212 



The Journal of Heredity 



less lackin<:^ in the normal sex instincts. 

 The college has been the means of 

 selecting from the general poijulation 

 the less normal type. This conclusion 

 seems to be confirmed by the discovery 

 of Johnson and Stutzmann that Welles- 

 ley women who do not graduate have a 

 higher birth rate than those who do, 

 that is, they approach more nearly to 

 the norm, while those who attain to the 

 highest intellectual honors, Phi Beta 

 Kai)pa, Durant and Wellesley scholar- 

 ships, yield the lowest birth rate or are 

 farthest from the norm. Professor Cat- 

 tell, as cited by those authors, finds also 

 that the wives of American men of 

 science are on the average prolific in 

 recijjrocal proportion to the degree of 

 their college attainments. We regret 

 that the Syracuse records did not 

 furnish data for further evidence on 

 this point* 



NO CAUSE FOR ALARM 



If our reasoning is correct, are we not 

 unduly alarmed at the eugenic disaster 

 which seems to threaten from the low 

 birth rate of this supiJoscdly superior 

 class of women? It is doubtful if they 

 are a superior class excc]jt in a strictly 

 limited sense — often a ]nirely intellectual 

 sui^eriority. In reality they represent a 

 highly specialized class of low fecundity, 

 a severely selected type, as Johnson has 

 ])ointed out, but not well selected for 

 the foundation of a great racial stock 

 from a eugenic standpoint. They are 

 of great value to society in their way 

 and deserving of having their fine 

 ciualities developed to the utmost and 

 utilized in the needs of society. For 

 many of them, doubtless, the college 

 courses heretofore offered are well 

 adai)ted and have been the means of 

 bringing to fruition the socially valual)le 

 (jualities which they i)ossessed. It is 

 not to be supi)osed that a difl"erent tyjje 

 of college training would have been de- 



sirable for them, nor is it evident that 

 any other form of education would 

 have increased their reproductiveness 

 materially. On the contrary, many 

 would have become restless under the 

 system and would ha\'e sought relief in 

 some atmosphere that aijpealed more to 

 their purely intellectual asjjirations. 

 But the college should also ])rovide for 

 the needs of their sisters whose domestic 

 and motherly instincts seek eciually if 

 less obtrusively the opportunity for fvill 

 development and expression. The re- 

 sult would not be to increase the re- 

 i:)roduCtive qualities of that type of 

 woman which the higher edvication has 

 heretofore cherished, but wovild attract 

 to a higher education the t\-pe of woman 

 which is naturally more rei:)roductive. 

 These normal, "all-round," "red- 

 blooded" women are the really superior 

 type and the college should provide a 

 course of training attractive to their 

 instincts and intended to develop all 

 their innate powers and cai)acitics to the 

 highest efficiency. 



Since this paper was ready for the 

 ])ress the marriage rates for coeduca- 

 tional institutions recently ])ublishtd by 

 the editor of the Journal-^ have come 

 to my attention and seem to give 

 some additional support to this view. 

 For the institutions yielding the highest 

 marriage rates arc state schools that 

 make much of courses in applied 

 science ada]jted to the interests of home 

 builders and social efiiciency. Syracuse 

 and Stanford, more closely confined to 

 the classics, humanities, and pure science, 

 l)resent figures so nearly identical for 

 the same period as to be, the editor 

 remarks in a private letter, "uncanny." 



There remains for discussion the 

 comjjarison of our tables with similar 

 tables comi)iled for other institutions 

 such as the work of Dr. John C. Phillijis 

 on Harvard and Yale students'' and 

 Prof. Robert J. Sprague's ligxires for 



* Stanford's MarriaRC Kate. JotkN.M. ok Hkkiodity, viii, ]^). 170-173, Ai)rii, 1917. See 

 also Coeducation and MarriaKf. Joirnai, ok IIkkkditv, viii, ])]). 43-45, January, 1917. Stanford 

 and Syracuse are at o|)iJO.site sides of the continent; tlu- niarriaKe rate of their j^raduates for the 

 last decade of the nineteenth century is as follows: 



Men ]\'otneti 



Stanford 73.2% 48.5% 



Syracuse 72.7 48 . 6 



« PhiUips, John C. Op. n't. 



