264 THE TREND OF THE RACE 



types of the white and colored races in the United States; also 

 that the class of white men who have intercourse with colored 

 women are, as a rule, of an inferior type." Those familiar with 

 the life and ways of negroes and mulattoes especially in our 

 cities where the mulattoes are relatively abundant will be in- 

 clined to agree that the facts stated by Hoffman represent more 

 nearly the typical kinds of black-white matings that occur and 

 have occurred since the Civil War, than the theories of Reuter 

 as to how they might have occurred. If there is enough ability 

 in the selected negro stock to account for the superiority of the 

 mulatto when mated with ordinary white parentage we should 

 certainly find a considerable number of cases in which both black 

 parents were of a superior type and who would be expected to 

 produce ofTspring at least the equal of the better mulattoes. 

 Pure blacks of proven native ability of high order are in fact 

 rare. The fact that mulattoes, despite their relatively inferior 

 white parentage, are in all countries, superior to the blacks, is 

 strongly indicative of a marked difference in the average in- 

 tellectual capacity of the two races. 



It is scarcely necessary to point out that the intellectual 

 superiority of the mulatto over the negro affords no sufficient 

 ground for advocating the amalgamation of the negro and white 

 races. If the mulatto has a better mind than the negro, he is 

 apparently inferior to him in physique and is inferior in every way 

 to the whites. Any system of cross breeding which means the 

 substitution of mulatto for white children cannot be viewed as 

 anything but a serious menace. It is to be condemned, not only 

 from the biological standpoint, but because it would lead to social 

 and moral deterioration. To say that negro-white crosses are 

 undesirable on biological grounds, however, is not to assert that 

 race crossing is bad per se. If races are on the same level of 

 inherent physical and intellectual endowment their fusion may 

 produce a very desirable combination of qualities and might 

 give rise to a diversity of traits which would be socially valuable. 

 We have insufficient grounds for condemning crosses of races or 

 peoples per se, but only those crosses which substitute an inter- 



