INTERNATIONAL CONGRESS OF EUGENICS 5 



whole; and, if this be so, the cure should be as wide- 

 spread as the disease. Many methods, including volun- 

 tary sterilization stimulated by some carefully regulated 

 pressure, must be utilized in the future in order to les- 

 sen the rate of multiplication of the lower half of 

 humanity, and in this endeavor I hope to see America 

 also playing a leading part. 



Turning to what is called positive eugenics, that is to 

 the methods of increasing the fertility of all the better 

 stocks, here there is now a crying need for a bold for- 

 ward movement. The very first step should be to make 

 certain indisputable truths so widely known that they 

 shall come to affect the everyday life of the whole na- 

 tion. All should be made to realize that those stocks in 

 which the families are habitually limited so as to con- 

 tain only one or two children, are, in fact, disappearing 

 off the face of the earth. Science has now taught us 

 that each time that procreation takes place, one half of 

 the hereditary endowment allotted to a human being for 

 that occasion is actually thrown away, the half retained 

 being joined up with a similar half from the other 

 parent, these two together making up the full endow- 

 ment needed by the child. But if half the then avail- 

 able hereditary endowment disappears with the appear- 

 ance of every child, it follows that there must be on the 

 average at the very least two children in each family — 

 there really must be three or more — if the stream of life 

 which is thus being passed on to future generations is 

 not in time to run quite dry. Those stocks in which 

 families are deliberately restricted to less than three are 

 at each generation failing to transmit a large portion of 

 their natural qualities to their descendants, and poster- 

 ity really should not look upon them as forming part of 

 their ancestry. As to those who have a right to review 

 their family history with any satisfaction and who are 

 nevertheless using contraceptive methods so freely that 

 their blood must necessarily be thus watered down by 

 interbreeding with other stocks, they are in fact refus- 



