162 



The Journal of Heredity 



submit expert control to the inexpert." 

 But lack of specialization is no essential 

 part of democracy. Specialists in all 

 fields of human activity are developed 

 in democracies no less than in other 

 forms of government, and if in selecting 

 men for public office we still retain some 

 of our pioneer ideals this phase of our 

 development is rapidly passing. No 

 doubt we often make mistakes in choos- 

 ing men for public positions, but do 

 other forms of government avoid such 

 mistakes' In a democracy these mis- 

 takes may be quickly remedied; when 

 we become sufficiently aroused "we 

 turn the rascals out," but it is more 

 difficult to get rid of a corrupt or incom- 

 petent autocrat. 



Modern democracy is not the rule of 

 the people as a whole, of ignorant 

 masses, of "the blind God of Numbers." 

 A democracy no less than an autocracy 

 is a government by leaders, but in the 

 former case these leaders are chosen by 

 the people and are responsible to them 

 and in the latter they are not. Leaders 

 in a democracy have great power, and in 

 great crises such as war, their powers 

 may be temporarily greatly increased, 

 but they are not autocrats for they must 

 render to the people an account of their 

 stewardship. In no modern form of 

 government do the people as a whole 

 make plans for war or peace, for taxa- 

 tion or legislation or even party plat- 

 forms. These things are determined by 

 leaders and in general the mass of the 

 people hold them responsible only for 

 results. Govenraient, no less than per- 

 sonal behavior proceeds by the princi- 

 ple of "trial and error, " and the majority 

 in a democracy decides only whether 

 the results are failures or successes. 

 Furthermore a democracy is much more 

 sensitive to this test than is any other 

 form of government, for a failure is 

 quickly abandoned and its authors 

 repudiated. The contrast between de- 

 mocracy and autocracy is not between 

 "numbers and rightness," but it is 

 between rightness as measured by the 

 effect upon the majority or on only a 

 small minority of the people. Modern 

 democracy demands, and has, experts 

 even in matters of government, and 



who can truly say that the results are on 

 the whole worse than in an autocracy? 

 The greatest problem which confronts 

 all types of government is the problem of 

 social cooperation. Efficient coopera- 

 tion may for a time be forced upon a 

 people by a powerful autocracy but 

 history has generally shown that such a 

 course ends in class antagonisms and the 

 destruction of social union. Self-gov- 

 ernment and majority rule are generally 

 recognized as the best form of govern- 

 ment for intelligent people; a paternal 

 form of government may be better 

 suited to ignorant and undeveloped 

 races, but only in case willing coopera- 

 tion can be secured, for the end and aim 

 of social evolution is cooperation with- 

 out compulsion. A genuine democracy 

 seeks and obtains a degree of coopera- 

 tion which compulsion can never ob- 

 tain. Ideal democracy means not less 

 specialization but fuller cooperation 

 than in other forms of government. 



II 



But it is not so much Mr. Ireland's 

 views on democracy as on heredity to 

 which attention should be called in this 

 Journal. There is good evidence, as Mr. 

 Ireland assumes, that acquired charac- 

 teristics are not heritable and that men- 

 tal and moral traits are inherited in the 

 same way that physical traits are — 

 namely according to the law of Mendel. 

 Sexually produced organisms are mo- 

 saics of characters each of which is 

 usually derived from one or the other of 

 the two parents but not from both. 

 These characters, or rather their germ- 

 inal causes, the genes, are separable in 

 hereditary transmission and in the for- 

 formation of the germ cells they are 

 taken apart and in the fertilization of 

 the egg new combinations are made. 

 Good and bad traits are widely dis- 

 tributed throughout all classes of men, 

 good and bad genes occur in all kinds of 

 germplasm. East calculates that the 

 gene or genes for feeble-mindedness 

 occur in one person out of fourteen in the 

 population of this country and un- 

 doubtedly the genes for superior intellect 

 are also widely distributed. Even in 

 obscure families a fortunate combina- 



