The Otago Witness. WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE SOUTHERN MERCURY. (WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 20, 1913.) THE WEEK.

Otago Witness, Issue 3101, 20 August 1913, Page 48

The Otago Witness. WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE SOUTHERN MERCURY. (WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 20, 1913.) THE WEEK.

“ Kunquam allnd natura, oliud sapienlia dixit.” JCVSIAL. . . . „ “ Good nature and good sense must ever jo;n. POPS-

The remark made bv the Minister of Public Works to the deputation which waited on Mr Massey to urge the necessity of completing the South Island Trunk railway by making the SO miles connection between Parnassus and Ward, has a direct bearing upon the future of the Otago Central line. Mr W. Fraser stated that the applications for public works this session were six or seven times as great as the money available; and the Minister gently reminded the deputation that some £44,000 was spent on the Trunk line last year, and that the cost of one stretch of 10 miles averaged. £20,000 per mile. He added a •word of warning concerning the necessity of selecting the best route, caustically commenting on the lamentable gravity of the mistakes made in public works in the Dominion, interjecting the explanation that he did not wish his name connected with any such costly mistakes. It is as well to face the fact that one chief reason why it is impossible for the present Government to proceed with railway construction at a rate commensurate with the due development of the resources of the Dominion is simply because of the reckless expenditure of borrowed money carrying heavy rates of interest in the past. So long as the Public Works Department was administered in the interest of vote-catching, it was inevitable that very often the routes decided upon should prove costlv in the extreme. The Otago Central railway has been called upon to suffer by reason of a series of such costly mistakes. It is 35 years since the construction of the line was authorised to Lake Wanaka, and, in the expectation that it would be completed in six years, hardy and self-reliant settlers wore induced to take up land in the Upper Clutha Valley. What a series of disappointing heartbreaks has intervened is now a matter of history. It is more than 20 years since the Otago Central Railway League was started in order to urge the pushing on of the line with the vigour that its importance to Dunedin and to the country districts demanded, and incidentally to refute the slanders concerning the barrenness of the country through which the railway, when completed, is destined to pass. When the railway had been opened as far as Clyde, an appeal was made to the patriotism of Otasro to desist from clamour concerning the Otago Central and other railways in the south, until such time as the North Island Trunk railway had been completed. And

South Island Hallways.

true to its patriotic principles, the league held its hand. Now, however, that the north has had more than its due share of money and attention in the matter of railway construction, the Central line once more claims attention, and to this end the discussion of the league at its annual meeting last week was directed. Happily the slanders concerning the Otago Central have been effectually laid to rest, and it is impossible even for the severest critic of the enterprise to refute the forceful remark made by Mr P. R. Sargood that “a railway for Central Otago was now a national necessity, and the country now lying idle was waiting to be developed. The Minister of Public Works himself is convinced of the importance of the continuance of the railway to W anaka. and with him are a number of the North Island members who recently visited the district. If the league has accomplished nothing more, it has succeeded in finally disposing of all doubts as to the ultimate utility of the railway. The problem that now ‘faces the Government is purely a financial one. Unless something surprising takes place it is probable, as Mr George Fenwick nointed out at the annual meeting of the league, that another 10 years nrav elapse ere the line on its preseiu gauge can be carried to its natural terminus. On the other hand, the adoption of the idea of a light railway suitable for carrying all available produce to a remunerative market would, by reducing the estimated cost, bring the completion of the line within a reasonable date. And the league finally adopted a recommendation along those lines. It will be for the- Government now to decide what is the better course to puruse. Meanwhile the settlers in the Upper Clutha may take heart tit the agitation, which will now be persistently pursued until victory shall crown the efforts of the league.

The Times in a leading article chronicling the unprecedented success Knffn'fs a d of the Congress 0 netics. which has just concluded

its deliberations in London, rejoices over "‘the rebuke administered by Dr Bateson to the ardent votaries of eugenics.” The nature of that rebuke may bo gathered from the cabled summary of Professor Bateson's paper on “Heredity.” in which he said that “it was impossible to avoid the conviction that no matter what influences were brought to bear by hygiene or education, the ultimate decision rested with the germ cells. The whole course of modern science and legislation had been exercised to preserve defective strains in our midst, yet genetic science did not justify the present violent measures in America with a view to controlling marriage on the basis of eugenics, because genetic physiology was still empirical.” This warning would never have been needed had the ardent eugenists of America but taken to heart the sags counsel iterated with force, and fervour by the founder of the science, Sir Francis Gallon. In season and out of season Sir Francis Gallon insisted that in all cases education must x jrece dc action. “It is above all things needful,” he wrote, “for the successful progress of eugenics, that its advocates should move discreetly and claim no more efficiency on its behalf than the future will confirm; otherwise a reaction will be invited.” And already there are signs of a reaction, principallyprovoked by the attempts at legislation of an extreme order promoted in the United States. Mr Edgar Schuster in a recent little manual on the subject thus sums up American endeavour as reported to the recent Eugenics Congress in London:—“Laws permitting or enforcing sterilisation in certain cases have been passed in several States of the American Union. The eight States which have passed laws of this description, together with the dates in which they are passed, are given as follows:—lndiana, 1907; Washington, 1909; California, 1909; Connecticut, 1909; Nevada, 1911; lowa, 1911; New Jersey. 1911; New York, 1912. But at the present time their operation has been suspended, as the question has been raised whether the Constitution of the Union permits of such enactments by individual States It thus happens that onlyin the case of Indiana and California have they ever been enforced. In Indiana f a commission consisting of three surgeons is empowered to select for treatment from reformatories or other State institutions of a similar nature persons deemed by them to bo unimprovable mentally and physically, and unfit for procreation. During the years 1907 and 1908. 125 operations were compulsorily performed, but in January. 1909, a new Governor was elected opposed to such measures, and since then nothing of the kind has been done.” Besides these attempts at enforced sterilisation the United States has gone a good wav in the direction of regulating marriage on eugenic lines. The State of Washington has gone the furthest by not allowing “marria-es of common drunkards, habitual criminals, epileptics, imbeciles, feeble-minded, or these who are afflicted with hereditary insanity, advanced consumption, or any contagions venereal disease.” In Kansas a law has been passed making cohabitation between unmarried persons a criminal offence, this being an obvious attempt to supplement the provision made prohibitory, the marriage of epileptics, imbeciles, feeble minded, or insane persons. But as Mr Schuster sagely points out: —“There is r.o ground for supposing that any- good can come from laws such as these'. Even if it were possible to prevent by statute the marriage of epileptics and feeble-minded persons and their like, illegitimate unions and the increase of prostitution would be the result and there is abundant proof that laws are powerless to stop these evils.’’

j lii these. as in other matters of vital import to the rare, it is not safe to pro far in advance of popular opinion, which opinion must be moulded hv education based on sound scientific conclusions. And it is im-

Prof ItfttPSOll'n Conrlosl ii'.

possible to question that the conclusions of Professor Bateson are such as will commend themselves to the general public. In effect this distinguished scientist, whose work in conjunction with the Cambridge School of Genetics working along the lines pioneered by Abbe Gregor Mendel, declares, in so many words, for making haste slowly. There can be little doubt that the introduction to the House of Com mons last year of the Mental Deficiency Bill excited alarm in a notoriously conservative community, since when interest in eugenics and in the Eugenics Education Societies has shown serious decline. Professor Bateson proposes to alter all this by making genetics the starting point and basis of all eugenic action. Professor Punnett, in his little book on Mendelism, says:—‘Tt is not long since the English language was enriched bv two new words —eugenics and genetics-—and their similarity of origin has sometimes led to confusion between them on the part of those who are innocent of Greek. Genetics is the term applied to the experimental study of hereditary and variation ni animals and plants, and the main concern of its students is the establishing of law and order among the phenomena there encountered. Eugenics, on the other hand, deals with the improvement of the human race under existing conditions of law and sentiment. The eugenist has to take into account the religious and social beliefs and prejudices of mankind. Other issues are involved besides the purely biological one, though as' time goes on it is coming to be more clearly recognised that the eugenic ideal is sharply circumscribed by the facts of hereditary and variation, and by the laws which govern the transmission of qualities in living things. ... 1 feel convinced that if the eugenist is to achieve anything solid, it is upon them that he must primarily build. Little enough material, it is true, exists at present, hut that we now see to be largely a question of time a.nd means.” And in another place the game authority says;—‘‘By regulating their marriages, by encouraging the desirable to come together, and by keeping the undesirable apart, we could go far towards ridding the -world of the squalor and the misery that cbme through disease and weakness and vice. But before we can be prepared to act, except perhaps in the simplest cases, we must learn more about them. At present we are woefully ignorant of much, though we do know that full knowledge is largely a matter of time and means. One day we shall have it, and the day may be nearer than we suspect. Whether we make use of it will depend in great measure upon whether we are prepared to recognise facts, and to modify or even destroy some of the conventions which we have become accustomed to legat’d as the foundations of onr social life.” This is practically Professor Bate son's position, but the difficulty that bars the way is to decide how far the results of the experiments made on plants and animals in* regard to variation and hereditary can be said to apply to mankind. It is interesting, however, to note that the Medical Congress decided to conduct experiments on animals in order to discover the relation between alcohol and degeneracy.