254 INBREEDING AND OUTBREEDING 



The United States has been confronted by this grave 

 question for some time. In Africa it has hardly yet come 

 to the fore, but within three generations it will be recog- 

 nized as the political and economic problem. What the 

 solution will be, no one knows. It seems an unnecessary 

 accompaniment to humane treatment, an illogical exten- 

 sion of altruism, however, to seek to elevate the black 

 race at the cost of lowering the white. And the state- 

 ment is made with all due regard to the fact that there 

 are certain desirable characteristics existent in the black 

 race, and that unquestionably the two races overlap in 

 general inlierent capacity. The white race as a whole is 

 not equal to the black race in resistance to several serious 

 diseases, as the medical records of the United States 

 army show. The two strains have built up disease resist- 

 ance along different lines, and the addition of both 

 sets of immunity factors would be desirable. But the 

 practical attainment of such a benefit, given the genetic 

 premises, is so improbable as to be negligible, apart from 

 other considerations. 



What would be the result of racial intermixture be- 

 tween the yellow and the white is not so certain. Both 

 races have produced high types. Can one say that either 

 is on the whole the better ? The Chinese, the development 

 of very early tribal mixtures, have had a great productive 

 period. In a sense their productivity has decreased, yet 

 their germ plasm is unquestionably good. The Japanese, 

 the result of a much later racial amalgamation, have de- 

 veloped into a wonderful people. Whether it is fair to 

 say the white race is the greater because in the past two 

 centuries they have made such wonderful contributions 

 to civilization is a question. The contributions of the 



