What is eugenics? / by Major Leonard Darwin.

  • Leonard Darwin
Date:
[1937]
Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0)

Credit: What is eugenics? / by Major Leonard Darwin. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    EUGENICS Ш THE FUTURE 71 whether coming from public or private funds. And we thus see that philanthropy is constantly helping to defeat its own aims. No check must, however, be placed on these noble efforts to lessen human suffering. What we have to seek for is some way of counteracting those consequences of philanthropy which are harmful. Another general question which has to be considered is whether any couple has the right in all circumstances to bring offspring into the world. Here we have first to ask, What is the meaning of the word right ? If a man says he has a right to live to the age of eighty, such a statement is meaningless ; because all men cannot be made to live to that age. If a man says he has a right to vote at a certain election, he means that the Government ought to see to it that he can record his vote on that occasion. The right of one person always implies an obligation on some other person or persons. And it is only by considering the obligation side of these questions that light can be thrown on them. As to an unlimited right to parenthood, this would imply an obligation on the part of the State to see to it that all couples could always produce as many children as they liked. But the State does not do this in the case of persons confined in prisons or other institutions. And surely the State ought not to facilitate the appearance of such off¬ spring as would be likely to produce an injurious effect on all future generations. The right to parenthood cannot be unlimited. There are, however, other rights which must be held in view. It is generally held that all men have a right to live. If so, every child must, to say the least, be kept alive, if necessary by public assistance. If nothing else were done, this assistance would, as we have seen, tend to encourage the inferior to produce more children. For this reason the State may justly accompany public assistance with certain conditions as to the further production of children. Returning to the limitation of the size of the families of those we have called dependents, we have seen that they
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