Am  Jour.  Pharm. ) 
November,  1920. ) 
Law-Making. 
829 
WK  TAI,K  EUGENICS  AND  PRACTICE)  ANTI-E)UGENICS. 
One  who  should  study  the  accompHshed  and  attempted  legisla- 
tion  of  the  last  quarter  of  a  century  might  reasonably  arrive  at  the 
conclusion  that  the  chief  object  of  civil  government  is  to  protect 
the  mentally  incompetent,  the  morally  weak  or  vicious  and  the 
physically  unfit.  He  would  observe,  for  example,  that  the  law 
makes  it  difficult  to  secure  useful  and  necessary  drugs  for  the  treat- 
ment of  the  mentally  and  morally  competent  in  order  to  keep  them 
out  of  the  hands  of  degenerates  who  might  use  them  to  their  own 
hurt.  He  would  discover  legislation  to  handicap  the  enterprising 
and  progressive  business  man  in  order  to  enable  the  less  enterprising 
and  less  progressive  to  succeed.  He  would  note  the  legislation 
of  trade  union  rules  designed  to  penalize  the  skilled  and  industrious 
artisan  and  prohibit  him  from  producing  more  or  better  work  than 
the  unskilled  and  lazy.  He  would  discover  numberless  schemes, 
either  accomplished  or  in  process  of  accomplishment,  designed  to 
pension  the  lazy,  incompetent  and  wasteful  members  of  society  and 
to  collect  the  pensions  from  the  industrious,  competent  and  eco- 
nomical members.  He  would  observe  parlor  philosophers  talking 
about  the  importance  of  developing  a  mentally  fit  and  physically 
strong  and  virile  race  and  advocating  governmental  and  social 
policies  designed  to  produce  the  opposite. 
Since  we  have  such  an  abundance  of  societies  and  devices  in- 
tended to  favor  and  protect  weaklings  and  degenerates,  would  it 
not  be  timely  for  humane  people  to  establish  a  society  to  protect 
the  rights  of  those  who  are  neither  weak  nor  vicious,  who  exercise 
a  proper  restraint  upon  their  appetites  and  passions,  who  are  indus- 
trious and  thrifty,  and  in  every  way  prove  their  right  to  respectful 
consideration? 
Is  it  not  time  to  return  to  the  viewpoint  of  the  fathers  of  the 
republic  as  to  the  proper  functions  of  government,  and  to  realize 
that  the  sane  and  decent  members  of  society  possess  certain  inalien- 
able rights  of  which  they  should  not  be  deprived  in  order  to  confer 
special  benefits  upon  those  who  do  not  deserve,  or  who  have  abused 
the  privileges  of  citizenship? 
No  good  citizen  would  willingly  oppose  any  sane  attempt  to  re- 
form whatever  may  be  amiss  in  our  social  or  political  institutions, 
but  surely  we  are  entitled  to  demand  that  such  reforms  be  framed 
with  due  regard  for  the  rights  of  the  innocent  bystander. 
