Diane B. Paul, Controlling Human Heredity: 1865 to the Present (Humanities Press International, Atlantic Highlands, NJ, 1995). 157 pp. ISBN 0-391-03916-4 (paperback).
As the author of this history of eugenics notes, from 1880 to 1930 mental, temperamental, and moral traits were assumed to be inherited. As a corollary arose the belief that society should foster breeding of those who possessed favorable traits and discourage or prevent the breeding of those who did not. This book traces the history of these beliefs, unfortunately a preeminently American history, and tries to connect it with present-day concerns about the problems which might arise in the development of "genetic medicine."
The word eugenics itself was coined by Francis Galton in 1883. His definitions (he produced several) were rather innocuous if taken at their face value but today eugenics is considered bad because of the extremes to which it was carried, the restrictive uses to which it was put, and the importance and influence it had in determining government policies, ranging from the sterilization of those deemed unfit to the denial of entrance to the United States of peoples and races "proved" to be blatantly inferior.
The excesses of the eugenics movement are well detailed in these pages. Some of this information has already been reported in this Newsletter (see p. 13, Winter 1995; p. 42, Fall 1995; p. 30, Winter 1996), but here it is available in extenso, with chapter and verse. Some of these excesses strike us now as risible or, as the author says, "from ludicrous to loathsome." The legion of middle-class women hired to judge at a glance the heredity of rural families on the basis of the "trait books" with which they armed themselves. These American "family studies" workers identified rural clans beset by pauperism, prostitution, insanity, and crime. State fairs all boasted "Eugenics Buildings" where exhibits portrayed the verities of eugenics charts of "Marriages: Fit and Unfit," as well as of "Unifit Human Traits" and exhortations to improve the breeding of humans as we do of animals: "Selected parents will have better children. THIS is the great aim of eugenics."
Perhaps the most unsettling passages in this book are those detailing the racist beliefs, inspired by eugenics, of such figures as Theodore Roosevelt and Calvin Coolidge. In the words of the author, "Roosevelt probably did more than any other individual to bring the views of academic race theorists to ordinary Americans." He repeatedly called for the need to "keep out races which do not assimilate with our own," and during his presidency repeatedly called for curbs on immigration. Coolidge echoed eugenicists' racial views when he asserted that "there are racial considerations too grave to be brushed aside . . . divergent peoples will not mix or blend. The Nordics propagate themselves successfully. With other races, the outcome shows deterioration on both sides."
One of the most telling subjects discussed is the sorry misuse of inteligence testing. Nearly half of white draftees were feeble minded. Some 40% of foreign-born draftees had a mental age of less than eight as compared with 21% of the native-born!
The author does not limit her book, as I have limited my review, to eugenics in the United States. There is an excellent chapter on the vicissitudes of the movement in Great Britain and the role of such luminaries as Darwin, Wallace, and Galton, who battled over their divergent views. There is also a discussion of eugenics in Germany and Scandinavia. The Law for the Prevention of Genetically Diseased Progeny passed just two months after the Nazis' rise to power, allowed for compulsory sterilization. Eugenics were also popular in the Sandinavian countries. In Germany the sterilization law was the prelude to murder. A registry of Gypsies was compiled and was used to round them up for transport to concentration camps. The German sterilization program was followed in 1939 by a euthanasia program designed to rid the nation of its mental patients, "useless eaters." This has already been mentioned on p. 42 of our Fall 1995 issue, where I reported that one of the first victims of this policy was Hitler's mentally ill half-sister. At any rate, the technology of the gas chamber was first developed in connection with this program.
The last chapter, "From Eugenics to Human Genetics,"details the author's concerns that present-day genetic counseling, amniocentesis, and genetic testing for inherited diseases, all characterized as "human genetics," may be but an individualized version of eugenics. Legal considerations spur doctors to promote the use of tests. Biotechnology manufacturers want to make money. Insurers want to save the costs of paying for the care of a defective child. Once abortion was made legal, there was a rationale for carrying out the tests and acting on the results. Nevertheless, to my mind, there is a great difference between a government acting by fiat in what it considers the best interests of the society (henced forced sterilization) and an individual acting in what he or usually she considers in her best interests on the basis of information and counseling founded on the results of individual tests. An interesting concern, that of the author, but not one with which I agree.
- Irma S. Jarcho
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