100 HEREDITY AND SOCIAL FITNESS 



XVIII. CONCLUSION. 



Finally, we may indicate certain bearings of the results of our study 

 on the present-day program for race betterment. We have looked 

 upon the course of development of the various lines considered here 

 as a vast experiment in selective mating. In this process the better 

 elements, though sometimes weak with respect to certain traits, have 

 generally, through their own reaction to social and economic condi- 

 tions, been brought together. Advantageous combinations thus 

 effected have resulted in marked advance in economic worth. The 

 worse elements, those weak or lacking with reference to many socially 

 efficient traits, have, through their failure to effect matings with 

 strength, persisted in their original defects and diversified their original 

 weakness, and so sunk lower and lower in the scale of social fitness. 



As we survey the whole course of our national history, the view 

 appears tenable that it is by similar convergence of lines in a process 

 reaching far back into colonial and old-world history that great strains 

 have arisen noted on the one hand for original enterprise and moral 

 worth, and on the other hand for dependency and moral unworthiness. 

 The questions may well arise here: How far is the control of matings 

 practicable or desirable with regard to the evolution of such strains? 

 Can the evolution of the former class be safely left to the natural 

 preference of the healthy, energetic, and able to mate with their own 

 kind? Since the worst strains seem powerless to efU'ect improvement, 

 and even with natural checks on their rtlultiplication are becoming 

 too great a burden on society, what means should be adopted for their 

 elimination? 



Let us consider two of the more important eugenic measures that 

 have been advocated in relation to the conditions set forth in this 

 history. Such measures fall into five main classes: first, segregation 

 and even sterilization of the grossly defective; second, state control of 

 marriages through the operation of an eugenics board; third, Federal 

 control of immigration; fourth, creation of an enlightened public 

 sentiment in favor of eugenic matings; fifth, eugenic education of 

 prospective marriage mates. 



So far as these families are concerned, the activity of public-spirited 

 citizens has already resulted in the segregation of the living repre- 

 sentatives of child-bearing age belonging to an entire imbecile line. 

 In the light of our histories this action is amply justified. But what 

 of the numerous defectives and degenerates of the other two socially 

 unfit lines? As already pointed out, only one of them is at present 

 receiving institutional care. The great majority lead a parasitic 

 existence at the expense of the community and are thus a drag on 

 any economic progress, while their menace to the moral growth of 

 the social group is unquestionable. 



