Laws which tend to surround marriage with a reasonable amount of formality and publicity are, in general, desirable eugenically. They tend to discourage hasty and secret marriages, and to make matrimony appear as a matter in which the public has a legitimate interest, and which is not to be undertaken lightly and without consideration. Laws compelling the young to get the consent of their parents before marriage are to be placed in this category; and likewise the German law which requires the presentation of birth-certificates before a marriage license is issued.
A revival under proper form of the old custom of publishing the banns is desirable. Undoubtedly many hasty and ill-considered marriages are contracted at the present time, with dysgenic results, which could be prevented if the relatives and friends of the contracting parties knew what was going on, and could bring to light defects or objections unknown or not properly realized by the young people. Among other states, Missouri has recently considered such a law, proposing that each applicant for a marriage license be required to present a certificate from a reputable physician, stating in concise terms the applicant's health and his fitness to marry. Notice of application for a marriage license shall be published in a daily paper three consecutive times, at the expense of the county. If at the expiration of one day from the publication of the last notice, no charges have been filed with the recorder alleging the applicants' unfitness to marry, license shall be granted. If objection be made by three persons not related in blood to each other, on the ground of any item mentioned in the physician's certificate, the case shall be taken before the circuit court; if the court sustains the objection of these three unrelated persons, a license to wed shall be denied; if the court overrules the objection, the license shall be granted and court costs charged to the objectors.
Although interesting as showing the drift of public sentiment toward a revival of the banns, this proposed law is poorly drawn. Three unrelated laymen and the judge of a circuit court are not the proper persons to decide on the biological fitness of a proposed marriage. We believe the interests of eugenics would be sufficiently met at this time by a law which provided that adequate notice of application for marriage license should be published, and no license granted (except under exceptional circumstances) until the expiration of two weeks from the publication of the notice. This would give families and friends time to act; but it is probably not practicable to forbid the issuance of a license at the expiration of the designated time, unless evidence is brought forward showing that one of the applicants is not legally capable of contracting marriage because of a previous mate still living and undivorced, or because of insanity, feeble-mindedness, under age, etc. Such a law, we believe, could be put on the statute books of any state, and enforced, without arousing prejudices or running counter to public sentiment; and its eugenic value, if small, would certainly be real.
This exhausts the list of suggested coercive means of restricting the reproduction of the inferior. What we propose is, we believe, a very modest program, and one which can be carried out, as soon as public opinion is educated on the subject, without any great sociological, legal or financial hindrances. We suggest nothing more than that individuals whose offspring would almost certainly be subversive of the general welfare, be prevented from having any offspring. In most cases, such individuals are, or should be, given life-long institutional care for their own benefit, and it is an easy matter, by segregation of the sexes, to prevent reproduction. In a few cases, it will probably be found desirable to sterilize the individual by a surgical operation.
Such coercive restriction does, in some cases, sacrifice what may be considered personal rights. In such instances, personal rights must give way before the immensely greater interests of the race. But there is a much larger class of cases, where coercion can not be approved, and yet where an enlightened conscience, or the subtle force of public opinion, may well bring about some measure of restraint on reproduction. This class includes many individuals who are not in any direct way detrimental to society; and who yet have some inherited taint or defect that should be checked, and of which they, if enlightened, would probably be the first to desire the elimination. The number of high-minded persons who deliberately refrain from marriage, or parenthood, in the interests of posterity, is greater than any one imagines, except a eugenist brought into intimate relations with people who take an intelligent interest in the subject.
X. comes, let us say, from a family in which there is a persistent taint of epilepsy, or insanity. X. is a normal, useful, conscientious member of society. To talk of segregating such an individual would be rash. But X. has given some thought to heredity and eugenics, and decides that he, or she, will refrain from marriage, in order to avoid transmitting the family taint to another generation. Here we have, in effect, a non-coercive restriction of reproduction. What shall we say of the action of X. in remaining celibate,—is it wise or unwise? To be encouraged or condemned?
It is perhaps the most delicate problem which applied eugenics offers. It is a peculiarly personal one, and the outsider who advises in such a case is assuming a heavy responsibility, not only in regard to the future welfare of the race, but to the individual happiness of X. We can not accept the sweeping generalization sometimes made that "Strength should marry weakness and weakness marry strength." No more can we hold fast to the ideal, which we believe to be utopian, that "Strength should only marry strength." There are cases where such glittering generalities are futile; where the race and the individual would both be gainers by a marriage which produced children that had the family taint, but either latent or not to a degree serious enough to counteract their value. The individual must decide for himself with especial reference to the trait in question and his other compensating qualities; but he should at least have the benefit of whatever light genetics can offer him, before he makes his decision.
For the sake of a concrete example, let us suppose that a man, in whose ancestry tuberculosis has appeared for several generations, is contemplating marriage. The first thing to be remembered is that if he marries a woman with a similar family history, their children will have a double inheritance of the taint, and are almost certain to be affected unless living in an especially favorable region. It would in most cases be best that no children result from such a marriage.
On the other hand, the man may marry a woman in whose family consumption is unknown. The chance of their children being tuberculous will not be great; nevertheless the taint, the diathesis, will be passed on just the same, although concealed, possibly to appear at some future time. Such a marriage is in some ways more dangerous to the race, in the long run, than that of "weakness with weakness." Yet society at present certainly has no safe grounds for interference, if such a marriage is made. If the two persons come of superior stock, it seems probable that the gain will outweigh the loss. In any event, it is at least to be expected that both man and woman would have a deliberate consciousness of what they are doing, and that no person with any honor would enter into a marriage, concealing a defect in his or her ancestry. Love is usually blind enough to overlook such a thing, but if it chooses not to, it ought not to be blindfolded.
In short, the mating of strength with strength is certainly the ideal which society should have and which every individual should have. But human heredity is so mixed that this ideal is not always practicable; and if any two persons wish to abandon it, society is hardly justified in interfering, unless the case be so gross as those which we were discussing in the first part of this chapter. Progress in this direction is to be expected mainly from the enlightened action of the individual. Much more progress in the study of heredity must be made before advice on marriage matings can be given in any except fairly obvious cases. The most that can now be done is to urge that a full knowledge of the family history of an intended life partner be sought, to encourage the discreet inquiries and subtle guidance of parents, and to appeal to the eugenic conscience of a young man or woman. In case of doubt the advice of a competent biologist should be taken. There is a real danger that high-minded people may allow some minor physical defect to outweigh a greater mental excellence.