"The step from killing the child in the womb to murdering a person when out of the womb, is a dangerously narrow one," sagely remarks a recent medical author, probably speaking for many others, who somehow succeed in blinding themselves to the fact that this "dangerously narrow step" has been taken by mankind, only too freely, for thousands of years past, long before abortion was known in the world.
Here and there, however, medical authors of repute have advocated the further extension of abortion, with precautions, and under proper supervision, as an aid to eugenic progress. Thus, Professor Max Flesch (Die Neue Generation, April, 1909) is in favor of a change in the law permitting abortion (provided it is carried out by the physician) in special cases, as when the mother's pregnancy has been due to force, when she has been abandoned, or when, in the interests of the community, it is desirable to prevent the propagation of insane, criminal, alcoholic, or tuberculous persons.
In France, a medical man, Dr. Jean Darricarrère, has written a remarkable novel, Le Droit d'Avortement (1906), which advocates the thesis that a woman always possesses a complete right to abortion, and is the supreme judge as to whether she will or not undergo the pain and risks of childbirth. The question is, here, however, obviously placed not on medical, but on humanitarian and feminist grounds.
We have seen that, alike on the side of practice and of theory, a great change has taken place during recent years in the attitude towards abortion. It must, however, clearly be recognized that, unlike the control of procreation by methods for preventing conception, facultative abortion has not yet been embodied in our current social morality. If it is permissible to interpolate a personal opinion, I may say that to me it seems that our morality is here fairly reasonable.[[442]] I am decidedly of opinion that an unrestricted permission for women to practice abortion in their own interests, or even for communities to practice it in the interests of the race, would be to reach beyond the stage of civilization we have at present attained. As Ellen Key very forcibly argues, a civilization which permits, without protest, the barbarous slaughter of its carefully selected adults in war has not yet won the right to destroy deliberately even its most inferior vital products in the womb. A civilization guilty of so reckless a waste of life cannot safely be entrusted with this judicial function. The blind and aimless anxiety to cherish the most hopeless and degraded forms of life, even of unborn life, may well be a weakness, and since it often leads to incalculable suffering, even a crime. But as yet there is an impenetrable barrier against progress in this direction. Before we are entitled to take life deliberately for the sake of purifying life, we must learn how to preserve it by abolishing such destructive influences—war, disease, bad industrial conditions—as are easily within our social power as civilized nations.[[443]]
There is, further, another consideration which seems to me to carry weight. The progress of civilization is in the direction of greater foresight, of greater prevention, of a diminished need for struggling with the reckless lack of prevision. The necessity for abortion is precisely one of those results of reckless action which civilization tends to diminish. While we may admit that in a sounder state of civilization a few cases might still occur when the induction of abortion would be desirable, it seems probable that the number of such cases will decrease rather than increase. In order to do away with the need for abortion, and to counteract the propaganda in its favor, our main reliance must be placed, on the one hand, on increased foresight in the determination of conception and increased knowledge of the means for preventing conception,[[444]] and on the other hand, on a better provision by the State for the care of pregnant women, married and unmarried alike, and a practical recognition of the qualified mother's claim on society.[[445]] There can be little doubt that, in many a charge of criminal abortion, the real offence lies at the door of those who have failed to exercise their social and professional duty of making known the more natural and harmless methods for preventing conception, or else by their social attitude have made the pregnant woman's position intolerable. By active social reform in these two directions, the new movement in favor of abortion may be kept in check, and it may even be found that by stimulating such reform that movement has been beneficial.
We have seen that the deliberate restraint of conception has become a part of our civilized morality, and that the practice and theory of facultative abortion has gained a footing among us. There remains a third and yet more radical method of controlling procreation, the method of preventing the possibility of procreation altogether by the performance of castration or other slighter operation having a like inhibitory effect on reproduction. The other two methods only effect a single act of union or its results, but castration affects all subsequent acts of sexual union and usually destroys the procreative power permanently.
Castration for various social and other purposes is an ancient and widespread practice, carried out on men and on animals. There has, however, been on the whole a certain prejudice against it when applied to men. Many peoples have attached a very sacred value to the integrity of the sexual organs. Among some primitive peoples the removal of these organs has been regarded as a peculiarly ferocious insult, only to be carried out in moments of great excitement, as after a battle. Medicine has been opposed to any interference with the sexual organs. The oath taken by the Greek physicians appears to prohibit castration: "I will not cut."[[446]] In modern times a great change has taken place, the castration of both men and women is commonly performed in diseased conditions; the same operation is sometimes advocated and occasionally performed in the hope that it may remove strong and abnormal sexual impulses. And during recent years castration has been invoked in the cause of negative eugenics, to a greater extent, indeed, on account of its more radical character, than either the prevention of conception or abortion.
The movement in favor of castration appears to have begun in the United States, where various experiments have been made in embodying it in law. It was first advocated merely as a punishment for criminals, and especially sexual offenders, by Hammond, Everts, Lydston and others. From this point of view, however, it seems to be unsatisfactory and perhaps illegitimate. In many cases castration is no punishment at all, and indeed a positive benefit. In other cases, when inflicted against the subject's will, it may produce very disturbing mental effects, leading in already degenerate or unbalanced persons to insanity, criminality, and anti-social tendencies generally, much more dangerous than the original state. Eugenic considerations, which were later brought forward, constitute a much sounder argument for castration; in this case the castration is carried out, by no means in order to inflict a barbarous and degrading punishment, but, with the subject's consent, in order to protect the community from the risk of useless or mischievous members.