HEREDITY 



United States have never demonstrated complete faith in 

 Jefferson's principles in any concrete manner. Sustained 

 and, for the most part, logical action based on the doctrine 

 of human parity has been carried out only by the Soviet 

 Republics. The keystone of Communism is a religious 

 acceptance of two biological errors, to wit, that all persons 

 have the same innate intellectual equipment, and that 

 acquired characters are inherited. The second tenet, by the 

 way, means to the Communist that stuffing the present 

 generation with schooling will make their descendants 

 more intelligent. In the United States we have not carried 

 matters so far. But we have labored to achieve democratic 

 perfection by assuming that suffrage can be exercised wisely 

 by anyone reaching the age of twenty-one years, provided 

 he or she has been properly moulded into the American 

 pattern by a primary school education. And, Fourth of 

 July orations to the contrary notwithstanding, this is not 

 a well-ordered scheme. 



The country has become much more socialistic than most 

 people realize. Theoretically it is committed to a policy 

 of free medical advice, and free mental training in the 

 public schools. This program is partly logical and partly 

 illogical. It is logical in that every citizen should be given 

 the opportunity to realize on every physical and mental 

 asset he possesses. It is illogical in that we treat all indi- 

 viduals as if they were Boston terriers, trimming their 

 ears and teaching them identical tricks, so that they will 

 fit a single given standard. It would be much better, would 

 it not, after patching up such physical disabilities as we 

 may, to give each child all the education he can assimilate 

 of the type for which he is fitted? There is no point in trying 

 to teach our twenty million morons to read and write. 

 It is hardly worth while to prod another twenty million 

 dullards through grammar school. It is foolish to lower 

 high-school and college standards so that everyone who 



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