The Evening Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News, and Echo. WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER G, 1899. IMMORALITY AND THE DECREASING BIRTHRATE-

Auckland Star, Volume XXX, Issue 211, 6 September 1899, Page 4

The Evening Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News, and Echo.

WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER G, 1899. IMMORALITY AND THE DECREASING BIRTHRATE-

For the cause that lacka assistance, For the -wrong that neods resistance, For the futuro in the distance, And the good that -we can do.

Some, months ago we referred in these columns to the steady decline in the birthrate of New Zealand and its sister colonies. Mr Coghlan, statist to the Government of New South Wales, has just prepared a pamphlet dealing with flu's very important, subject, and, al the same time, the matter has been

given greater public prominence, in other quarters. That it isa study that demands the attention of this colony, not merely as much as, but more than that of any other of the Australasian states, must be very patent to our readers when we recall to their minds certain significant facts which are apt to slip their memories. The birthrate of New Zealand was, in 1880, the highest of any country in this part, of the world, and higher than that of any country in Europe or America. It is now the lowest in Australasia, and only a little higher than that of France, which is invariably quoted as the most striking example of a low birthrate. In our previous article we discussed at some length the position which the figure* of the statisticians disclose, and indicated the peril that seemed to threaten these colonies. As to the probable causes which have led To the decline, ■we are not in a position to speak definitely. Doubtless the influence of climate has to be largely considered, and in addition there are the same factors at work here which are held responsible in Europe and America for the general decline of the birthrate in those countries. These factors have been tabulated thus: '-The great diffusion of physiological information; the lessening of restraint from religious and social opinion; and the greater cost of family life, which leads to the desire to have fewer children in order that they may each be better provided for."

Without goinff into particulars, we think it may be reasonably assumed that morality plays a very great part in this question, and it is hardly necessary .to add that everything goes to suggest that public immorality is of itself responsible, to a very large extent, for the decline in the Australasian birthrate. Whether it tells more potently against au increase in our population here than it does in other lands we would not like to say, but the conjunction in Australasia of a birthrate that shows an abnormal decline, and of such a increasingly low condition of public morality in sexual relations as Mr Coghlan's figures indicate, seems to us very significant, The New South Wales statist, as quoted in our cablegrams of yesterday, finds that one-third of the total first births are due to ante-nuptial conception. There is some difficulty in determining from the message whether this startling state of things has reference to New South Wales alone, or to Australia as a whole, or to the continent with New Zealand included. But granted the statist is speaking only of the Mother Colony,, we gather from other statistics that an average taken •ill over Australasia anight give very much the same results. Taking the figures for illegitimacy for 1896, which'of course only include the number of children actually born out of wedlock we find that the percentage for New Zealand is the next lowest in these colonies. For that year the figures were:—Tasmania 5.91, New South Wales 5.71, Victoria 5.63, Western Australia 5.01, Queensland 5.22, New Zealand 4.43, and South Australia 3.45. The rate in N.S. Wales

is now close on 7 per cent, and in the other colonies we' fear there has been an increase also. In respect to these figures it is only fair to point out that the general fall in the total number of births from causes not affecting illegitimacy makes the proportion of children born out of wedlock larger than it would otherwise be. Still making every allowance on i that score, the investigations of the I New South Wales statist revealv an astonishingly low moral state in this part of the world. Nor can they by any means pretend to furnish an inj sight into the total of immorality ! that blots these colonies. Jn other words, there is no getting away from the fact that the actual condition of I things must be worse in a way than one infers from the figures. The birth rate affords but a very unreliable index to the prevalence of illicit relations between the sexes, since the widespread knowledge of physiological information, to which we have alread referred, is as much at the command of the unmarried as the married. No wonder under these circum- I stances that moral men throughout these colonies are aghast at the amount of moral lawlessness and lij cense that marks society in Australasia and that students of sociology among us are anxious to discover the cause | of our moral decline. "Is it in the I climate?" is the question one frequently hears.asked. The semi-tropic sun under which a large proportion of Australasians live has certainly a great deal to do in promoting early |

maturity, and may in the same way. inflame the passiotis more strongly than if we lived in a cooler climate. The fact that in Auckland, the warmest city in New Zealand, the proportion of illegitimate births is less per cent, than in Dunedin, the coldest of our large centres, and all the other towns, would seem to show that the argument of climate will not apply to New Zealand, but on the other hand, our apparent moral superiority to Wellington, Christchurch, and Dunedin may be apparent only and due rather to a greater infertility, itself one result of warm climatic conditions, than to a, higher moral tone. Whatever there may be in the climate theory should certainly tell in favour iof this colony as against Australia. .We believe with the Rev. Mr Waddell, j who has just contributed a paper to ' the "Review of Reviews" on the mii fliience of climate on character, that. .New Zealand occupies "the most favourable range of the temperate zonefor the development of a rich robust character," and that must iii the end mean a moral character. No doubt what we want most here to raise tis morally are not changes in our physical enI vironments, but a higher tone of pubI lie opinion.