Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 11.djvu/298

 282 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY

Among us today marriage is a sexual union recognized by law, which is not necessarily entered into for the procreation of children, and, as a matter of fact, frequently remains childless. Mr. Galton seems, however, to mean a sexual union in which the offspring are the essential feature. The distinction is important, for the statements made about one kind of marriage would not hold good for the other. Then, again, by " restrictions " do we mean legal enactments or voluntary self-control ?

Mr. Galton summarizes some of the well-known facts which show the remarkable elasticity of the institution of marriage. By implication he asks whether it would not be wise further to modify marriage by limiting or regulating procreation, thus introducing a partial or half monogamy, which may perhaps be called borrowing a term from botany hemigamy. I may point out that a fallacy seems to underlie Mr. Galton's implied belief that the hemigamy of the future, resting on scientific principles, can be upheld by a force similar to that which upheld the sexual taboos of primitive peoples. These had a religious sanc- tion which we can never again hope to attain. No beliefs about benefits to posterity can have the powerful sanction of savage taboos. Primitive marriage customs are not conventions which everyone may preach for the benefit of others, and anyone dispense with for himself.

There is one point in Mr. Galton's paper which I am definitely unable to accept. It seems to be implicitly assumed that there is an analogy between human eugenics and the breeding of domestic animals. I deny that analogy. Animals are bred for points, and they are bred by a superior race of animals, not by themselves. These differences seem fundamental. It is important to breed, let us say, good sociologists ; that, indeed, goes without saying. But can we be sure that, when bred, they will rise up and bless, us? Can we be sure that they will be equally good in the other relations of life, or that they may not break into fields for which they were not bred, and spread devastation? Only a race of supermen, it seems to me, could successfully breed human varieties and keep them strictly chained up in their several stalls.

And if it is asserted that we need not breed for points, but for a sort of general all-round improvement, then we are very much in the air. If we cannot even breed fowls which are both good layers and good table birds, is it likely that we can breed men who will not lose at other points what they gain at one? (Moreover, the defects of a quality seem sometimes scarcely less valuable than the quality itself.) We know, indeed, that there are good stocks and bad stocks, and my own small observations have suggested to me that we have scarcely yet realized how subtle and far-reaching hereditary influences are. But the artificial manipulation of human stocks, or the conversion of bad into good, is still all very dubious.

It would be something, however, if we could put a drag on the propagation of definitely bad stocks, by educating public opinion and so helping forward the hemigamy, or whatever it is to be called, that Mr. Galton foresees. When two stocks are heavily tainted, and both tainted in the same direction, it ought to be generally felt that union, for the purposes of procreation, is out of the question. There ought to be a social conscience in such matters. When, as in a case known to me, an epileptic woman conceals her condition from the man she marries, it ought to be felt that an offense has been committed serious enough to annul the marriage contract. At the same time, we must avoid an extreme scrupulosity. It is highly probable that a very slight taint may benefit rather than injure a good stock. There are many people whose intellectual ability, and even virtues as good citizens, seem to be intimately bound up with the stimulating presence of some obscure "thorn in the flesh," some slight congenital taint. To sum up: (i) let us always carefully define our terms ; (2) let us, individually and as a nation, do our best to accumulate data on this matter, following, so far as we can, the example so nobly set us by Mr. Galton ; (3) let us educate public opinion as to the immense gravity of the issues at stake ; (4), in the present state of our knowledge, let us be cautious about laying down practical regulations which may perhaps prove undesirable, and in any case are impossible to enforce.