The Need for Eugenic Reform

Abstract

THIS is in every respect a notable book by a most distinguished author. Major Darwin has now for fifteen years occupied the presidential chair in the Eugenics Education Society, and comparatively few realise the services which he has rendered towards making clear the social implications of the results of the scientific study of heredity. The word ‘Eugenics’ signifying ‘the study of the agencies under human control by which the human stock can be improved’ was coined by Galton, as most people know. Most are also aware that it was associated in the public mind with a number of fantastic projects for the compulsory mating of specially selected specimens of opposite sexes in order to improve the race. For this conception of the subject Galton is directly responsible; it has led to eugenists being regarded as a collection of faddists, and has drawn on to the whole subject the sharpest shafts of ridicule and sarcasm. G. K. Chesterton has said of eugenic reform that it could be imposed only on slaves and cowards, and it is, no doubt, of ‘Galtonian’ reforms that he was thinking when he made this statement.

The Need for Eugenic Reform.

By Leonard Darwin. Pp. xvii + 529. (London: John Murray, 1926.) 12s. net.