Euthenics, the science of controllable environment / A plea for better living conditions as a first step toward higher human efficiency

by Ellen H. Richards

Personal conduct was free from such delegated power in the Anglo-Saxon thought. The Englishman’s house was his castle inviolate. This was especially true of the early American settlers. Laws interfering with personal liberty, a man’s right to drink tea, to punish his own children, to beat his own wife, to keep his own muck-heap, have been deeply resented by the American citizen. Each step in the protection of his neighbor has been taken only by a struggle extending the common law of nuisance to a variety of conditions.

The protection of the man against himself, and of his wife and child against his ignorance or greed, is one of the twentieth century tasks yet hardly begun.

The control of man’s environment for his own good as a function of government is a comparatively new idea in republican democracy. The cry of paternalism is quickly raised, on the one hand, of socialism, on the other. Each gain has been at the cost of a hard-fought battle. But it is certain that the individual must delegate more or less of his so-called rights for the sake of the race, and since the only excuse for the existence of the individual is the race, he must so far relinquish his authority.

It is a part of the urban trend that the will of the man, of the head of the family, should be superseded by that of the community, city, state, nation.

Even though all the agencies for the education of both young people and adults that have been discussed in the preceding chapters were set in motion at once, there would still remain many thousands in township and city untouched by these forces, or so touched as to arouse rebellion against such novel notions.

Only the child can be educated to acquire habits of right living so perfectly that the suitable action takes place unconsciously. Twenty years hence these trained children will be the chief citizens of the republic, the leaders of public opinion. Today, however, less gentle means, less gradual processes, must be used in order that these children may have a chance to grow up.

In the social republic, the child as a future citizen is an asset of the state, not the property of its parents. Hence its welfare is a direct concern of the state. Preventive medicine is in this sense truly State Medicine, and means protection of the people from their own ignorance.

In the laws made with this end in view lies one of the greatest educative agencies known. We have referred in the last chapter to the need of drawing attention to defects and dangers in order that people may know what the results of their careless ways may be. No surer way has been found to fix attention than to attempt to enforce a law or collect a fine for disobedience of it. A marked illustration of this truth is given in the case of the ordinance against spitting in street cars. In many cities a notice was posted in each car—usually with little effect. In some a fine of five dollars was added, with little more result. Boston was one of the first cities to pass an ordinance, and it accompanied the law with a fine of one hundred dollars. This compelled attention—a sum which represented to the workman more than his yearly savings, more than any single expenditure. To the business man, even, it was a sum not to be lightly dropped on a filthy car floor. This mere statement of the value of cleanness made an almost instantaneous change in the habits of thousands. Within two days the car floors became practically free without a single fine being collected within that time, as far as the author is aware.

The law imposing fines for neglect of removal of garbage or of screening stables must be occasionally enforced in order to express degree of disapproval. A petty fine is of little use.

Conditions of motion, of rapid intermingling of distant populations—a thousand miles in a day is now possible—make national control a necessity. It is proved that quick results may be gained in saving lives and property by that prompt and thorough action which well-equipped Federal forces alone possess. The stamping out of yellow fever in Cuba, the redemption of Panama, the suppression of sporadic outbreaks at New Orleans, the quick response to a discovery, as in the cases of pellagra and the hookworm—all these show what a thoroughly alive government may do.