In what ways should the State seek to better human environment?
(1) Municipal governments should supervise town and village planning. The riotous individualism of our American people has resulted in the haphazard growth of countless dreary towns and an architectural anarchy that resembles nothing more than an orchestra playing with every instrument tuned to a different key. The stamp of public control is to be seen, if at all, in an inconvenient and monotonous chessboard plan for streets. Congestion of traffic at the busy points; wide stretches of empty pavement on streets little used; houses of every style and no style, imbued with all the colors of the spectrum; weed-grown vacant lots, unkempt yards, some fenced, some unfenced; poster-bedecked billboards-verily, the average American town is not a thing of beauty. Matthew Arnold's judgment is corroborated by every traveler. "Evidently," he wrote, "this is that civilization's weak side. There is little to nourish and delight the sense of beauty there." A certain crudeness is inevitable in a new country, and will be outgrown; age is a great artist. Man usually mars with his first strokes; and it is only when he has met his practical needs that he will dally with aesthetic considerations. Many of our older cities and villages have partly outgrown the awkward age, become dignified in the shade of spreading trees, and fallen somehow into a kind of unity; a few of them, especially near the Atlantic seaboard, where the stupid rectangularity of the towns farther west was never imposed, are among the loveliest in the world. But in general, in spite of many costly, and some really beautiful, buildings, and acknowledging the individual charm of many of the wide piazzaed shingled houses of the well-to-do, and the general effect of spaciousness, our towns and villages are shockingly, depressingly ugly. Money enough has been spent to create a beautiful effect; the failure lies in that unrestrained individualism that permits each owner to build any sort of a structure, and to color it any hue, that appeals to his fancy, without regard to its effect upon neighboring buildings or upon the eyes of passers-by. All sorts of architectural atrocities are committed-curious false fronts, fancy shingles, scroll-work balustrades, and the like;-in the town where these words are written, a builder of a number of houses has satisfied a whim to give eyebrows to his windows, in the shape of flat arches of alternate red and white bricks, with an extraordinarily grotesque and discomforting effect. But even where the buildings are good separately, the general effect is, unless by coincidence, a sad chaos.
In the more progressive countries of Europe matters are not left thus to the caprice of individuals; in some German towns, and the so-called garden cities of England, we have excellent examples of scientific town planning, conducing to homogeneity, convenience, and beauty. The awakening social sense in this country will surely lead soon to a general conviction of the duty of an oversight of street planning and building in the interests of the community as a whole. There is no reason why our towns should not be sensibly laid out, according to a prearranged and rational plan; they might have individuality, picturesqueness, charm; be full of interesting separate notes, yet harmonious in design, making a single composition, like a great mosaic. Such an environment would have its subconscious effects upon the morals of the people, would awaken a new sense of community loyalty, and drive home the lesson of the necessity and beauty of the cooperative spirit.
Among the features of this town planning are these:
Streets must be laid out in conformity with the topography of the neighborhood and the direction of traffic. Gentle curves, or frequent circles, as in Washington, must break the monotony of straight lines; the natural features of the landscape, hills, bluffs, a river, must be utilized to give character to the town. The height of buildings must be regulated in relation to the width of the streets, and the percentage of ground space that may be built upon determined. All designs for buildings must be approved by the community architects with consideration of their harmony with neighboring buildings. A public landscape architect should have supervision over and give expert advice for the planting of trees and shrubbery and the beautifying of yards back as well as front. Factories and shops should be confined to certain designated portions of a town (and the smoke nuisance strictly controlled); disfiguring billboards and overhead wires done away with; parks laid out and kept intact from intrusion of streets or buildings. Fortunately, the majority of our American houses, built of wood, are temporary in character; and most city buildings at present have a life of but a generation or two. In this evanescence of our contemporary architecture lies the hope for an eventual regeneration of American towns. In the city and village of the future, life will be so bosomed in beauty that there will be less need of artificial beauty-seeking and gaslight pleasures. A healthy local pride will be fostered and community life come into its own again.
(2) Municipalities should provide facilities for wholesome recreation out of doors. Children, in particular, ought not to be obliged, for lack of other space, to play upon city streets, where they impede traffic and run serious risks. [Footnote: On New York City streets two hundred and thirty-one children were killed in twenty-one months, according to recent figures.] Schoolyards should be larger than they generally are, and bedtime; in the big cities the roofs should be utilized also. Every neighborhood should have its ample playgrounds. For want of such provision children of the poor grow up pale and pinched, without the normalizing and educative influence of healthy play, and with no proper outlet for their energies, so that crime and vice flourish prematurely. With proper foresight open spaces can be retained as a city grows, without great expense; the economic gain, in a reduced death-rate, reduced cost for doctors and nurses, police, courts, and prisons, and increased efficiency of the next generation of workers, will easily balance the outlay, without weighing the gain in happiness and morality.[Footnote: See on this point, the literature of the Division of Recreation of the Russell Sage Foundation, and of the Playground and Recreation Association of America (1 Madison Avenue, New York City). Jane Addams, The Spirit of Youth and the City Streets. C. Zueblin, American Municipal Progress, chap IX. J. Lee, Constructive and Preventive Philanthropy, chaps. VIII-XII. Outlook, vol. 87, p. 775; vol. 95, p. 511; vol. 96, p. 443.] But, indeed, adults stand also in need of outdoor life. Grounds for ball games, bowls, and all sorts of sports should be generously provided if human life is not to lose one of its pleasantest and most useful aspects. For evenings there should be attractive social meeting-places, neighborhood clubs, supervised dance halls, and the like, such as the social settlements now to a slight extent provide, with notably beneficial results. As the poorer classes come more and more into their inheritance of the fruits of industry, these desiderata may perhaps be again left to private initiative; but at present there is a large class too pressed by poverty to get for itself these necessities of a normal life; and the need of the people makes the duty of the State.[Footnote: Cf. C. R. Henderson, The Social Spirit in America, chap. XIV.]
(3) The States and the Nation must be careful to conserve the natural resources of the country from waste, and advantage of the people. The forests, still so recklessly felled, must be guarded, not only for the sake of the future timber supply, but to prevent floods, ensure a proper supply of water in times of drought, and preserve the soil from being washed away. The scientific practice of forestry, the maintenance of an efficient fire patrol, and the reforestation of denuded areas that can best be utilized for the growth of timber, must be undertaken or supervised by government experts. The very limited supplies of coal, oil, and natural gas must be protected from waste. Arid lands must be brought into use where irrigation is possible, swamp lands drained, waterways and harbors improved to their full usefulness.[Footnote: On national conservation, see C. R. Van Hise, The Conservation of Natural Resources. Outlook, vol. 93, p. 770. Atlantic Monthly, vol. 101, p. 694. Review of Reviews, vol. 37, p. 585. Chautauquan, vol. 55, pp. 21, 33, 112.] National and state highways must be built as object-lessons to the towns and counties that still leave their roads a stretch of mud or sand.[Footnote: It is estimated that ninety per cent of the public roads in the United States are still unimproved; that the average cost of hauling produce is twenty-five cents a mile-ton, as against twelve cents in France; that $300,000,000 a year would be saved in hauling expenses if our roads were as good as those of western Europe.] All of these material improvements have their civilizing influence, their moral significance; as Edmond Kelly put it, "By constructing our environment with intelligence we can determine the direction of our own development." So it is of no small consequence what sort of homes and cities we live in. During the next generation or so, while the State is slowly bestirring itself to undertake these duties, there will be great need of civic and village improvement associations, women's clubs, merchants' associations, etc, to arouse public interest, demonstrate possibilities, and stir up municipal holidays, Memorial Day, Independence Day, Arbor Day, Thanksgiving Day, etc, should be used to stimulate civic pride in these matters; pulpit and press should be brought into line. It will be a slow and discouraging, but necessary, task to awaken the people to a realization of the potentialities for a better civilization that lie in the utilization of government powers. What should be done in the way of public education? The principle of state support of education has, happily, been pretty fully accepted in this country, although in the East the universities still have to depend upon private benefactions. The public-school system is excellent in plant and principle; the next step is to work out a rational curriculum. The average high-school graduate today has learned little of what he most needs to know how to earn his living, how to spend his money wisely, how to live. The average girl knows little of housekeeping, less of the duties of motherhood.[Footnote: Cf. H. Spencer, Education, chap. I: "Is it not an astonishing fact that though on the treatment of offspring depend their lives or deaths, and their moral value or ruin, yet not one word of instruction on the treatment of offspring is ever given to those who will hereafter be parents? Is it not monstrous that the fate of a new generation should be left to the chances of unreasoning custom, impulse, fancy . . . ?" The whole chapter is worth reading; the neglect of which Spencer complained still persists.] The dangers of sex indulgence-the greatest of all perils to youth, the poisonous effects of alcohol, the necessities of bodily hygiene, are seldom effectively taught. Moral and religious education is, owing to our sectarianism, almost absolutely neglected. The evils of political corruption and unscrupulousness in business, the social problems that so insistently beset us, are little discussed in school. Yet here is an enormous opportunity for the awakening of moral idealism and the social spirit. Boys and girls in their teens can be brought to an eager interest in moral and social problems; class after class could be sent out fired with enthusiasm to remedy wrongs and push for a higher civilization. The failure to awaken more of this dormant good will and energy, and to direct it for the elevation of community standards and the solution of community problems, is a grave indictment against our complacent "stand-pat" educational system. Religious instruction will be a delicate matter for the indefinite future; but inspirational talks on non-controversial themes should find place, and perhaps a presentation of different religious views in rotation by representatives of different communions. In some way, at least, recognition should be made of the important role played by religion in life. Besides the school system, other means of public education must be extended. The libraries and art museums must reach a wider public. The docent-work in the museums is a recent undertaking of considerable importance. Free public lectures, free mothers' schools, city kindergartens, municipal concerts, university extension courses-such enterprises will doubtless become universal. The work of the National Government in spreading knowledge of scientific methods of agriculture and of practicable methods of improving country life- information about the installation of plumbing systems, water supply, sewage systems, electric lights, etc.- is of wide educational value. In 1911 the average schooling of Americans was five years apiece. Such inadequate preparation for life is a disgrace to our prosperous age. Education should be universally compulsory until the late teens at least; it should be regarded not as a luxury, like kid gloves and caviar, but as the normal development of a human being and the common heritage. It ought not to be the exclusive privilege of "gentlemen"- of certain select, upper- class individuals; as economic conditions are straightened out, universal education will become practically feasible. It is not only as a matter of justice, but in the interests of public welfare, that education should be given to all. It will actually pay in dollars and cents, in increased efficiency, more intelligent voting, decreased crime, decreased commercial prostitution, and crazy propaganda of all sorts. The city of Boston was right in inscribing on its public library the motto: "The commonwealth requires the education of the people as the safeguard of order and liberty." What can be done by eugenics? Environment and education are of enormous importance in determining what the mature individual shall be. But the result is strictly limited by the material they have to work upon; the individual who is handicapped by heredity cannot expect to catch up with him who starts the race of life better equipped, if both have equally favorable influences and opportunities. These influences can effect little permanent improvement in the human stock; that can only be radically bettered by seeing to it that individuals of superior stock have children and those of inferior stock do not. We have "harnessed heredity" to produce better types of wheat and roses and cattle and horses and dogs; why not produce better types of men? The study of these possibilities constitutes the new science of eugenics, which its founder, Francis Galton, defined as the study of "those agencies which humanity through social control may use for the improvement or the impairment of the racial qualities of future generations." Dr. Kellogg defines it as "taking advantage of the facts of heredity to make the human race better." "Good breeding of the human species." We may first ask what duties the disclosures of this new science lay upon the individual.
(1) The constitutional health of children is partly deter parents at the time of conception and birth. Most deaths of newborn infants are due to prenatal influences. Overstrain, malnutrition, alcoholism, and all physical excesses tend to cause physical degeneracy in the offspring. It is obviously the duty of prospective parents- and that means practically all healthy young people-to keep themselves well and strong, so as to give a good endowment of health to their children.
(2) Feeble-mindedness, epilepsy, some forms of insanity, and some venereal diseases are inheritable defects; those who suffer from them must refrain from having children. Studies of the "Jukes" family and the "Kallikak" family, and others, show convincingly the spread of these defects where defectives marry. To bring children into the world to bear such burdens-and to cost the State, as they are almost sure to, for their support [Footnote: The descendants of the original degenerate couple of "Jukes" cost New York State in seventy-five years $1,300,000. See R. L. Dugdale, The Jukes. H. H. Goddard, The Kallikak Family]-ought to be regarded as a grave sin.
(3) Little positive advice can yet be given as to those who are BEST fitted to have children, except in the matter of health and freedom from inheritable defects. According to Professor Boaz,[Footnote: F. Boaz, The Mind of Primitive Man.] one racial stock is about as good as another; so whatever selection is to be made may be between individual strains. But to breed the human stock for beauty, energy, mental ability, immunity to disease, sanity, or what not, is a task far beyond our present knowledge. Personal value and reproductive value are not closely correlative; and the factors that determine a good inheritance are highly complex. So that the choice of wife and husband may be left to those instinctive affinities and preferences which will in any case continue to be the deciding causes for the strong and educated and well-to-do to beget and rear children; the tendency to "race-suicide" among the upper classes is a matter for serious alarm. That portion of the population that is least able to give proper nurture to children, and to train them up to American ideals, is producing them in overwhelmingly greatest numbers. The older stocks in this country are dying out and being replaced by the large families of the east and south European immigrants. In England also, we are told, one sixth of the population, and this the least desirable sixth, is producing half of the coming generation. In 1790 the American family averaged 5.8 persons; in 1900 the average was 4.6. Among native Americans the average is lower still. College graduates are failing to reproduce their own numbers. Everywhere the Western peoples are breeding more and more slowly, while the Orientals, Negroes, and, in general, the less civilized peoples, are multiplying rapidly. Unless the upper classes in western Europe and America cease their selfish refusal to rear citizens, the earth will be inherited by the more backward peoples. This means, plainly, a perpetual clog upon progress. We may now ask what the State should demand in the interests of race- improvement.