professional classes, the artisans and the so-called middle classes 

 generally. Statistics show that whereas in London the birth rate was 

 higher sixty years ago among the classes just mentioned, fifty years 

 later the conditions had become exactly reversed, and that the paupers, 

 the defectives and the undesirable generally were reproducing at a 

 greater rate than the other civic elements. The outcome of such a state 

 of affairs, without the intervention of other forces, would be easy to 

 predict. One modifying factor exists in the differential death rate, 

 which falls most heavily on the physically and morally unfit; but here 



