342 The Journal 
(f) To cooperate with institutions. organiza- 
tions and individuals working toward the same 
general purpose. 
Eugenicists have expressed hearty 
sympathy with the idea of Mother- 
craft education, appreciating that it is 
in large part a genuinely eugenic 
movement, and not a mere matter of 
euthenics; that it antedates and goes 
deeper than some phases of the ‘Save 
the Babies’? movement, which in some 
quarters even disregards the interests 
of eugenics. Let us quote some of Gal- 
ton’s own words: 
“Man is gifted with pity and other 
kindly feelings; he has also the power of 
preventing many kinds of suffering. I 
can conceive it to be within his power 
to replace Natural Selection by other 
processes that are more merciful and 
not less effective. This is precisely the 
aim of eugenics. Its first object is to 
check the birth rate of the unfit, instead 
of allowing them to come into being, 
though doomed in large numbers to 
perish prematurely. The second object 
is the improvement of the race by 
furthering the productivity of the most 
fit by early marriages and healthful 
rearing of their children. Natural Se- 
lection rests upon excessive production 
and wholesale destruction; eugenics in 
bringing into the world no more indi- 
viduals than can be properly cared for 
and those only of the best stock.” 
Galton considered as a worthy eugenic 
measure the providing of a dowry for 
worthy young women, who in England 
in his day had limited prospects of 
marriage without such accessory. In 
our day and country this has no mean- 
ing. It is the adolescent girl, who in 
our country has almost unlimited free- 
dom of choice as to whom she will 
marry—or whether she will marry at 
of Heredity 
all— who holds the control of the future 
of the family and the race. It is she 
who controls the birth rate, infant 
mortality, the divorce rate, monogamy, 
polygamy or promiscuity, social wel- 
fare. According to her ideals, her fore- 
sight, her wise direction of instincts will 
society progress or deteriorate at its 
very foundations. Shall she be left to 
meet these responsibilities with only 
the guidance of impulse and naivete, 
with the impression that to anticipate 
them seriously is unbecoming and 
abnormal? Naturally, she is not in- 
terested in technical essays, charts, 
diagrams, research reports, controver- 
sial discussions in genetics and social 
psychology and pathology. She will 
rarely appreciate her responsibilities 
through such channels until after her 
important decisions have been made— 
if ever. But there is for her a direct 
avenue. She instinctively loves little 
children and loves to be with them. 
Mothercraft education, with its inti- 
mate daily life with little children, is 
teaching eugenics in a language she can 
understand. From her training in the 
care and education of these little tots 
she eagerly comes with personal ques- 
tions of eugenic import; she begins to 
realize that it is natural and normal 
for her to anticipate this phase of her 
future and to prepare herself for it; 
and she seriously develops her ideals 
for her own family. 
Mothercraft education is constructive 
eugenics, based upon the maternal in- 
stinct inherent in every girl, peda- 
gogically utilizing the nurturing, play, 
work and childlife interests of young 
womanhood. Truly, for these young 
women it is not learned theses, but a 
little child that shall lead them. 
Infant Mortality Meeting 
The next meeting of the American 
Association for the Study and Preven- 
tion of Infant Mortality will be held 
in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, October 
19-21, 1916. 
The section on Eugenics will hold no 
meeting. Prof. M. F. Guyer, of the 
University of Wisconsin, who is now 
chairman of the eugenics committee, is 
arranging a meeting for 1917. 
