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CHAPTER I
CERTAIN POPULATION PROBLEMS
Child-Protection and the Population Question.—In the struggle for existence among the nations, that nation is the victor which consists of the greatest number of individuals best endowed with bodily, mental, and moral health.
No national entity can resist the attacks of others if its numerical strength is comparatively small. If a contest takes place between two nations whose numerical strength is approximately equal, the healthier of the two will gain the victory.
Even in prehistoric times a minimal degree of Child-Protection was indispensable to tribal existence. To rear children diminished, indeed, the quantity of wealth available to maintain the life of the parents, and consequently rendered even more difficult than before the struggle with the hostile forces of nature. None the less, it was absolutely essential to rear a minimal number of children. A sufficient number of boys must be reared to maintain the ranks of the warriors needed for the protection of the tribe against the attacks of its neighbours; and since tribal wars were unceasing, the number requisite to replace those who fell in battle was considerable; girls also must be reared in numbers sufficient to be the mothers of the required number of warriors. But it was against the tribal interest that more children than these should come into the world; and it was desirable that superfluous infants should perish.
The most important factors in human evolution are the quantity and the quality of individual human beings. Until quite recently it is only upon quantity of population that any stress has been laid: the quality of the population has been ignored; being either taken for granted, or regarded as dependent upon chance conditions. The problems of population were not recognised as quantitative and qualitative, but were believed to be quantitative merely. Both Socialism and Child-Protection have intimate associations alike with the quantitative and with the qualitative problems of population. Both Socialism and Child-Protection exert a powerful influence upon the quantity and the quality of human beings; and conversely these latter react no less powerfully upon Socialism and Child-Protection.
The leading aim of Child-Protection is to prevent the death of children before they attain an age at which they become competent to contribute directly to the welfare of society. The next most important aim of Child-Protection is to ensure that the individual whose life has been preserved shall not become useless or dangerous to society. These leading aims may be pithily summarised in the following terms: “the prevention of a high mortality-rate,” and “the prevention of a high criminality-rate.” The main factor of a high mortality-rate is excessive mortality in childhood; and the main factor of a high criminality-rate is excessive criminality in childhood. (The rate of mortality affects the quantitative element, and the rate of criminality affects the qualitative element, of the race.)
In the course of human racial history certain sentiments make their appearance (parental love, altruism, and humanism), in consequence of which, even among nations to which the fear of a declining population is no longer known, actions endangering the health or the life of children come to be regarded as immoral and punishable; these sentiments subsequently constitute the main foundations of Child-Protection. But a recognition of the expediency of Child-Protection, and a desire to increase the population, have also at all times exercised a very great influence upon the degree to which methods of Child-Protection have been adopted and enforced. In any community in which an increase in numbers would involve over-population, an individual has, ceteris paribus, less value than in a community in which no such risk has to be considered; for this reason, in the latter community, more stress will be laid upon Child-Protection than in the former community.
The following examples will show that this reasoning is sound. As a result of the wide acceptance of the “mercantile theory” of political economy, inasmuch as this theory laid much stress upon the importance of an increase in population, the care of foundlings came to receive much more attention, even in Protestant countries. Moreover, though it is an indisputable fact that the fierce attack made by Malthus, in his widely celebrated work on The Principles of Population, upon the Foundling Hospitals of his day, was directed especially against the fact that these institutions received children quite unconditionally, yet it is also perfectly true that Malthus’s views regarding Foundling Hospitals harmonise perfectly with his ideas as to the possibilities and dangers of over-population. Although some authors maintain that the connection we have pointed out obtains only among comparatively uncivilised peoples, and that as civilisation progresses, sentiment alone is decisive in forming our views in the matter of Child-Protection, those who advance such a contention may be referred to the example of modern France.
The following conception is dominant in France. It is sad but true that the number of births hardly shows any excess over the number of deaths—nay, that in certain years the births are fewer than the deaths; hence it happens that the population of the other states of Europe increases much more rapidly than the population of France. It is essential that something should be done to counteract this difference, by which the position of France as one of the great Powers of Europe may ultimately be endangered. Since all the laws and regulations which have been instituted with a view to increasing the birth-rate have remained fruitless, some new method must be found of bringing about a more marked excess of births over deaths. Since excessive mortality among children is the principal cause of a high death-rate, the State and the community must take all the steps in their power to reduce child mortality to a minimum.
Fertility of the Lower Classes.—In the civilised countries of twentieth-century Europe, the mean birth-rate is about thirty; that is, for every thousand inhabitants, there are thirty births each year; France is far below this mean, with a birth-rate of twenty-one, and Russia far above, with a birth-rate of about forty-nine. In the country districts, fertility and the birth-rate are greater than in the towns. Transient variations in the birth-rate depend upon various disturbing factors, such as war, civil disorders, and rise in the prices of the necessaries of life.
The lower the type of life, the greater is the insecurity of existence; and it is necessary that this should be counterbalanced by greater vigour of the forces of reproduction, and a consequent increase in the number of the offspring. Thus differences between the different species have a great influence upon the procreativeness of these species, so that there is a direct causal connection between the quality of a species and the number of the individuals of which it is made up. But it remains in dispute whether the rise (or fall) in the quantity, directly gives rise to a decline (or increase) in the quality; whether, within the limits of an individual species, the quantitative differences between the individuals making up that species are of importance; whether, within the limits of a single species, the individual members are more fertile in proportion as they stand at a lower level in development; and, finally, whether the fertility of the individuals of any species diminishes as the species advances in its evolution.
As regards the fertility of the human species, the decisive influences are not physiological, but social. The view that higher brain development or prolonged intellectual activity restricts fertility has been rightly contested. Undoubtedly, powerful intellectual activity tends to inhibit the sexual impulse, but this is no less true of great physical exertions. The causes of the high birth-rate among the lower classes of the population are the following:—
(a) Members of the proletariat have to marry earlier in life than those belonging to the middle and the upper classes.
(b) A smaller proportion of the proletariat suffers from venereal infection.
(c) Owing to the overcrowded condition of their dwellings, those belonging to the poorer classes find it far more difficult to observe “prudential restraint.”
(d) The poor make less use than the well-to-do of positive methods for the prevention of conception.
(e) To those belonging to the poorer classes, to have children is often economically advantageous. A child can help in the work of the household, and can early engage in some occupation enabling it to contribute towards the expenses. On the other hand, in the case of the comparatively well-to-do, a large family involves the risk of a depression in the standard of life.
(f) Women of the middle and upper classes are far more afraid than working-class women of pregnancy and childbirth. They actually suffer more from these eventualities, because their sheltered life makes them weaker and more susceptible; in many cases also they shirk motherhood because they think that pregnancy will interfere with their “social duties.”
An excessive number of conceptions, pregnancies, and deliveries is harmful, not merely from the outlook of the domestic economist, but also from that of the political economist. If the aim of the State is to secure a population which is not merely numerous, but also of good quality, care must be taken that the number of conceptions, pregnancies, and deliveries shall not be unduly great; for when the number of births is exceedingly large, it is very likely that the number of those to attain maturity will actually be less than if the birth-rate had been lower.
We have to take into consideration, not only the difference between the birth-rate and the death-rate, but also the important matter of the actual number of births and deaths. Although in any two cases the terminal results may be identical, it is a matter of grave economic moment how the figures are comprised by which these identical results are attained. If, to effect a certain increase in population, a comparatively large number of births and deaths has been requisite, there has been an enormous waste of time, energy, and wealth.
The large families of the proletariat provide a greater supply of labour, and this leads to a fall in wages. Because wages are lower, there results, in turn, an increase in the birth-rate. The great number of conceptions among the proletariat interferes with the effective working of selective forces—an evil which every unprejudiced thinker must deplore, and must endeavour to remedy to the utmost of his ability. The most important means available for this purpose are: first, a rise in wages, and, secondly, the use by the proletariat of positive methods to restrict or prevent procreation.
Parents should procreate so many children only as they are in a position to maintain and educate in a suitable manner; it is obvious, therefore, that working-class families should be comparatively small. Yet to-day we see the exact opposite. Only among the well-to-do and the more intelligent sections of the population do we find that these principles are carried into effect. The tragic consequence is that the more prosperous and the comparatively intelligent procreate very few children, the very reverse of what is desirable. Rich people are in a position to have many children, and have but few; working-class parents, on the other hand, ought to have but few children, and they have a great many. If the weekly wage-earners were more prosperous and more intelligent, they would be in a position to have more children, but they would, in fact, have fewer in that case.
The Tendency of Evolution.—During the last quarter of the nineteenth century, a decline in the birth-rate set in in every civilised country in Europe, notwithstanding the fact that in all these countries the proletariat constitutes an ever-increasing proportion of the total population. The probable causes of this decline are: first, women’s dread of pregnancy, of childbirth, and of rearing children, and, secondly, pelvic contraction(?).
The death-rate is harder to control than the birth-rate. For the birth-rate is influenced to a far greater extent by factors which are under individual control; whereas, in the case of the death-rate, great natural forces are the chief determinants. Death comes to every one, whether his parents and other relatives desire it or not, but those only are born whose parents desire it. In this matter of the population problem, well-considered action will be directed where a result may be obtained with comparative ease. By this it is not meant to imply that the campaign against excessive mortality is to be altogether neglected; but rather that the campaign against an excessively high birth-rate demands more attention than it has hitherto received.
The tendency of evolution to-day is to effect a decline in the birth-rate. In the future far more attention will be paid, than has been paid in the past, to the demand of social hygiene that potential parents shall be careful to procreate healthy children only. On the other hand, the knowledge that will enable parents to prevent undesired conceptions will become more and more widely diffused. In times to come, an ever-increasing proportion of pregnancies will be deliberately willed.
The decline in the birth-rate will necessarily result in a decline in the death-rate, and more especially in a decline in the death-rate of infants and children. Ultimately, we shall see a decline, not merely in the birth-rate and the death-rate, but also in the difference between the total number of the births and of the deaths. It is beyond dispute that these figures are tending to become less variable and more constant than they were in former times.
CHAPTER II
STATISTICAL PROBLEMS OF POPULATION
Miscarriages, Premature Births, and Still-Births.—The statistical data regarding miscarriages, premature births, and still-births are somewhat untrustworthy. There is no general agreement as to the precise signification of these terms among the medical practitioners, coroners, and registrars of any one country—not to speak of differences in these matters in different countries; and this difficulty applies above all to the matter of still-births. In some countries, children dying during the act of birth or within a few hours after birth are regarded as born alive, but in others as still-born. When we are comparing the birth-rate and the death-rate in different countries, these causes of error must not be forgotten.
In the twentieth century, in the civilised countries of Europe, the premature births vary between 5 and 9 per cent., and the still-births between 3 and 4 per cent., of all births. For every 100 still-born girls there are approximately 130 still-born boys. Among the lower classes of the population, still-births are more frequent than among the upper classes. Within the same class, such births are more frequent among those living in unfavourable conditions than among those more favourably situated; and in manufacturing towns they are more frequent than in agricultural districts. The proportion is affected by the age of the mother, and still-births are at a minimum among mothers at ages from 20 to 25 years. In the course of time, notwithstanding the gigantic development of manufacturing industry, and in spite of the more accurate registration of still-births, the proportion of such births has diminished; the principal reason for this is the advance in medical science.
Mortality.—In the civilised countries of Europe the death-rate in the twentieth century varies between 15 and 32 per mille. Among the chief causes of transient variations in the death-rate are: war, civil disorders, and rise in prices. A rise in the price of the necessaries of life affects the lower classes of the population more especially, but its influence upon the general death-rate is trifling. Death-rate varies in accordance with occupation. The lower classes have a higher death-rate than the upper; the weekly wage-earners have a higher death-rate than the rest of the population; and mortality is greater in the towns than it is in the country. Of late years, there has been a gradual decline in the death-rate, the decline in the towns being proportionately greater than the decline in the country districts; in this case also the decline must be attributed mainly to the advance in medical science.
The Productive Age and the Unproductive Age.—The distinction of the productive age from the unproductive age is a matter of great importance. The former extends from the age of 15 to the age of 65; the latter, the unproductive age, comprises the years before the age of 15 and those after the age of 65. Certain other classifications of the population, such as the distinction of those of an age for school-attendance from those at other ages (those of the former age comprising about one-sixth of the population), and the distinction between youthful and adult criminals, are of no interest in relation to our special inquiry.
Classification of the Population according to Age.—In the civilised countries of modern Europe, persons at ages of 0 to 10 comprise about 24 per cent. of the population; those at ages 10 to 20 comprise about 20 per cent.; and those at ages 20 to 30 comprise about 16 per cent. of the population. Those under the age of 15 years comprise about 30 per cent. of the population, each year of life corresponding to from 2 to 3 per cent.; infants (those under 1 year) making up 3 per cent., and each year of life after that only a little more than 2 per cent. At all ages under 15 the boys are more numerous than the girls.
The age-pyramid of the population has a form which depends upon the birth-rate. When the birth-rate is higher, or the excess of births over deaths greater, the base of the pyramid is comparatively wide. Thus, in the majority of the civilised states of Europe, about 30 per cent. of the population consists of those under 15 years of age; but in France, where the birth-rate is exceptionally low, those under 15 years of age comprise a much smaller proportion of the total population.
In the country districts, the age-class of the children and the age-class of the old both contain proportionately larger numbers than the same age-classes in the towns. In the large towns and the manufacturing districts, there is an especially large proportion of persons of about 20 years of age. There are three reasons for this: first, the birth-rate is higher in the country districts; secondly, there is a drift from the country to the towns of persons of an age to earn a living; and, thirdly, a proportion of those who have grown old in the towns find their way back to the country.
The Excess of Women.—All the civilised countries of twentieth-century Europe contain more women than men. For every 1000 males there are invariably more than 1000 females. The excess of females is not usually greater than 5 per cent. Only in certain uncivilised countries of Europe do we find no excess of females. Whether we compare the total female population with the total male population, or compare only males and females of a marriageable age, the result is the same; the females are always in excess. Even in those countries in which women are comparatively less numerous, we still find an excess of women of a marriageable age.
This excess of women depends upon the following causes:—In civilised countries more boys are born than girls. The average excess of male births over females is 106:100. (In the case of illegitimate children, the excess of male births is not so great as in the case of legitimate children.) But in males the death-rate is much higher than it is in females. Especially high is the death-rate among male infants (in the first year of life), and among males during the ages at which they are competent to earn a livelihood. The reason given for the higher mortality of male infants is that their powers of resistance are inferior to those of female infants; during the productive years of life the death-rate of males is higher because, on the one hand, they have a far greater mortality than women from diseases of occupation, and, on the other hand, during this period of life males suffer far more than females from the effects of alcoholism, of criminality, and of various other factors exercising an unfavourable influence upon their death-rate.
Thus the excess of women is closely associated with that peculiarity of the modern system of production in virtue of which far more men than women are engaged in the work of production. This is obvious from the consideration that the death-rate of wage-earning women is higher than that of other women, and from the consideration that in great towns the ratio between the death-rates of the respective sexes is very different from what it is in the country districts. The excess of women is one of the causes of the failure of so many women to marry, of the birth of so many illegitimate children, of the wide diffusion of prostitution, &c. But it would be quite erroneous to attribute these various phenomena of our sexual life exclusively to the prevalent excess of women.
If in any country we desire to diminish the excess of women, it is necessary not merely to lessen the emigration of males, but also to diminish the death-rate of male children. This may be effected by reducing infant and child mortality in general, for measures that accomplish this reduction will lower the death-rate of boys to a greater extent than the death-rate of girls; for the higher the death-rate the greater the effect we can produce by measures effecting its diminution. Hence child-protection, the principal means for the diminution of infant and child mortality, is not only an important part of our campaign against the excessive mortality of male children, but will tend to redress the existing numerical inequality between the sexes, and thus to ameliorate the conditions of our social life.
The regulation of the birth of boys and girls (the determination of sex) would be an important means for the restoration of a proper numerical balance between the sexes, and would therefore be of value, not merely to interested individuals, but also to society at large. Unfortunately, contemporary science is not even in a position to ascertain the sex of the infant before birth; and still less are we in possession of such a knowledge of the determinants of sex as might enable us to procreate boys or girls at will. Should the astounding advance in medical science eventuate in the solution of this problem, it will then be in our power to restore the proper numerical balance of the sexes.
Marriage.—In the civilised countries of modern Europe the number of marriages per 1000 inhabitants of all ages is from 6 to 8; whilst for every 1000 inhabitants of a marriageable age the annual marriage rate is 50. Of 1000 men over 15 years of age from 400 to 700 are married, whilst of 1000 women over 15 years of age from 440 to 640 are married. A high marriage-rate is not per se either a favourable or an unfavourable manifestation; it is dependent upon economic conditions, and transient variations in the marriage-rate arise from the favourable or unfavourable economic conditions of the year in which these variations occur.
In consequence of the enormous development of the manufacturing industries, there has been a great increase in the numbers of those engaged in these industries; a large proportion of farm servants has been transformed into wage-earners of the towns. Since men of this latter class commonly marry young, whereas a comparatively small proportion of farm-servants marries, an increase in the marriage-rate has been noticeable during the latter half of the nineteenth century. But since the beginning of the present century a decline in the marriage-rate has become perceptible, and the causes of this decline are more difficult to ascertain. During the nineteenth century the divorce-rate underwent a continuous increase. The divorce-rate is higher in towns than in the country, and higher in thickly populated than in thinly populated countries.
Illegitimate Sexual Relations.—Except as regards the birth of illegitimate children, the only statistical data available regarding illegitimate sexual relations are those which have been obtained by private inquiries. The following are the most important statistics bearing on this question. The annual number of illegitimate births in Europe exceeds 600,000. In most European countries the illegitimate births constitute from 8 to 9 per cent. of the total births, and in every large country in Europe the illegitimate number several millions. From privately collected statistics we learn that in all civilised countries the great majority of unmarried mothers belong to the working classes and to the class of domestic servants; in many countries more than 80 per cent. of unmarried mothers may be thus classified. If from the number of illegitimate children we wish to deduce the probable number of unmarried mothers, we have always to bear in mind the fact that an unmarried mother commonly has one child only, whilst married women have on the average from three to four children. We learn from private statistics that of the fathers of illegitimate children not more than about 45 per cent. belong to the proletariat.
The relationship between the number of illegitimate births, on the one hand, and the number of legitimate births and the number of marriages, on the other, is, on one view, the following. The greater the number of marriages, the smaller will be the number of illegitimate births; the greater the average age at marriage, the greater also will be the number of illegitimate births. It is, indeed, extremely probable that a high marriage-rate leads to a low illegitimate birth-rate, and conversely; but we are not justified in regarding such a causal sequence as unquestionable. Variations in the marriage-rate and in the illegitimate birth-rate may be the joint consequences of other common factors.
Statistical Data.—The statistics relating to child mortality are in an exceptionally well-developed state, and no unprejudiced student of sociology can afford to ignore them. The literature of child mortality contains a number of extremely important and thoroughly trustworthy works; the reason for this may be that, in comparison with other difficult problems of population, the study of questions of child mortality is easier, because various disturbing influences which complicate adult death-rates have no bearing upon child mortality.
Even simpler is the question of infant mortality.[1] In computations dealing with this matter it is not necessary to make use of the figures of the general census, for the calculations are based simply upon the recorded births and deaths. The calendar year in which the birth took place does not come directly into the question at all. What we record is the rate per thousand at which, in or during a particular year, say 1909, infants have died before attaining the end of the first year of their life; some of these will have been born in the year 1909, others, of course, in the year 1908.
Nearly 30 per cent. of all deaths are infant deaths; about 10 per cent. of all deaths are those of children of ages one to five years; about 50 per cent. of all deaths are those of children from birth to fifteen years. The least dangerous section of human life is between the ages of ten and fifteen years. Child mortality, extremely heavy during the year of infancy, diminishes greatly after the completion of the first year, and diminishes enormously after the completion of the fifth year. In the civilised countries of Europe, at the end of the nineteenth and the beginning of the twentieth century, of every 1000 infants, from 100 to 300 die, on the average, every year. The attainable minimum of infant mortality, under conditions practically realisable to-day, may be regarded as about 70 per 1000. In families in which exceptionally favourable conditions prevail, the infant mortality rate is even lower than the figure just stated; in the families of the higher aristocracy and among the royal houses it is as low as one-half, and even as low as one-third, of this “practicable minimum” of 70 per 1000.
Since the middle of the eighteenth century there has, in nearly all the countries of Europe, been a decline in infant mortality, in the case alike of boys and of girls; this fall in the infantile death-rate is greater than the fall in the general death-rate. Although the data available justify this general statement, it is necessary to point out that authentic statistical data bearing on the question exist only in the case of small and isolated areas, such as individual towns; national registration of such particulars is of much more recent date than the middle of the eighteenth century.
Certain Contributory Causes.—The influence upon infant mortality of certain causes commonly regarded as important is in fact small. Statistical data prove beyond dispute that local and climatic factors exercise no direct influence at all upon the infantile death-rate; such influence as these factors do exercise is an indirect one, operating through the effect which climate and locality may have upon social conditions. The same qualification applies to the influence of race and of religion upon infant mortality. There are differences in the infantile death-rates as between Teutons and Slavs, and as between Christians and Jews; but these differences are in no way directly dependent upon the differences in race or in religion, and they must be ascribed to the differences in social conditions. Fertility is well known to exert a decisive influence upon infant mortality; but variations in fertility are not the direct effect of any differences in race or creed; they are a consequence of the varying social conditions in which those of the respective races or creeds actually live. Thus it is only in certain social conditions that Slavs are more fertile than Teutons, and Jews more fertile than Christians. The constitution of the parents exercises a considerable influence upon infant mortality; but the parental constitution must be regarded as largely dependent upon the social environment in which the parents themselves have grown to maturity.
The Chief Causes of Infant Mortality.—Among the commonly enumerated conditions affecting infant mortality the following are conspicuous: the proportion of infants reared by artificial feeding instead of being suckled; work for wages by the mothers of infants; the general intelligence of the lower classes of the population, and their knowledge of the care and management of infants; the general state of the public health, including such conditions as the degree to which the general population is enabled to avail itself of the medical knowledge of our time (in all the countries claiming to be “civilised,” bald official statistics prove beyond dispute that a large proportion of the children dying before attaining the age of one year die without having ever received any medical treatment whatever); the number of illegitimate births, &c. But all these conditions are in essence nothing more than social conditions. Thus we are practically justified in saying that the determining factors of infant mortality are social conditions and nothing else. With striking unanimity, those who have made a special study of this question formulate the conclusions summarised in the following paragraph.
The infantile death-rate is higher among the lower classes than it is among the upper. Within the limits of those making up what are termed “the lower classes,” the infantile death-rate is higher in proportion as the social conditions are unfavourable. The figure attained by the infantile death-rate depends above all upon the social circumstances and the earning capacity of the parents. Inasmuch as an infant does not possess the faculty of spontaneous change of place or of other spontaneous activity, since it is unable even to express its needs in an intelligible manner, its fate depends upon the soil in which it grows—its very life depends upon its environment. Such, from the social standpoint, is the essential characteristic of the age of infancy. The infant born of well-to-do parents has better chances of life than the infant born of poor parents, for the former lives in more favourable circumstances, and receives in every respect a better upbringing. It is a demonstrable fact that most children that die succumb, not from inherited weakness, but owing to the errors and defects of their upbringing.
The materials available in proof of this proposition are ample and incontrovertible. Whatever the place, the time, and the other conditions submitted to investigation, and whether the investigated materials be large or small, we are led invariably to the same conclusions. In the bourgeois (middle and upper) classes, only 8 per cent. of the children die during the first year of life, but among the proletariat the infantile death-rate is 30 per cent. Even more significant, if possible, are the following facts. The infantile death-rate is higher among illiterate wage-earners than it is among literate wage-earners; it is higher among casual labourers than it is amongst wage-earners permanently occupied. In the strata of the population above the manual workers, we find that the infantile death-rate is lower as we pass from strata in which social conditions are comparatively bad to strata in which they are comparatively good. The infantile death-rate and the income of the parents vary in inverse ratio. The differences in the infantile death-rate as we pass from the poorer quarters of our towns to the richer quarters tell always the same tale.
The Great Number of Children.—The chief cause of high infant mortality and of high child mortality among the lower strata of the population is the great size of their families. The number of conceptions, pregnancies, and births varies directly as the infantile death-rate. If out of a certain limited income more children have to be maintained, the share of each in the commodities purchasable out of that income necessarily diminishes. The income of the manual worker is so small that, even if his family is quite a small one, it is exceedingly difficult for him to provide out of that income what he and his wife and children need for the satisfaction of elementary vital needs. With every additional child comes a further limitation of supplies for each individual member of the family. Not only does this have a directly unfavourable influence upon health, inasmuch as each child receives a smaller share of dwelling-room, food, &c. In addition, as more and more children are born, the worth of the individual child in the eyes of the parents diminishes.
The mother’s health is apt to suffer from the rapid succession of conceptions, pregnancies, and deliveries. For various reasons this is disadvantageous to the children. A woman thus affected will subsequently bring more weakly children into the world; the mother whose health is poor is unable to give as much time and pains to the rearing of her children as she would if she were well and strong; many women whose health has been broken by unduly frequent pregnancies die during a subsequent pregnancy or delivery.
But may it not be that the relationship between a large number of births and a high infantile death-rate is the reverse of that which we have suggested? Is it not possible that the great mortality among children may be the cause of an increase in the number of conceptions, pregnancies, and births? It is true that certain purely psychological factors may contribute to such a causal sequence. To a certain degree a high infantile death-rate has such an effect. For if a woman gives birth to a diseased or a still-born child, or if one of her children dies, the parents are more likely than would otherwise be the case to desire to have another child, and the wife will be more ready to undertake the troubles of another pregnancy and the risks of another delivery.
The most important means for the diminution of child mortality is to improve the conditions of working-class life. It is indisputable that the more prosperous members of the working class have fewer children on the average than those who are not so well off; that in any region in which an improvement has taken place in the conditions of working-class life a fall in the birth-rate has ensued; that the poorer the condition of any stratum of the proletariat, the larger is the average family. An increase in the average working-class income will lead to a proportionately greater decline in the death-rate of infants and young children. For this increase in income will operate in two ways: in the first place, if the number of children remain the same, the rise in income will ensure for each child a larger share of the necessaries of life; and, in the second place, with the rise in income the size of the average family will diminish, and this will reduce the child mortality. Inasmuch as the height of the infantile death-rate depends mainly upon the great infant mortality among the lower strata of the population, every effort at reform in this direction must begin at the lower end of the social scale.
Child Mortality in the Towns.—A connection appears to exist between density of population and the death-rate: if the other conditions remain unchanged, the death-rate increases pari passu with increasing density of population. The question whether in the towns child mortality is higher than in the country districts has not yet been decisively answered; and it is equally uncertain whether from the hygienic standpoint the existing rural conditions are better than the urban. It appears probable that child mortality is higher in the towns than in the country districts; it is more doubtful, however, if the same can be said of infant mortality. The statistical data available on this question must be subjected to a stringent critical examination. The infant mortality which truly belongs to the towns appears smaller than it really is, for the reason that a proportion of the infants born in the towns are placed in the care of foster-parents living in the country, and some of these die in the country. It is equally true that many people from the country die in hospitals and other institutions in the towns; but this applies much more to adults than to children.
The proletariat constitutes a large majority of the inhabitants of the urban districts; the proportion of artificially reared children is greater than in the country, the housing conditions are less favourable, there is less opportunity for open-air life, venereal diseases are more prevalent, and fertility is lower. But against these considerations we must set the fact that the urban population is more intelligent, and for this reason better understands the various methods of artificial feeding of infants; the fact that charitable institutions are more effective in the towns, and the fact that in the towns better hygienic conditions prevail. The sanitary improvement of the towns by better cleansing of the streets, an improved water supply, better methods of disposing of sewage and refuse, &c., has led to a reduction not merely of the general urban death-rate, but also of the infantile urban death-rate; whereas in the country districts these rates have remained stationary, or have even undergone an increase. In wealthy towns the death-rate is lower than in poor towns; like differences are observed as between the rich and the poor quarters of one and the same town. Wealth has so marked an influence in lowering infant mortality that in the wealthy villa quarters of large towns the infantile death-rate may be as low as from 10 to 20 per mille.
The Effect of Housing Conditions.—The infantile death-rate is very closely connected with the character of the housing conditions. The rate of infant mortality in any particular dwelling varies directly with the number of inhabitants, and varies inversely with the number of rooms available per family. Those living in the upper stories of tenement houses have a higher death-rate than infants living in lower stories and basements. This influence of bad housing conditions in producing a rise in the infantile death-rate is only to be expected. The habitation exercises its influence upon the infant by day and by night, and through every detail of the infant’s life. To give one instance, there is an intimate connection between the quality of the dwelling and the quality of the infant’s food; in a suitable dwelling milk may be more readily kept cool, preserved from contamination, sterilised, &c.
The Effect of Age.—The degree to which bad conditions of life endanger health varies inversely with the age. The maximum danger to health from such conditions is incurred by infants. The younger the infant the greater the danger that bad conditions will prove fatal; and most of the environmental factors unfavourable to the maintenance of infant life come into operation immediately after birth. The younger the infant, the less resistant it is to external influences. Therefore the younger the infant, the more carefully does it need to be watched and safeguarded. Physicians and statisticians lay great stress upon the degree to which the infant’s chances of life depend upon its age in days and months.
Time of Birth, Seasons, and Meteorological Conditions.—Is it possible to demonstrate the existence of any connection between the time of birth and the temporal variations in the infantile death-rate? In the months in which the number of births is high, the infantile death-rate is probably also higher than at other times. This is true more especially of the very cold months, when infants cannot be taken freely into the open air; it is true also of the very hot months. It is well known that the annual curve of births exhibits two notable elevations—one in February and March, and the other in September; this depends on the fact that most conceptions take place, on the one hand, in the spring-time—that is, at the time of the general awakening of nature; and, on the other hand, in December, when nature reposes, and agricultural labours are at a standstill. But owing to the fact that the factors influencing infant mortality are so numerous and variable, it is not possible to demonstrate any definite relationship between the times of maximum births and the times of maximal infantile death-rate.
The seasons and the meteorological conditions exert an influence upon infant mortality through the intermediation of their effect upon various social conditions. The infantile death-rate is highest during the summer, the rate in the months of July, August, and September greatly exceeding that in the other months of the year. During the hot season, contaminated and decomposing milk gives rise to fatal illness on all sides. When we compare different years, we find that the height of the infantile death-rate varies directly with the heat of the summer. This influence of the hot season is exerted almost exclusively upon artificially reared infants, and especially on those in whom the technique of artificial feeding is improper. It is an established fact that the children of the well-to-do largely escape a similar fate, simply because that in their case it is possible to keep the milk artificially cool, and to prepare it more carefully in other ways.
CHAPTER IV
THE QUALITY OF THE POPULATION; ARTIFICIAL SELECTION (EUGENICS) AND EDUCATION
Natural Selection and Artificial Selection.—The selective method practised by Nature works by means of the procreation of millions of individuals, and by the subsequent elimination of those individuals which are imperfectly or not at all adapted to their environing conditions; that is to say, natural selection operates repressively or destructively. Artificial selection, on the other hand, aims at preventing the procreation of individuals inadequately adapted to their environment; it deliberately eliminates those elements which are useless to society, or which can be utilised by society only at excessive cost: thus artificial selection is a preventive method.
Natural selection is cruel and uneconomic. As far as the human species is concerned, natural selection is not essential to our advance towards perfection; it is even to a considerable extent superfluous. In the case of humanity, racial improvement remains possible even in the absence of a relationship between the numbers of the species and the available means of subsistence so unfavourable as to necessitate a fierce struggle for existence. In the earlier stages of human evolution, such an unfavourable relationship between the numerical strength of the species and the supply of the means of subsistence was perhaps a cause of racial advance; but to-day such a relationship would be nothing but a hindrance to progress. For the human species to-day, the significance of natural selection is historical merely; the future belongs to artificial selection. The device for humanity must be, “Not Natural Selection, but Artificial Selection—Eugenics!”
The Interests of the Future Generation.—The attitude of our present legal system towards actions likely to be injurious to the interests of future generations is a quite erroneous one. We concern ourselves solely with the interests of the contemporary generation; the interests of future generations are left entirely to chance; it is perfectly obvious that whenever a conflict of interests arises, the well-being of our descendants is unhesitatingly sacrificed. In our present laws it is difficult to point to a single provision for the protection of subsequent generations against the result of the sexual irrationality and the excessive sexual egoism of our contemporaries.
Bodily injury of one human being by another is a punishable offence. But the man affected with alcoholism or syphilis who procreates a child incurs no punishment whatever, although the consequences of the latter’s action are far more serious. To-day hardly any attention is paid to the question of what qualities are desirable in the parents in order to ensure the procreation of offspring well equipped for a happy and useful life. In the breeding of plants and animals, definite rules are followed, in order to secure the progressive improvement of the species concerned. But who trouble themselves about conscious selection for the improvement of the human species?
The view will ultimately prevail that the strong only are of value to society, and that every weak member of the community involves a definite social loss. It will be generally understood that large families are not advantageous, inasmuch as it is not quantity but quality that really matters. The day will come in which fatherhood and motherhood will be permitted only to the strong, and in which every endeavour will be made to prevent the birth of diseased and weakly individuals. As far as the “protection” of a great many children is concerned, the method that will be adopted will be to prevent their ever coming into the world. In the future, we shall know better than we know to-day which children are competent to grow up into useful members of society; and those buds which fail to attain this standard will be pruned away.
Beyond question, it will not be long before it will be generally understood that the proper application of eugenist principles to the human species will be secured, not so much by coercion, as by enlightenment. But for this very reason it will become of enormous importance to popularise the elements of educational science and of the hygiene of childhood, to effect the sexual enlightenment of children and of adults, and to secure the diffusion of sound ethical ideas. It will be taught that actions injurious to the interests of future generations are immoral, and some of them will even be made punishable offences. Steps will also be taken to ensure as far as possible that only those individuals shall marry whose offspring may be expected to be healthy.
In regard to all these problems, the acquirements of medical science are of enormous importance; for it is upon the acquirements of positive science that legislation dealing with such matters must be based. Unfortunately, however, the medical science of our own day is not always in a position to give a decisive and satisfactory answer in respect of the various problems just stated; and suitable legislation on these matters must be deferred to the future, when guidance may be anticipated from the inevitable progress of medical science.
Inheritance and Education.—In human beings, as in other animals, an improvement in the inborn capacities is possible. At the present time we are content to take children as we find them, and we simply endeavour by education to make every child into a useful member of society. But only through influences affecting hereditary qualities can the material of future generations be improved, and a humanity be brought into being better equipped than we are for the tasks of civilisation. Enduring human progress can be effected only by the simultaneous study and application of the laws both of education and of heredity. As by selection the hereditary equipment is improved, the limits of what is attainable by means of education will also be extended.
Even to-day, heredity and education commonly co-operate in the same direction, for in most cases the two influences are exercised by the same personalities. Parents of fine quality tend to procreate children of like quality, and also to give these same children an exceptionally good upbringing; contrariwise, degenerate parents tend to procreate degenerate children, and to bring them up badly.
Nature of Education.—The inherited character of human beings is not a unitary whole, but consists of different parts. Unless this were so, man would speedily succumb in the struggle for existence; for it depends upon the circumstances in which he finds himself, which parts of his inherited character undergo a necessary development. Just as nature brings into existence an enormous number of living beings, and then, by the mechanism of the struggle for existence, selects for survival those individuals which are best adapted to the environmental conditions, so in the inherited human character there exist available for the influences of education thousands of rudimentary capacities, and it is the particular environmental conditions which determine which of these capacities are cultivated and developed, and which are allowed to undergo atrophy.
Among these environmental conditions are the deliberate processes of education, which also select certain capacities for special cultivation, and allow others to atrophy or disappear. The latter part of this process takes place in accordance with the natural law, that every organ which is left unused undergoes atrophy, and may even altogether disappear. The task of education does not presuppose any alteration in the inherited character. On the contrary, the educator utilises the existence of the various inherited characteristics in such a way that he makes those qualities he wishes to develop take the field against those he wishes to suppress.
The inherited character contains certain possibilities of development. If it were fixed and unalterable, education would be entirely unthinkable. In the practical work of education we have to reckon with the fact that there are present in every child certain developmental factors, constituting the pre-conditions of the development which that child will subsequently undergo; that in the course of growth the character undergoes extensive alterations; finally, also, that the child’s character is something very different from that of the adult. Education is thus seen to consist of the influences exerted upon the character by the application of certain external factors; it is a selection from the entire complex of inborn capacities and inborn tendencies.
Character of the Child.—The view that the child possesses all the vices and all the peculiarities of the criminal is as erroneous as the opinion that the criminal, owing to the arrest of mental development, remains for ever a child, and that he is one in nature with the savage who, unaffected by conditions of time or place, preserves unchanged the type of humanity in the childhood of our race. As yet no proof has ever been supplied of the hypothesis, that concealed within the child’s nature lies the tendency to do evil. But it is an incontestible fact that the child entirely lacks power to withdraw itself from harmful influences, and that if criminal inclinations are artificially implanted in the child, they will infallibly develop if no counteracting influences come into play. The child is a virgin soil, which will in due course bring forth good fruit or bad fruit according to the nature of the tillage; at birth the child is qualitatively and quantitatively incomplete; but all the faculties are there in embryo, and ready for their further development. The smaller the circle of ideas, the stronger will be the influence, the greater will be the effect, of any new idea that enters this circle. In the child, above all, the circle of ideas is so small, that every new idea will constitute a quite appreciable fraction of all the ideas that already exist.
Limits of Educability.—Education is able to develop the useful capacities and qualities of human beings, and to repress those capacities and qualities that are useless and harmful; but it is beyond the power of education to develop qualities and capacities of which the germs do not previously exist in the child. Even the best education is incompetent to improve a character which is congenitally altogether bad, or to do anything for a child whose character, though congenitally good, has been completely corrupted by evil influences.
Unfortunately, science is not yet sufficiently advanced to enable us to determine with absolute certainty which children are educable. As long as our knowledge of this matter remains defective, society must undertake the fruitless education of such children.
Educability depends, first of all, upon the inherited dispositions of the brain; when the deviations from the average in this respect are considerable, we have to do with a diseased brain. According to the kind and the degree of the deviation, we distinguish several groups of mental abnormality occurring in childhood, namely:
(a) Morbid psychical (psychopathic) constitutions.
(b) Congenital feeble-mindedness (debility).
(c) Fully developed and well-marked mental disorders.
In the first group we find a number of morbid changes far less severe in character than those comprising groups (b) and (c); these are commonly curable, provided only treatment is begun in early childhood. It is absolutely essential that such cases should be cured if possible: for unless this is effected, in most cases (and especially when they belong to the poorer classes of society) the males become habitual vagrants, whilst the females adopt a life of prostitution. Numerous inquiries have established the fact that a strikingly large proportion of tramps and other vagabonds were from childhood upwards of a psychopathic constitution.
The number of those exhibiting mental abnormality has notably increased in recent times, but this increase does not affect those suffering from true insanity. Many of those who in adult life exhibit symptoms of mental abnormality do so as a result of the psychopathic constitution, and in many such cases the troubles of adult life might have been prevented by judicious measures during childhood. In cases belonging to group (b), comprising persons suffering from congenital feeble-mindedness, the possibility of education depends entirely upon the degree of mental debility. In cases belonging to group (c) education is impossible. The question of ineducability is of importance, above all, in relation to the possibilities of a coercive reformatory education. The possibility that attempts at education may prove altogether fruitless must never be lost sight of; for although it is an established fact that mentally abnormal children usually need a coercive reformatory education, in the case of children whose mental abnormality exceeds certain limits, even such an education is impracticable. In these cases also the rule applies, that the prospects of success are greater the earlier the matter is taken in hand.
The Aim of Education.—What is the aim of education? Should we seek to educate the child for society; or should it be our primary aim to cultivate the inborn capacities of the child? The value of the individual depends upon two factors, upon the capacities and qualities he has inherited, and upon the capacities and qualities he has acquired. Education must not attend exclusively to one group or to the other, but must deal with both groups harmoniously. The child must be taught to adapt itself to all possible circumstances and conditions; at the same time it must receive an education suited to its own capacities and endowments. In the character of every child there exist the germs of individuality. Whether it is normal or abnormal, whether it is a foundling or not, whether it is educated by its parents or at school, in the family or at an institution, it must be educated in accordance with the needs of its own individuality. The educationalist’s device should be—individualisation.
The greatest delight of every individual, whether child or adult, is to be occupied in accordance with its own inclinations, and to be treated by others in a manner suited to its own peculiar tendencies. This perhaps depends upon one of the primary laws of physics, that motion takes place in the direction of least resistance. Individualisation in education is an exceedingly difficult matter; and yet it is less difficult than appears at first sight. Differences in individual character are far less extensive than is generally believed, and it is an error to suppose that the character of every child differs in important respects from that of every other. It is an impossible aim of education to make every child a being with a well-marked individuality. If the differences were too great between those whose education is completed—that is, between those grown persons who play their parts in ordinary human intercourse, such intercourse would be less extensive and more difficult than it now is.
The child must be educated in such a way that its actions are not instinctive and uncontrolled, but consciously purposive and self-controlled; but at the same time the educationalist must guard against the danger of making the child into a will-less puppet. It has frequently been observed that obedient children are unlikely to grow up into men of any particular note, the reason being that they are accustomed to do only what they are told, and have never learned to act on their own initiative.
Knowledge is a mighty weapon, but it is one which can be used either to good purpose or to ill, and it is per se neither moral nor immoral. Knowledge is Power, but it is not Virtue. It is not the ability to read and to write which matters; the important question is, what one reads and what one writes. Among those who can neither read nor write, we find many who are extraordinarily rich in practical experience. This is to be explained by the fact that those who can read and write are able to gain impressions indirectly as well as directly, whilst illiterate persons are entirely dependent upon their own direct experience of life.
Among the causes of crime, illiteracy by no means plays so important a part as is generally believed. For this reason, when we are studying the condition of any particular country, we must avoid laying too great a stress upon the percentage of illiterates among its population. The number of illiterates depends in part also upon the proportions of persons at various ages, inasmuch as, in reckoning the percentage of illiterates to the general population, those under school age are left out of the account.
By no means is it the aim of education to provide general culture. The State cannot possibly insist that every individual should devote himself to the acquirement of general culture, for the most talented person is at times unable to earn his own living. In the struggle for existence, general culture, taken by itself, is utterly useless.
Good Example.—The phenomena which the child has opportunities for observing exercise a great influence upon its development. Although the view that the child imitates everything instinctively is erroneous, it is unquestionable that education will prove successful only in cases in which the personality of the child’s teacher is one which puts a good example before the child’s eyes. It is not enough merely to instruct a child verbally. It is essential that the child should see that the teacher himself practises all which is theoretically asserted to be right and admirable.
Confidence and Love.—Authority and compulsion are important factors of education; but those take the wrong path who attempt to influence the child by means of authority and compulsion alone. For individualisation in education the device should be, Confidence and Love. These mean to the child what sunshine means to the plant: without sunshine, the plant lags behind in its growth, and ultimately perishes; but in the sunshine it flourishes abundantly.
Reward and Punishment.—The view that neither reward nor punishment should be employed as instruments of education is erroneous, for unquestionably both have considerable influence upon human activities and intercourse. The only matter really open for consideration is, what should be the nature of the rewards and the punishments to be employed, and what should be the method of their application? It is wrong to punish or reward a child so often that either becomes habitual. The teacher, who is in most cases the accuser and the injured person (since a child’s wrong actions are apt to take the form of offences against an instructor), should not also assume the office of a judge against whose decision there is no appeal, and the office of executioner. Above all, the time-honoured system whereby every childish offence is expiated by deliberately inflicted physical pain must be abandoned.
The corporal punishment of children is certainly harmful. (a) Corporal punishment is injurious to the child’s health. In former times this objection had perhaps less weight, for the child’s constitution, and especially the child’s nervous system, were then less sensitive than they are to-day. (b) Corporal punishment gradually makes the child quite indifferent to the handling and making-use of its body. In many instances, either in the chastiser or in the chastised, or in both, it gives rise to sexual excitement. It is especially dangerous for girls, whom it is apt to prepare for a life of prostitution. (c) Corporal punishment has a coarsening and hardening influence both on teacher and on child. The teacher tends ever more and more to give way to his impulses, and thereby becomes a disastrous example for the child. (d) Corporal punishment breaks the child’s will, and induces a sense of degradation which is greater in proportion to the intensity of the child’s own self-respect. (e) Corporal punishment makes a child hypocritical and deceitful, and gives it a hint to be wilier the next time. For ultimately the idea is formed in the child’s mind that it has been punished, not for committing a fault, but because it has been found out.
Punishment should always be of such a nature as to strengthen as much as possible those inner forces and impulses through whose weakness the liability to the punishment has been incurred. On no account whatever should the punishment be such as will encourage in the child’s mind the belief that the act for which it is punished was, after all, one it had a right to do. If, for example, a child has injured a servant, it should be punished by making it relieve the servant of some portion of the latter’s work. If the child has injured any one, it is not a suitable punishment for the teacher to inflict direct injury on the child, for this would merely encourage the latter to believe that the strong are justified in inflicting injury on the weak.
Education by the Parents.—Throughout nature, wherever the young of any animal have to live through a prolonged period of imperfectly protected immaturity, it is the duty of the parent-animals to bring up their offspring. Above a certain level in the animal scale, this duty is universal. The lower in the scale any species of animal, the more rapidly do the young of that species attain maturity; conversely, the higher the stage of development of any species, the longer is the period of immaturity, and the longer are the children dependent upon their parents. This rule applies to human beings also, and the relationships above described obtain among the different varieties and races of mankind. Of all new-born animals, none is so helpless as man; and of all animals, his period of immaturity is the longest. The period of upbringing lasts longer in man than in other animals, the human young are longer dependent on their parents, and the parents themselves in the human species are more long-lived than the parents of most other species of animals.
The younger the individual human being, the more dependent is it upon others. An infant cannot continue to exist at all without external help. Its only needs at first, indeed, are for food, drink, sleep, and cleansing; but the older it is, the more complex is the care it demands. As the age of the human individual increases, the more do its needs continue to enlarge. The younger the human being, the more dependent is it upon parental care, and more particularly upon maternal care; and the more helpless the offspring, the more does the educational influence of the mother exceed in importance that of the father.
The view that the natural province of work of the father is to provide the means of subsistence for himself and his family, while the mother’s work, on the other hand, is to care for the children, is erroneous. It is not merely unnecessary for the mother to spend all her time with her child, but such a course of action imposes an excessive strain upon her, and has a dulling effect. It is also a false view that only those women properly fulfil their duties as wives and mothers who devote their whole time to the upbringing of their children and to the cares of their household.
The influence of the parents upon the child is a very powerful one, because child and parents are, as it were, syntonised through hereditary dispositions and tendencies. Oscillations of character in the parents spontaneously initiate oscillations of character in the child, but in this syntonic influence there may subsist a very great danger. The healthier the parents, and the better suited they are to one another, the better are the dispositions the children inherit from them, and thereby the children are fitted to receive a better education. Among the lower animals, parents educate their offspring solely in accordance with the dictates of instinct. For the upbringing of the human young, the guidance of human instinct is inadequate; educational aptitudes and special educational knowledge are also indispensable. Normal human parents may desire to give their children the best possible education; but in many instances they do not know themselves what the best education is; and even if they do know this, they will be unable to provide such an education by their own unaided efforts, and will be dependent upon others for the upbringing of their own children. It is quite impossible for anyone to follow a trade or profession, to supervise the management of a household, and at the same time to be the instructor of his or her own child. For this, parents lack the requisite time and energy. As time goes on, the principle of the division of labour comes more and more into application; it is in accordance with this principle that the education of children should be entrusted to professional educationalists.
Education in Different Social Classes.—The education received by an individual is determined mainly by the class to which that individual belongs. In every industrial state, the degradation of the working-class families becomes apparent. The wages of the manual workers are very small; and owing to illness, strikes, lock-outs, and commercial crises, even this small income diminishes from time to time, or may entirely cease. Insecurity is the keynote of the working man’s economic existence. The consequences of this insecurity are ill-humour and embitterment, which find expression for the most part in domestic life. The place of work is often far removed from the dwelling-place. Husband, wife, and the elder children go to work; they have to get up very early in the morning, when the children are still asleep. Since the spells of rest for meals are very short, they have no time to go home; or if they do hurry home, they have to gulp down their food with lightning speed. Not until late in the evening, when the children have gone to sleep again, do the parents return home. Thousands of working men, owing to the distance of their homes from their work-places, remain a whole week away, and return home to their families only on Saturday. Even if the parents get home from work in the evenings before their children are asleep, the former are so worn out by long hours of exhausting toil that they can do nothing for their children.
The housing conditions of the working classes are rarely satisfactory. In consequence of this, the children are often driven to live in the streets; and this, in turn, leads to immorality and to crime. Often the children of working-class families do not remain at home at all, but find their way to crÈches, foundling hospitals, poorhouses, and other institutions. Proletarian parents have less knowledge and less capacity for the education of their children than parents belonging to other classes of the population. These latter, also, can more readily afford to entrust the education of their children to other persons.
Nevertheless, the education of the children of the well-to-do cannot be unconditionally regarded as better than the education of the children of the poor. The chief defects as regards the children of the well-to-do are, that they are apt to receive too much attention; they are often spoiled, and their initiative is continually suppressed. Rich parents keep servants, and entrust to these in large part the upbringing of their children. In our day it has come to be regarded as necessary and natural that children should be cared for by servants; thus the influence exercised by servants upon the children of the well-to-do is a very extensive and by no means a happy one. For these servants commonly lack refinement and intelligence, and the abilities of the trained educationalist are altogether lacking to them. The domestic servant may bring up suitably his or her own children, but not the children of another; and the failure will be especially marked when the child’s social position is much higher than the servant’s.
Parents, School, Environment.—The three primary factors in education are: parents, school, and environment. Strictly speaking, indeed, parents and school are only parts of the environment. In a sense, however, the whole of education is nothing more than the influencing of the capacities and dispositions of the child by external factors—that is, by the environment. The influence exercised by the environment is very great. As social life develops in complexity, the child is exposed ever more and more to the influences of environment, and the educative influence exercised by this latter becomes ever more extensive. But in our time the child is less exposed than the adult to the influences of the environment.
In the first years of life the work of education is in the hands of the parents, and above all in those of the mother. Subsequently the schoolmaster and schoolmistress share with the parents in the work of education, and the part played by the parents becomes ever less important. In addition, however, to the influence exerted at first by the parents, and subsequently by the teachers, the general environment does its work from the very earliest days of life. It is a natural postulate of a sound education, that all these three factors, parents, school, and environment, should co-operate, and that each should exercise its appropriate influence. If they counteract instead of assisting one another, the general result will be unsatisfactory and inadequate. In vain does the school attempt to exercise a favourable influence if the work of the school is undone by the influence of the parents. Again, the joint influence of parents and of school is fruitless if the child, when away from home and out of school hours, is under the influence of bad associates. Unfortunately, with the development of capitalism such cases have become ever more common.
The Tendency of Evolution.—With the passage of the years, the importance of education continually increases. The seductions and the temptations encountered by young people to-day are at once far more frequent and far more subtle than was the case in former times. To enable them to withstand these allurements, the young require a better and a more careful education. In the early stages of evolution, alike in the struggle for existence between individuals and in the struggle for existence between competing tribes, physical strength was the decisive factor of success; but in the later stages of human evolution it is upon intellectual and moral well-being that victory in the struggle depends. Hence intellectual and moral education become of ever greater importance. To-day, one whose intellectual and moral education has been neglected is far less able to meet with success the demands made by modern life than one living some hundreds of years ago, whose education had been neglected, would have been able to meet the demands made by the life of his own time. In such a case, in our own day, the likelihood that one whose education has been neglected will be useless and even dangerous to society, is far greater than it would have been in former times; and as time goes on the differences between those who have had an appropriate education and those whose education has been neglected will become more and more extensive.
It is well known that the majority of habitual criminals are persons who began to commit punishable offences in the earlier years of their life. It is only in the rarest instances that by legal punitive methods we prevent a juvenile offender from developing into a habitual criminal; the object of the punishment is seldom attained. The question therefore presses itself upon our attention, whether the prevention of crime cannot best be attained in another way than by the use of penal methods, namely, by the proper education of children.
Education has no bearing upon the life of persons living in complete isolation; it is a postulate of social life alone, and becomes impregnated to a continually greater extent with social elements. The modern tendency of social evolution is to relieve the family of the cares of education, which becomes to an increasing extent a communal duty; whilst the share of the parents in the education of their children is limited, social institutions providing more generally and more thoroughly for that education. England offers us a typical example of the working of this modern tendency; for England is commonly regarded as pre-eminently individualistic, and yet there is no country in which more limitations have been imposed upon parental authority, or in which compulsory and universal education is more thoroughly enforced by the State.
The elements of educational science depend mainly upon the social conditions that obtain in the country with which we have to do; as time passes, the science undergoes a progressive alteration, and leads us from individual education to social education. The elements of the education of the future will depend upon the general configuration of social life, upon the characteristics of domestic life, and upon the regulation of parental authority. The individual household of our own time has no regard at all for the special needs of the child, and the various occupations carried on in such a household constitute a hindrance to the proper upbringing of children. The labours of the kitchen expose children to constant accidents—from fire, boiling water, sharp instruments, &c. The parents, and more especially the mother, will in times to come be much less occupied than at present in domestic drudgery, and will consequently have more time to devote to the upbringing of their children. The parents will also themselves stand at a much higher level of culture, and this cannot fail to lead to an effective demand for the more suitable upbringing of children. The modern dwelling and its furniture take no account at all of the needs of children; at every turn there are sharp corners and hard objects, by contact with which children may be, and often are, seriously injured. In former times various occupations were carried on in the individual household which hardly any one now dreams of doing at home: among these may be mentioned, spinning, weaving, laundry-work, soap-boiling, the slaughtering of animals and the preparation of their flesh, the grinding of meal, &c. &c. In the United States of America even to-day many families take all their principal meals at public restaurants; in America also, to an increasing degree, heating, ventilation, and lighting of the houses is provided from central establishments. The household of to-day is inconvenient and uneconomical. Much work is still done at home which could be done more cheaply, more effectively, and more conveniently elsewhere. As time goes on, one labour after another which is now done at home will be removed altogether from the sphere of the domestic economy, and this will necessarily lead ultimately to the disappearance of the individual household. In the future, human beings will occupy separate dwellings, but not separate households; or, to put the matter more intelligibly, most of the work now carried on in the individual household will be arranged for from centralised organisations. It is obvious that these changes will lead to extensive modifications of our present individual methods of domestic architecture.
The educational developments of the future will depend, not only on the changes that have been foreshadowed in domestic life, but also on the future development of the institution of the family. Naturally, the characteristics of the family and the characteristics of the household are intimately associated. But, whatever changes may ensue in these respects, the fundamental principle that the parents are responsible for the upbringing of their children is not likely to be abandoned, for it is based upon an instinct deeply rooted in the very nature of human beings. But the actual work of education will probably be in the hands of educational specialists almost exclusively, as soon as the days of infancy and very early childhood are outgrown. When physically able to do so, mothers will, of course, suckle their own children. The transformation of our domestic economy and our domestic architecture will result in giving enormously increased importance to institutions for the upbringing of children; crÈches, kindergartens, and elementary schools will play a far greater part than at present in social life; such institutions will probably care for children in every possible way, and will aim at the satisfaction of all their elementary needs.
CHAPTER V
PROS AND CONS OF CHILD-PROTECTION
Introductory.—The lex minimi (“law of parsimony”) is not merely a natural law, but is also the guiding principle both of legislative and of executive activity. From this law we learn, among other things: “When we wish to attain any end, we must arrange to do this with the smallest possible expenditure of means; with the means available we must secure the greatest possible result; the cost of production must not exceed the value of the finished product. No institution should be maintained if its utility is less than the equivalent of the cost of its maintenance. However fine an aim may be, it must never be forgotten that society and the State have other aims in addition to this one, and that if for the attainment of this particular aim an excessive expenditure of wealth is requisite, some wealth will be used up which is needed for the attainment of other aims.”
Prevention is better than cure. One whose actions are guided by foresight will use preventive methods all the more readily because prevention is a part of the natural order of things. It is applicable not only in domestic life, but also in the general life of society; and as evolution proceeds, the importance of repression continually diminishes, whilst the importance of prevention continually increases.
Every social institution serves for the attainment of some particular end—is, that is to say, a means to that end. If an end can be obtained without consuming wealth—that is, without employing the means involving such an expenditure of wealth, then the sacrifice of this wealth and the employment of these means are superfluous, and even harmful. The tendency of every social institution is, in fact, to become superfluous, and to be superseded with the passage of the years.
The wise physician who has to deal with the diseases affecting the human body does not confine his efforts to the treatment and relief of symptoms, but endeavours to ascertain and to remove the causes of those symptoms. He is well aware that a method of treatment which is confined to the relief of mere symptoms will effect no more than a temporary improvement, and that as long as the cause of the symptoms remains in active operation, the morbid phenomena will continue to recur. Now these considerations apply with just as much force to the social organism as they do to the individual human organism. When we pass judgment upon a social institution, we must always endeavour to ascertain whether any defect we may notice connected with its working belongs to the social institution as such, and whether the fault is inseparable from the institution, or whether we may reasonably expect that in the further course of development, or as a result of better organisation, this particular defect will disappear. In the work of child-protection, these fundamental principles must always be kept in mind.
Objections to Child-Protection.—A number of objections have been formulated against child-protection, of which the following may be mentioned. In crÈches and other institutions for the care of young children, the spread of infectious diseases very readily occurs. Most of the institutions aiming at child-protection are really rewards of immorality, and thus tend to encourage immorality. It is a natural law that a child should be cared for by its own parents, and child-protection, in so far as it separates the child from its parents, is unnatural.
Most of these objections are invalid. Many authors maintain that the protection of juvenile criminals does more harm than good; but even if this is true to-day, it does not follow that juvenile criminals should not be protected, but simply that our methods of protection should be better adapted to their purpose. The objections urged against crÈches and other institutions for the care of young children should not lead to the inference that no such institutions ought to exist, but should rather draw our attention to the necessity for taking better measures to prevent the introduction and spread of infectious diseases. No one can doubt to-day that the suppression of these diseases is within our power.
Objections to the Care of Foundlings.—In the literature of our subject we find great diversity of opinion regarding the care of foundlings, and it is therefore necessary that we should examine the objections that have been made to institutions for this purpose. A careful study of the matter will show that the criticisms apply not to the general principle on which foundling hospitals are instituted, but to a particular form of this institution. It is well known that the foundling hospitals of former days received children by means of a turn-table, through an aperture in the wall (so that the person who brought the child might remain entirely unknown), that the children grew to maturity in such institutions, that the infants were artificially fed, that the most elementary hygienic precautions were neglected in these buildings, &c. &c. It is natural that such foundling hospitals as these should be attacked by many writers as harmful in the highest degree. But these writers completely ignore the fact that the defects were not characteristic of all foundling hospitals, and that therefore they did not attach to the institutions as such, but were the outcome simply of defective organisation; they also fail to observe that the care of foundlings may be undertaken without instituting foundling hospitals. The weightiest of all the objections to foundling hospitals is that the cost of maintenance of these institutions is disproportionate to any good they may effect, inasmuch as the value to society of those foundlings who attain maturity is no proper equivalent for the pains expended in attaining this result. In view of the lex minimi, to which reference was made at the beginning of this chapter, has such an institution any right to exist?
The turn-table for the reception of children was instituted for two reasons. In the first place, the whole act of “exposing” a child was to be discreetly veiled from the public eye; and, in the second place, no excuse was to be left open for the crime of infanticide. It is true that in our own day there are many reasons to be alleged against retaining the turn-table; it provides a means whereby the parents of children born in lawful wedlock can evade their natural obligations, and impose these upon society at large; it involves a legal contradiction, inasmuch as it tacitly permits, and even formally invites, parents to expose their children, although this is a criminal offence; finally, it leads to the overcrowding of the foundling hospitals. In short, all the objections to the institution of the turn-table are perfectly sound; but it would be altogether unwarrantable to infer from this that foundling hospitals themselves are unnecessary and even harmful. Foundling hospitals can exist without a turn-table (not a single modern foundling hospital contains any such thing); the defects of foundling hospitals with turn-tables are not defects of foundling hospitals as such, but defects attaching to the institution of the turn-table.
If we are told that foundling hospitals fail to attain their ends (the prevention of infanticide and the increase of the population), if we are told that the foundling hospitals were themselves murder-traps, and that all they could do was to preserve for society a few individuals competent for harm rather than for good, we may rejoin that in modern foundling hospitals the death-rate is much lower than it was in those of former times, that children now receive in these institutions a much better upbringing than was formerly the case, and that the defects alleged do not attach to foundling hospitals as such, but merely to this or that way of managing such institutions. Finally, it is necessary to point out, that whereas the foundling hospitals of former times, owing to their defective administration, probably did not “pay,” the progress of medical science has greatly reduced the death-rate in foundling hospitals, the children in these institutions are now much better brought up, and for these reasons the effective return made by foundling hospitals to society is far greater than it used to be.
Darwinism versus Poor-Relief.—Many Darwinians oppose Poor-Relief. The interest of the community demands that its members should be physically, intellectually, and morally sound. Social evolution and social well-being depend upon the survival of the fittest. It follows from this that the interest of the community demands that we should prevent the birth of diseased and weakly individuals; and that if such individuals should nevertheless be born, the sooner they perish the better. If this were unconditionally true, we should have to admit that the relief of destitution is not merely useless to society, but is positively harmful.
In many instances, by the application of medical skill and knowledge, it is possible, at considerable expenditure of effort, to keep alive sickly persons, those predisposed to crime, and those predisposed to particular diseases—persons who, in default of such special care, would inevitably have succumbed. Such defectives, attaining maturity, procreate their kind, producing a new generation of sickly individuals, with deficient powers of resistance. Such applications of medical science are doubtless valuable from the point of view of the individuals thus benefited, but they promote the deterioration of the race. This anti-eugenist influence is exerted in a twofold manner: not only are the defectives kept alive and enabled to procreate their kind, but these defectives utilise goods and services which would otherwise have been allotted to healthy persons, whereby these latter become less well able to found and rear families.
The relief of destitution provides support for the weaker members of the community. Whereas, in default of public assistance, such persons would hesitate to marry, a generous public provision for the destitute facilitates the light-hearted increase of the lower classes of the population, since these latter feel justified in believing that, should the worst come to the worst, their children will be provided for by the community. In the relief of the destitute, the commodities devoted to the maintenance of the weak are taken away from the strong. In consequence of this deprivation, the strong find it necessary to limit their families—an example which the weak will not follow. Thus the relief of destitution favours a reversed selection. The relief of destitution also impairs the efficiency of the processes whereby the diseased and useless constituents are eliminated from the social organism, and this interference with eliminative processes is no less dangerous to the social than it is to the individual organism.
Darwinism versus Child-Protection.—The Darwinians maintain that all these considerations apply with equal force to child-protection. We must, they tell us, protect strong children only, and do nothing for the weakly. Child-protection to-day, they insist, effects the reverse of this. It counteracts excessive child mortality, which is an effective factor in selection, through its destruction of weakly children. For example, the existence of foundling hospitals induces many parents to abandon the care of their own children, and to commit these to the foundling hospitals. Many parents, being aware that the State undertakes the coercive reformatory education of neglected children, deliberately neglect the education of their own children, in order to force the community to undertake it.
During the first years of life, continue these ultra-Darwinians, more children die than in the later years of childhood, because, owing to natural selection in the first years of life, a larger proportion of the weak succumb, so that the level of health of those in the later years of childhood is considerably higher. High infant mortality is at once a symptom and a means of natural-selection. Years characterised by high infant mortality necessarily follow years in which the infantile death-rate has been low. In countries with high infant mortality the population is stronger, because the badly-equipped new-born infants die in greater proportion than the well-equipped; in subsequent years the mortality is consequently lower, the fitness for military service is greater, and tuberculosis is less common. To diminish infant mortality would lead to a more rapid increase of population; it would, in fact, give rise to over-population to such an extent that the struggle for existence would become even more cruel and abhorrent than it is to-day. Certain departments of child-protection lead to the preservation of children whose survival is altogether undesirable—children which would otherwise have perished during the first years of life.
(If it is true that illegitimate children are of very little use to the community, and if it is impossible to prevent the birth of such children, it is at any rate desirable, continue the writers of this school, that those which actually do come into the world should die as soon as possible. Consider also born criminals. These inflict grave injury on the community. If it is impossible to prevent their birth, should not society at least take steps to secure that their life should be as short as possible?)
The Right View.—These views are only partially correct. It may be true that a great proportion of illegitimate children are weakly, and perhaps for this reason their mortality-rate and criminality-rate are excessive; it is also probable that in the absence of child-protection their death-rate would be considerably higher than it is. Elsewhere in this work we shall consider whether, and to what extent, it is possible to prevent the birth of illegitimate children. It may also be true that the born criminal is physically, intellectually, and morally degenerate, and that for these reasons in the absence of child-protection he would probably succumb in early life.
The race is not always damaged by the survival of those who have suffered from disease. The disease may be of such a kind that the patient who survives may recover completely, and may procreate perfectly healthy children. It is a very thorny question whether it can ever be right to refrain from the cure of certain patients, because to cure them would be injurious to the race. Here humanity and race-interest seem to conflict. If, in the future, by the proper application of preventive methods, we are able to ensure that very few such sick persons shall exist, it will no longer be necessary to attempt to cure such as do exist, for in that day the application of the euthanasia in such cases will no longer be regarded as inhuman, but rather as perfectly natural and right.
To the assertion that only the healthy and strong should be protected, we may answer that the sickly and the weakly are far more in need of such protection. It is perfectly true that those who are not adapted to the conditions of their environment perish. But one of the chief aims of child protection is to enable children to become capable of adaptation to their environment; and in the majority of children we are able to effect this. Even those in whom this is unattainable ought not to be neglected, because, while they are slowly succumbing, society suffers much injury from them. One who is ill or weak from one point of view only may nevertheless be a useful member of society, since perhaps in some other relationship he may be strong or healthy. In the present state of our knowledge, we are unable during a child’s early years, and still less immediately after birth, to determine positively whether the child is intellectually or morally defective, whether it is a born criminal, or whether it is one capable of developing into a useful member of society. We must certainly dispute the assertion that a child which is bodily weak is of necessity also intellectually and morally defective, since thousands of instances establish the fact that a child which is bodily weak often proves to be a useful member of society. If there were no child-protection, children would perish whose survival is unquestionably desirable.
We consider, therefore, that child-protection is necessary, although, notwithstanding great pains and great sacrifices, it often results in the survival of individuals who are useless to society. The view that only the children of the inferior and poorer classes of the population are suitable for the application of the methods of child-protection, is erroneous, if only for the reason that the well-to-do to-day bring forth offspring utterly regardless whether these are strong or weak; and also because capitalism interferes in other ways with the effective operation of natural selection. These various evils can be obviated to-day only by means of child-protection.
In the case of infants, there is no question of the struggle for existence. For their death-rate depends upon two factors—first, upon their inborn capacity; secondly, upon the conditions in which they are reared. The former factor is of far less importance in relation to infant mortality than it is in relation to child mortality. Only in an extremely limited sense is it possible, with regard to infants, to speak of a struggle for existence, in virtue of which the fittest survive. The infant is exposed to numerous dangers, in coping with which its inborn capacity hardly counts at all. When certain external influences come into play, the infant is quite incapable of making an advantageous use of its inborn physiological capacities. Such external influences destroy quite indifferently infants well-equipped and ill-equipped at birth. There is no doubt of the fact that a strong infant could better resist most of the diseases of infancy than a weakly infant; but the differences in power of resistance in infants are far less extensive than is generally believed. It is certainly wrong to maintain that a strong infant is able successfully to resist all diseases.
For the very reason that certain diseases—for example, certain affections of the stomach and intestines—will destroy even the strongest infant, the prevention of these diseases becomes a matter of the first importance. It is unquestionable that such diseases can be more effectively prevented in proportion as the circumstances are favourable in which the infant is reared.
It is certainly through an error of observation that some writers maintain that in the age-class of children who have survived their first year we find no weaklings. Even the strongest infant will not survive to enter this age-class if its environing conditions are too unfavourable. It often happens that an infant survives an illness, and yet survives in a damaged condition. A high death-rate is a consequence of a high disease-rate; but of the infants affected with disease, only a certain proportion succumbs, whilst the others survive with damaged constitutions, and constitute a favourable soil for fresh inroads of disease. In the twentieth century, in the civilised countries of Europe, of one hundred children dying during the first year of life, barely twenty die in consequence of inborn defects or congenital diseases (such as congenital debility, atrophy, congenital scrofula, tuberculosis, &c.).
If it were true that infant mortality exercised a selective function, we should find a high infantile death-rate associated with a low death-rate in the case of children past infancy, and conversely. But everywhere we find that the infantile death-rate and the death-rate amongst children at ages one to five vary directly, and not inversely. Moreover, the variations in the death-rates in children during different years of life are determined by the fact that the younger the child, the less are its powers of resistance; thus the danger to health resulting from unfavourable conditions of life varies inversely as the child’s age; and even within the limits of the first year of life, the infantile death-rate is higher in proportion as the time which has elapsed since birth is less. Among the lower classes of the population, the infantile death-rate is higher than it is among the upper classes. If a high infantile death-rate exercised a selective influence, we should find that among the lower classes the death-rate among children more than one year old would be less than the death-rate of upper-class children of corresponding ages. But this is nowhere the case.
The mortality of children between the ages of one and five years depends chiefly upon the incidence of the infectious diseases. It is well known that these diseases are much milder in civilised than in uncivilised countries. From this it follows that the death-rate among children between the ages of one and five years depends chiefly upon the level of civilisation; the death-rate being higher where the level of civilisation is low, and conversely; but the infantile death-rate is much less influenced by the standard of civilisation. Moreover, recent investigations have shown that (especially in large towns and in industrial regions) high infant mortality is closely associated with a low level of fitness for military service, and with a high death-rate from tuberculosis. It is true that the number of those who succumb to tuberculosis and the number of those who prove fit for military service are influenced by other causes in addition to the infantile death-rate—causes which have nothing to do with that death-rate. But the fact remains indisputable that the causes leading to a great mortality among infants tend to injure the constitution of those infants who succeed in surviving, and thus weaken the general health of the population.
Socialism versus Poor-Relief.—Many Socialists are opposed to the relief of destitution. Poverty existed prior to the rise of capitalism, and is found where the capitalist system has not as yet struck root. But the chief cause of poverty to-day is unquestionably capitalism. Capitalism is the creator of the proletariat, the type of the poor class; poverty and proletariat, poor man and proletarian, are almost equivalent terms. Capitalism is also the creator of pauperism (e.g. of the industrial reserve army), which must be regarded as an essential pre-condition of capitalist production. In the manufacturing districts, poverty is more extensive than it is in the agricultural districts. In the towns it is more extensive than in the country. Capitalism cannot exist without poor-relief. Unless the destitute are relieved out of the superfluity of capitalism, certain very undesirable consequences will ensue. For poverty is a chief cause at once of punishable offences and of all kinds of disease. The two main purposes of the relief of the destitute are, in fact, the protection of the rich against criminal outbreaks on the part of the poor, and the prevention of the epidemic diseases which would breed in the surroundings of neglected poverty, and spread thence to the homes of the rich.
The chief aim of poor-relief is to give help in cases of poverty arising from individual causes, to deal with poverty regarded as an individual concern. Poor-relief makes no attempt whatever to do away with the social causes of poverty—nor, indeed, could the methods of poor-relief effect this, even if the attempt were made. In a certain sense, socialism and poor-relief have a common character, inasmuch as both are opposed to free competition. It is the aim of poor-relief to relieve the disastrous consequences of free competition; the aim of socialism is to do away with class distinctions and existing contrasts between wealth and poverty—that is, to equalise and to democratise. But socialism does not favour the relief of destitution, and rather regards the need for such relief as a proof of the unrighteousness of the capitalist system. Socialism regards poor-relief as nothing more than a way of treating symptoms of social disorder, and as a method necessary only during the age of capitalism. Socialism is hostile to any social institution which serves to safeguard capitalism.
Socialism versus Child-Protection.—The considerations put forward regarding poor-relief bear to some extent on the relationships of child-protection to capitalism. Many departments of child-protection—foundling hospitals, for instance—are merely departments of poor-relief. Child-protection is chiefly concerned with the children of the poor, since these are far more in need of protection than the children of the rich.
Child-protection and socialism both existed, in a sense, prior to the development of capitalism. But in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, child-protection has received much more attention than in former times. This extensive development of child-protection is one phase of that general development whose other phase is the development of capitalism. Modern child-protection and modern socialism are necessary consequences of capitalism, and the existence of the last in the absence of child-protection and of socialism is altogether unthinkable. Capitalism gives rise to numerous diseases in the social organism, and then endeavours to cure them, for the most part, by the methods of child-protection. The causal relationship between capitalism and child-protection is not direct or primary. Certain applications of child-protection are not the direct consequences of capitalism itself, but only consequences of the causes by which capitalism has been created and evolved. When we come to examine concrete conditions, such as those of some particular country, we invariably find that child-protection and capitalism are intimately connected with the general development of the country with which we are concerned. This fact may interpose modifying conditions in the causal chain connecting capitalism and child-protection.
(The origin of the Children’s Courts in the United States of America offers an instructive example of this. In this country, as in England, special causes led early in the last century to the establishment of reformatory schools. But whereas in England, until quite recently, boarding institutions were preferred for this purpose, from the first, in the United States the attempt was made to arrange for the upbringing of neglected and criminal youths under family auspices. The reasons for the adoption of this latter plan in America were the enormous possibilities of territorial expansion and the lively demand for new population. When juvenile offenders came before the courts, responsible individuals would offer to undertake the upbringing of these children, binding themselves over to report at regular intervals upon the behaviour of the children, and generally accepting all necessary responsibility. The judges ventured upon such experiments, and as the successful results multiplied, this method of procedure attained the force of a customary institution, and subsequently was formally embodied in legislation.)
Certain departments of child-protection were in existence before the days of capitalism, but these departments were greatly influenced by the changes introduced by capitalism. For this reason the direct causal relationship between capitalism and child-protection cannot always be demonstrated. It may of course happen, in any particular country, that child-protection stands at a higher or a lower level of development than appears to correspond to the general state of social evolution or to the development of capitalism in that particular country. As an example of this, we may mention Hungary, which, in the matter of child-protection, is in advance of countries where the development of capitalism and of civilisation are in a far more forward state; and in Hungary the development of child-protection has proceeded in complete independence of the shackles of historical evolution.
It is not an advantage, but a disadvantage, that child-protection is necessary to-day. The country which has need of numerous institutions for purposes of social betterment is in a bad way; and, indeed, the more of such institutions it needs, the worse must its condition be. These considerations apply to other institutions as well as to child-protection. Just as it is desirable that no institutions for social betterment should be necessary, so also we might wish that child-protection were superfluous. To put the matter in other words, it is desirable that in any country those conditions should not exist which have made it necessary to establish institutions for social betterment. The country which has no need for such institutions stands at a higher level than the country to which they are still indispensable. But of two countries which have equal need for such institutions, the one which possesses them stands at a higher level than the one in which they have not yet come into existence. This last consideration must not be forgotten when we are making a comparative study of child-protection in various countries.
Child-protection to-day is solely concerned with attempts to palliate the evils which necessarily result from the essential nature of the social organism of to-day, and is not concerned with efforts to transform the nature of that organism. Child-protection alleviates some of the symptoms of capitalism, but does nothing to prevent the ever-renewed production of such symptoms. Thus we see that child-protection is not a scientific therapeutic method, for such a method tends, as time passes, to render itself superfluous. Child-protection is an important department of social activity. But there are other much more important departments. If the amount of wealth expended for the purposes of child-protection is excessive, means requisite to the attainment of other ends will be sacrificed, and the pursuit of much more important aims may be rendered impossible. The expenditure upon child-protection is useful to this extent, that it prevents the occurrence of much harm, and yet to-day a large proportion of such expenditure is quite useless, because the evils which child-protection attempts to relieve are not, as a matter of fact, all relieved. Capitalism is the source of the factors which make child-protection necessary. Hence all our efforts for child-protection are useless so long as we continue to create institutions by which capitalism is protected and strengthened. Child-protection to-day is in essence nothing more than a number of repressive measures, which are necessary only because capitalism will not permit the desired ends to be obtained by the use of preventive methods, owing to the fact that prevention would involve the destruction of capitalism. Thus the destruction of capitalism is a postulate, not of socialism merely, but also of child-protection. Unfortunately, few people as yet recognise that prevention is the true duty of the collective intelligence; instead of searching out the causes which have made the use of repressive measures necessary, they expect a cure to result from the use of repressive measures alone.
Let our device be, Prevention. The existing social order must be completely revolutionised. Let us have done with palliatives. It is time for a new creation. Repression is good, but prevention is a great deal better! The use of palliatives is a necessary evil attaching to the existing social order; but it is a crying instance of the contradictory character of existing social conditions. It is not right that child-protection should be the leading social and political activity of the State, although at present such activity is supposed to be the climax of political science. The course of action of a community which, while protecting children, oppresses adults, is unjust; for it would be better that children should perish, than that they should grow up to lives of misery, crime, or prostitution. It is impossible to sympathise with a country which sends the children of the working class to foundling hospitals, and the adult workers themselves to prison; which protects children simply in order to increase the population, and yet forcibly, as it were, drives the adults from the country as emigrants; which offers adult workers a starvation wage, and yet benevolently keeps paupers alive; which brings up pauper children to become proletarians, which breeds working men to depress by competition the wages of their fellows, and to play the part of miserable strike-breakers.
(Hungary affords an interesting example of this, for the social and political development of this country is by no means of the most modern type, and yet, in the matter of child-protection, Hungarian institutions are perhaps the finest in the whole world. It is true that child-protection in Hungary is to a large extent no more than child-protection on paper, if for no other reason, for this, that the proper administration of the Hungarian methods of child-protection cannot be carried out efficiently by the executive personnel available in that country.)
The true child-protection, the child-protection of the future, will take the form of the destruction of capitalism. It is true that in a certain way, and within certain limits, child-protection alleviates many of the evil effects of capitalism. But there is no doubt whatever that the aims of child-protection could be attained far more efficiently and far more rapidly by the destruction of capitalism. If we were to remove the causes which make child-protection necessary, as they would be removed by the destruction of capitalism, the need for child-protection would disappear. But the causes which make child-protection necessary to-day will not disappear until the State of the future comes into being. The question presses, should we postpone our attempts to deal with the symptoms of the disease, to palliate the defects of the existing social order, until the day arrives when we shall be in a position to deal with these evils once and for all by radical measures?
No! Even to-day we have to concern ourselves with child-protection. The physician must not refuse to treat his patient because the means available for treatment will not suffice to cure. The wise physician does indeed endeavour to discover and to remove the causes of disease, but he does not neglect the symptoms. He is well aware that the disappearance of the symptoms does not indicate the cure of the disease. Nevertheless, he holds it to be his duty to prescribe certain remedies which do no more than relieve symptoms. For in many cases symptoms are disagreeable and even dangerous, and may actually lead to the death of the patient, before there is time to bring into play methods of treatment which might deal effectively with the causes of the disease. Often, too, a remedial measure which does no more than relieve symptoms may have an excellent effect upon the general bodily well-being of the patient. There are even cases in which a remedial measure exercises an unfavourable influence upon the disease and upon the patient’s general condition, and none the less it has to be administered, in order to ward off some greater evil. To-day, child-protection is useful and even indispensable. It is true that a well-planned social order affords the best child-protection, and such an order is of far greater value than child-protection in the narrower sense of the term; but this does not make the latter form of child-protection superfluous.
The Right View.—The answers to the questions asked in this chapter, and more especially the detailed answer to the question, what subdivisions of child-protection are the most important to-day, and what is the relative importance of these various subdivisions, will be found in the Special Part of this book. There I discuss the individual subdivisions of child-protection, and discuss in each case the tendency of evolution. Unquestionably, the tendency of evolution is in the direction of the better regulation of the activities applicable to the various subdivisions of child-protection.
CHAPTER VI
THE EXECUTIVE INSTRUMENTS OF CHILD-PROTECTION
Introductory.—In individual countries there are three distinct factors engaged in the relief of destitution: local governing bodies, the central government, and the community at large. In different countries the various departments and activities of poor-relief are differently distributed among these several factors. Which of the three plays the leading part in this work depends upon the peculiar circumstances of the individual country. In any country that factor which predominates in the general and in the special work of administrative and executive activity is likely also to play a predominant part in the relief of destitution. The same three factors co-operate in the work of child-protection; and in any country their relative shares in this work commonly (but not necessarily) correspond to their relative shares in the work of poor-relief.
In Italy, even to-day, all three of these factors—the local authorities, the central government and the community at large—are engaged in providing for the care of foundlings and illegitimate children; but the distribution of this work among the three factors varies in different parts of the country, these differences being referable to historical causes, and more especially to the former territorial subdivisions of the country. In many countries in which national responsibility for the relief of destitution is unknown, many of the subdivisions of child-protection are nevertheless administered by the State. As an example may be mentioned the care of foundlings in France. There is a special reason for this in France, inasmuch as, owing to the fact that in this country inquiries as to the fatherhood of illegitimate children (la recherche de la paternitÉ) are forbidden, the care of foundlings constitutes a great, general, and very pressing need, which can best be met by State action. In many countries in which the central government is responsible for poor-relief, some of the most important subdivisions of child-protection are administered by voluntary associations; England, the classical land of governmental poor-relief, affords a good example of this. Here the fact that in England voluntary associations, as the outcome of the collective activity of the community at large, have long exercised a decisive influence in all directions, accounts for the special conditions to which attention has been drawn.
Local Governing Bodies.—When we are concerned mainly with local conditions, the local governing bodies become of primary importance. They are best acquainted with the people and their needs, and their acquaintance with these is the more intimate the smaller the community. Hence the necessary duties can often be carried out most effectively and most economically by the local authorities. Many retrograde local authorities, especially the smaller ones and those in the country districts, are hostile to many of the applications of child-protection, regarding them as immoral, and they may even be quite unable to grasp the mental attitude of those who advocate child-protection. Many local authorities are very slow to undertake any extensions of communal activity; either on account of this reluctance, or else because in small communities the cost per ratepayer of the work of child-protection is easily calculated, they are apt to be too much influenced by narrow financial considerations. This is, in fact, the gravest defect of child-protection as carried out by local authorities; and this explains also why it is that many local authorities either entirely neglect the most necessary work of child-protection, or fail to perform it adequately; and it explains why the institutions founded by such authorities for the work of child-protection do not always fulfil the aims with which they were originated. It is well known that in many local government areas the homes for destitute orphans are at the same time workhouses, poorhouses, foci of all kinds of evil elements. It is well known that even to-day certain local authorities hand over the children for whose care they are legally responsible, under indentures, to those who will take them for the smallest premium, the children receiving a wage of from 20 to 30 marks yearly. For the reasons explained, we find in many countries that the relief of destitution and child-protection are associated throughout extensive areas, and even that special ad hoc local authorities exist to deal with these matters. Just what institutions we find in any particular country will naturally depend upon how in that country the individual executive and administrative functions are allotted to the various municipal authorities, district councils, and such ad hoc authorities as may exist.
The Community at Large.—Where the sphere of functional activity of the local authority and of the central government ends, there the sphere of the community at large begins. The limit is that at which the local authority and the central government regard their duties as fulfilled; beyond this limit they are unwilling to interfere, and the assistance they are able to give is no longer adapted to the individual special cases, because their work is not individual but bureaucratic. Beyond this limit, then, the community at large must take up the burden. The benevolent activities of the community at large are better able than those of the central or local authority to deal with individual cases. The work of the State is done with head and intellect, that of the community at large is done with heart and feeling. But great as these advantages are, they are counterbalanced by very grave defects. Child-protection undertaken by the community at large is often nothing more than a multiplication of fainÉant societies, and an arena for self-important busybodies who wish to thrust themselves well forward in the public eye, but are completely ignorant of the subject of child-protection. (In Germany, for instance, no subdivision, however minute, of the work of child-protection can be mentioned, which does not possess a special “Society” to deal with the matter.) Child-protection as undertaken by the community at large lacks co-ordination with reference to any well-defined plan of activity, it effects much that is unnecessary and even harmful, whilst very necessary work is often done badly or not at all. The expenditure of time and money are enormous; the results attained are exceedingly small.
Of late years, especially in England and in the United States of America, societies for the organisation of the voluntary charitable activities undertaken by the community at large (the Charity Organisation Society, &c.) have come into existence; these are central organs to effect the harmonious co-ordination of philanthropic efforts, but do not usually themselves directly undertake charitable work. Such societies may play a very useful part, but they do not render the organisation and administration of poor-relief and child-protection by the central government and the local authority altogether superfluous. A very instructive example of the centralisation of voluntary activities for child-protection is that furnished by the Ungarische Kinderschutzliga (Hungarian Child-Protection League), founded in the year 1906. It is gradually absorbing all the really valuable child-protection societies, founds and administers all kinds of institutions for child-protection, is directly associated with all the executive instruments of the official work of child-protection, and sustains and amplifies the work of government in this direction. Its work is supervised from a central office in Buda-Pesth.
The Central Government.—The central government must, first of all, undertake those duties which, for financial reasons, the municipal authorities, district councils, ad hoc authorities, &c. cannot attempt. It must also satisfy certain general needs—that is, those needs whose mode of satisfaction is unaffected by varying local conditions. As in other departments of administrative activity, so also in the sphere of child-protection, a certain uniformity is requisite; and this uniformity can be attained in no other way than by the intervention of the central government. The satisfaction of very pressing needs, the overcoming of extraordinary difficulties, is possible only to the central government. Even in those countries in which local self-government is in a very advanced state of development, it is better that such legislative activity as is requisite in the domain of child-protection should be left to the central government.
The central government more readily takes over the duties of child-protection from the hands of the community at large than from the local authorities. As time goes on, ecclesiastical and voluntary benevolent activities become ever less important and less extensive as compared with those of the State. Whereas in ancient times private benevolence, and in the Middle Ages ecclesiastical benevolence, played the principal parts, in our own times these are more and more superseded by organised communal effort operating through the central government. At first the State takes over only the negative side of destitution—police regulation of mendicancy and the like. To-day there does not remain a single civilised State without at least the first beginnings of a national relief of destitution. The tendency to extend ever more widely the province of national responsibility for the relief of destitution is quite unmistakable. Those who oppose this tendency are already in a minority, and their number continues to diminish. State systems of poor-relief are by no means faultless, but the errors are not ineradicable; many of the defects are remediable, and are, in fact, being remedied as time goes on. In this respect the tendency of evolution in England, the classical land of national poor-relief, is extremely satisfactory.
The central government is harder to move, has more inertia, than the community at large. It is for this reason that new departments of activity are always first undertaken by the latter, and for this reason also that most of the subdivisions and institutions of child-protection owe their inception and the first phases of their development mainly to the community at large. But after this stage, when the new institution has been put upon its trial, when it has become generally diffused, and when its permanence is assured, it is taken over by the State. But, even then, there still remains one field of activity for the community at large, namely, to discover and draw attention to the errors in the State administration of child-protection. The development in Hungary of institutions for the care of foundlings and other illegitimate children since the beginning of the last quarter of the nineteenth century may serve as an example of this.
Every social institution which originates on a broad basis and meets a wide general need exhibits a natural tendency towards a unified organisation and towards centralisation. We see this tendency at work in the history of child-protection. Another tendency of evolution is an enlargement in the sphere of activity of the State, in the direction of the satisfaction of all the important vital needs of the community by organised communal effort, operating through the machinery of the central government.
The national acceptance of responsibility for poor-relief may take the form of the State being satisfied with the centralised and thorough governmental regulation of the relief of destitution, the administrative details being left in the hands of the local authorities and of the community at large. Of course this is no more than a half-measure, and yet in certain circumstances it may be an advantageous division of labour. For, when we consider the respective rÔles of the local authority and of the community at large in the work of child-protection, we must not forget that both are engaged in work delegated to them by the State, and for which the State is really responsible. Moreover, the relief of destitution, and that part of the work of child-protection analogous to the relief of destitution, are intimately associated with the problems of household-right and of domicile; because many central governments admit responsibility for the destitute only in the case of their own citizens, whilst in many countries a right to relief in case of destitution at the hands of the local authority is acquired by residence merely. Thus the problems of child-protection are interconnected with the legal problems of local administrative activity; and it may happen that the local authorities undertake certain departments of child-protection merely because these questions of domicile form part of their circle of interests.
A Unified System of Laws for Child-Protection.—Can the State institute a unified system of laws for child-protection, one comprising the entire legal material of child-protection? In former times such provision as there was for child-protection existed only in a dispersed form, as part of laws with other primary objects; not until later, when the question of child-protection had become one of considerable importance, did laws come into being dealing specifically with this subject. Provision for the enforcement in certain cases of a coercive reformatory education was originally a mere supplementary provision of the criminal law or of certain borough by-laws; but to-day, in many countries, special laws dealing with coercive reformatory education have been passed by the central government. The earliest special laws on the subject of child-protection dealt with the care of foundlings and illegitimate children, this being the first subdivision of our subject to attain specific importance.
The tendency of evolution is to codify, in a unified system of laws, all the legal material bearing upon any particular question. But a unified system of laws dealing with the subject of child-protection is not at present attainable. For child-protection is subject to change, almost from day to day and from hour to hour. If the legislator wished to keep pace with its development, he would have to alter and patch his system of laws year by year; but if this were done, the unified character of the legal system would soon become illusory, and numerous legal technical difficulties would inevitably arise. The question of child-protection finds a place in every department of law. There are many legal regulations regarding children which, owing in part to the technique of legislation, and in part to other causes, are, for practical reasons, best embodied in other laws. For example, laws relating to guardianship and to the care of illegitimate children cannot well be dealt with apart from the general laws bearing on family relationships.
A Centralised Authority for Child-Protection.—Is a centralised authority for child-protection possible? That is, is it possible to group under a unitary control all the agencies dealing with the protection of children? This idea certainly represents the tendency of evolution. As regards the care of foundlings and of illegitimate children, the tendency of evolution is in the direction of family care, all the families with which such children are placed being under the supervision of a single central authority, which deals with them all in accordance with identical principles. Still more clearly does this tendency manifest itself in the foundation of children’s courts, and in the endeavour to extend the powers of these to embrace all the legal relationships of children. In further exemplification of this tendency may be mentioned the development of infants’ milk depÔts and of schools for mothers—a development which has by no means reached its climax. Unquestionably, in the domain of child-protection, institutions which originally appeared very different in character become unified. Thus, infants’ milk depÔts, schools for mothers, schools for midwives, legal advice in children’s cases, &c., are now all being administered in connection with foundling hospitals.
The claims of the other departments of national and social life must not, however, be left out of account. Thus, whether certain questions should be referred to the law-courts, or to the local administrative authorities, to lawyers or doctors, to architects or schoolmasters; whether a local administrative authority should have the right to deal with one or two technical questions only, such as arise in a particular administrative area as to legal and executive powers, or with a number of such questions; whether certain duties should be undertaken only by specialised institutions, or by institutions which also subserve other functions—such questions as these involve a reference to other considerations in addition to those directly connected with child-protection.
Private and Official Activities.—To-day much of the work of the relief of destitution and of child-protection is undertaken by voluntary organisations, founded and administered by private individuals who are engaged also in other activities. These private persons work gratuitously, but often discharge their duties better than professional salaried and permanently appointed officials. Their work is better individualised, it is less bureaucratic, and has more heart in it. These advantages are the fruit of good-will and altruistic feeling. Nevertheless the rÔle of voluntary societies becomes continually less extensive. The tendency of evolution is to bring into operation more and more the principle of the division of labour, so that questions needing expert knowledge are dealt with by professional experts, persons permanently appointed for such work, paid accordingly, and really in possession of the specialised skill which is needed. The relief of destitution, and child-protection are, as is well known, both questions for experts; and it becomes more and more necessary that their administration should be in the hands of well-paid professional workers. Lawyers, although in the domain of child-protection they are laymen merely, play a decisive part to-day in this domain, as they do in most branches of administrative activity. They are placed at the head of the expert administrators, and have, if not the first word, what is perhaps even worse, the last word, in the majority of technical questions. It is necessary to enter an energetic protest against this predominance of lawyers. It is absolutely essential that not only the salaried professional workers, but also all those who take part in the work of child-protection in honorary offices or as occasional voluntary helpers, should receive an appropriate training for their work. Quite recently has originated the idea of Schools of Public Welfare—Schools and a Curriculum for Child-Protection. We must carefully distinguish from such schools for professional workers, courses of lectures whose purpose merely is to acquaint wider circles with the aims and methods of child-protection, or to initiate novices into such work.
The Medical Profession.—The most important task of child-protection is the protection of children’s health. The persons who should undertake the management of this department are those who possess the requisite expert knowledge in matters of health—that is to say, medical practitioners and specialists in the diseases of children. In most branches of child-protection, medical practitioners now play an important part. It rests with them to determine whether there does or does not exist a contra-indication to marriage. They have to render assistance before and during childbirth, they are the most important instruments for the protection of infants and for the care of foundlings and illegitimate children, and as consultants and administrators they exercise important activities in the domain of child-labour. Their part in other subdivisions of child-protection will be discussed in detail in a later chapter of this work. The importance of the work of medical practitioners continually increases. The tendency in almost all departments of child-protection is to arrange for a preliminary examination of the children by the doctor. Among the various reasons for such an examination, we may mention that in the case of uncontrollable children and juvenile criminals the doctor can make a thorough examination of the child’s physical and mental condition, and upon this examination he will base a decision, whether the child should be placed in family or institutional care, in a reformatory school, or in some other specialised institution—as, for example, a home for mentally abnormal children; further, it is the doctor’s duty to examine all children, before they begin to work for a living, as to their physical fitness, and upon the results of this examination to base an opinion whether the child is fit to earn its living at all, and if so, whether the trade selected by the relatives is a suitable one. The tendency is, further, that the doctor should give an opinion regarding the method of protection suited for the particular child. Quite recently, indeed, the desire has been widely and strongly expressed that all children should be subjected to continuous and appropriate medical control. The institution of school physicians, supplemented in recent days by medical control of the domestic environment of the school children, shows clearly that such medical supervision of all children is likely in time to become universal. In addition, we owe a great deal to the doctors in connection with the literature of child-protection. The ablest and most important works in this specialty are by physicians. In several handbooks of hygiene, most of the problems of child-protection receive attention, although the matter is not always treated very systematically. The enormous influence which medical science has exercised and continues to exercise upon the development of the individual branches of child-protection will become apparent in the Special Part of this work.
Women.—To what extent can women play a part as executive instruments of child-protection? Women are better fitted than men to supervise the bodily care of children. Women can more readily gain the confidence of those who need support and protection—above all, the confidence of other women (especially of lonely and forsaken women) and of children. They are better judges than men of defects in housekeeping and how to remedy them. Many things are confided to women which are kept hidden from men; and women can remedy many concealed defects where men could do no good. Such duties as these are commonly performed by women more conscientiously than by men, &c.
The following arguments have been put forward against the employment of women: (a) Women ought not to be exposed to the dangers and inconveniences inseparable from visiting the houses of the poor and other places subject to inspection; (b) Women are gossiping, soft-hearted, and credulous, so that they are unable to exercise authority, and are inclined to pay undue attention to exaggerated and quite irrelevant statements; (c) They interfere too much in the management of the households of the foster-parents, &c.
These arguments are worthless. Besides, the question of the employment of women in such capacities can only be decided fairly with reference to the individual subdivisions of the work of child-protection. Unquestionably, women are suitably employed as children’s nurses, matrons of children’s homes, governesses and school-mistresses, wet-nurses, medical practitioners, factory inspectors, sick-nurses, confidential agents of the official guardians of children, visitors of foster-parents. Where the common people have no confidence in women employees, for example, in rough, uncultivated districts, where, in the interests of child-protection, police intervention is necessary, as, for example, in the case of morally depraved and uncontrollable children, and where trusteeship has to be undertaken as in the case of orphan children who are heirs to considerable property, women cannot be employed. The tendency of evolution is to employ women as executive instruments of child-protection, and, indeed, to employ them as salaried public officials.
Numerous and serious objections must, however, be raised against the idea that ladies belonging to the upper classes should find amusement and relief from the tedium of their ordinary life by engaging in some branch of the work of child-protection (such as supervising the work of midwives, or visiting the foster-parents of boarded-out children). The work of such women is of little value in itself, and it takes bread out of the mouths of women who could do the same work very much better professionally and as a means of livelihood.
