But taken as a whole, it can hardly be supposed that the fecund stocks
of Pittsburgh, with their illiteracy, squalor and tuberculosis, their
high death-rates, their economic straits, are as good eugenic material
as the families that are dying out in the more substantial residence
section which their fathers created in the eastern part of the city.
And it can hardly be supposed that the city, and the nation, of the
future, would not benefit by a change in the distribution of births,
whereby more would come from the seventh ward and its like, and fewer
from the sixth and its like.
Evidently, there is no difficulty about seeing this form of natural
selection at work, and at work in such a way as greatly to change the
character of one section of the species. For comparison, some figures
are presented from European sources. In the French war budget of 1911 it
appears that from 1,000 women between the ages of 15 and 50, in
different districts of Paris, the number of yearly births was as
follows:
Very poor 108
Poor 99
Well-to-do 72
Very prosperous 65
Rich 53
Very rich 35
Disregarding the last class altogether, it is yet evident that while the
mother in a wealthy home bears two children, the mother in the slums
bears four.
Pages:
219
220
221
222
223
224
225
226
227
228
229
230
231
232
233
234
235
236
237
238
239
240
241
242
243