November 18, 1921] 



SCIENCE 



483 



distant races should — until we have collected more 

 knowledge — be avoided. 



Doctor Mj0en has requested the writer to 

 add his comments and to epitomize the situa- 

 tion in America. The writer has sent the 

 following reply: 



In general I approve of the Program for 

 Race Hygiene issued from the Winderen Labora- 

 torium in May, 1908, under Dr. Jon Alfred Mji/ien, 

 but I would like to add that there are special as- 

 pects of the problem as presented in America. 



(a) Education. — The aspect of the race hygiene 

 or eugenics movement which interests us most with 

 respect to the United States of America is popular 

 education. Legislation, both positive and negative, 

 in this ooimtry mil be of little avail unless sup- 

 ported by widespread popular knowledge and popu- 

 lar sentiment. When we witness the amazing prog- 

 ress that has been made in this country during the 

 last twenty-five years regarding personal hygiene 

 and especially the manner in which the discoveries 

 of Pasteur, of Koch, of Lister, of Dakin, Carrel and 

 others have become matters of common knowledge 

 and practise among the people, we should not de- 

 spair of creating similar widespread reform in 

 family life through popular education. In fact an 

 excellent beginning has been made in our schools 

 and colleges towards both positive and negative 

 race hygiene. Matters which were not considered 

 proper even to mention twenty years ago are now 

 simply and naturally spoken of as being of very 

 great importance to the future of the race. 



(6) State Legislation. — ^Many of the American 

 state governments have become suddenly aroused to 

 the fact that money which should be devoted to 

 education, to public utilities, to sound and healthy 

 amusement of our population, is diverted to the 

 humanitarian care of members of society who are 

 of no service to the state and who, unless eared for 

 and segregated, are actually a menace to the state 

 as well as a very serious economic loss. 



(c) Immigration. — The American political prin- 

 ciple that all men are created free and equal, while 

 designed to indicate that all men should have equal 

 rights before the law, has been interpreted to mean 

 racial equality in intellectual, spiritual, moral, and 

 physical endowment; investigations made during 

 the World War struck a very hard blow to such 

 American optimism. We discovered, for example, 

 that our people, on the average, had lost two and a 

 half inches in stature since the Civil War; that 

 races like the English, the Irish, and the Scotch, 

 coming from a similar geographic region, show 



marked inequality in intelligence. At the very bot- 

 tom of the list stand certain races from central 

 Europe which have been coming to America in 

 enormous nimibers. It is facts of this kind, brought 

 by anthropologists to the attention of the Ameri- 

 can Congress, which have led to a very careful sur- 

 vey and restriction of immigration. 



(d) The Outloolc. — While we are aware that we 

 are rapidly losing some of the best elements of oui 

 old American stock, which is being replaced in some 

 regions by very inferior stock, we do not regard the 

 outlook as discouraging, provided we act imme- 

 diately, without prejudice, and openly, and make 

 OUT strongest appeal to national sentiment. Amer- 

 ica has shown over and over again that she can 

 make any sacrifice, and make it very quickly, if she 

 is assured that the sacrifice is necessary for the 

 preservation of her institutions on which the com- 

 mon safety and welfare depend. Consequently this 

 is no time for discouragement, but the time for a 

 very strong appeal to the patriotism of our people. 



At a meeting of the members of the Inter- 

 national Commission, namely, Leonard Dar- 

 win (President of the first Congress), Lucien 

 March (representative of the French Govern- 

 ment), Eaymond Pearl (of Johns Hopkins 

 University), Charles B. Davenport (of the 

 Carnegie Institution of Washington, Cold 

 Spring Harbor, New York), in consultation 

 with ten leading representatives from other 

 countries and from the United States, an 

 ad interim committee was appointed to con- 

 tinue the work of the Congress until a 

 permanent American committee could be 

 selected by the main International Commis- 

 sion, which has its seat in London. In this 

 connection the following letter was addressed 

 by the writer to Professor Irving Fisher of 

 Tale University: 



October the eleventh. 

 Nineteen hundred twenty-one 



You will recall that the Congress authorised the 

 appointment of an ad interim committee to carry 

 on the work in America prior to the appointment 

 by the International Commission. I have consulted 

 with Major Leonard Darwin and Dr. Jon Alfred 

 Mj0en on this subject and they agree with me that 

 the wisest choice we could make of a Chairman is 

 Professor Irving Fisher of Yale University. The 

 ad interim committee will then be composed as fol- 

 lows: 



