RURAL HEALTH MENTAL 221 



fied local officials or, perhaps better, by the utilization of properly 

 qualified volunteer social workers, or existing local private or- 

 ganizations and societies, already dealing with dependents or 

 delinquents. This systematic supervision and control, could eas- 

 ily be made to cover an entire State, and would obviate the 

 present needless, costly and futile reduplication of effort. 



The most immediately practical method of prevention is that 

 of intelligent segregation. The average family is entirely free 

 from mental defect. It is possible that a real eugenic survey of 

 a given locality might show that 90 per cent, of the feeble- 

 mindedness in that locality was contributed by 5 per cent, of 

 the families in that community. The proposed governmental 

 supervision of the feeble-minded, with its sequence of registra- 

 tion, extra-institutional visitation, accumulation of personal and 

 family histories, cooperation with private organizations, public 

 school classes for defectives, and mental clinics, would soon indi- 

 cate the individuals most likely to breed other defectives. The 

 families with strong potentiality of defect would be recognized 

 and located. We know that if both parents are hereditarily 

 feeble-minded, all the children will be defective, and that if one 

 parent is feeble-minded, on an average half of the children will 

 be defective. Families and settlements of the Kallikak, Nam or 

 Hill-folk class, the so-called hovel type, can be broken up and 

 terminated by segregation of the members of the child-bearing 

 age. Every feeble-minded girl or woman of the hereditary type, 

 especially of the moron class, not adequately protected,, should 

 be segregated during the reproductive period. Otherwise she 

 is almost certain to bear defective children, who, in turn, breed 

 other defectives. The male defectives are probably less likely 

 to become parents, but many male morons also should be segre- 

 gated. This segregation carried out thoroughly for even one 

 generation would largely reduce the number of the feeble- 

 minded. 



The cost of segregation will be large, but not so large as the 

 present cost of caring for these same persons, to say nothing of 

 their progeny in future generations. These people are seldom 

 self-supporting and most of them are eventually supported by 

 the public in some way. From the economic standpoint, alone, 

 no other investment could be so profitable. The present genera- 



