The Influence of Christianity upon the Family.—While we cannot study further the evolution of the family in any detail, still it is necessary, in order to avoid too great discontinuity, to notice in a few sentences the influence of Christianity upon the family in Western civilization.

Early Christianity, as we have already seen, found the family life of the Greco-Roman world demoralized. The reconstruction of the family became, therefore, one of the first tasks of the new religion, and while other circumstances may have aided the church in this work, still on the whole it was mainly the influence of the early church that reconstituted the family life. From the first the church worked to abolish divorce, and fought as evil such vices as concubinage and prostitution, that came to flourish to such an extent in the Pagan world. Only very slowly did the early leaders of the church win the mass of the people to accepting their views as to the permanency of the marriage bond. In order to aid in making this bond more stable the early church recognized marriage as one of the sacraments, and, as implied, steadily opposed the idea of the later Roman Law that marriage was simply a private contract. The result was, eventually, that marriage came to be regarded again as a religious bond, and the family life took on once more the aspect of great stability. After the church had come fully into power in the Western world, legal divorce ceased to be recognized and legal separation was substituted in its stead. Thus the church succeeded in reconstituting the family life upon a stable basis, but the family after being reconstituted, was of a semipatriarchal type. Nothing was more natural than this, for the church had no model to go by except the paternal family of the Hebrew and Greek and Roman civilization. Nevertheless, the place of women and children in this semipatriarchal religious family established by the church was higher on the whole than in the ancient patriarchal family. The church put an end to the exposure of children, which had been common in Rome, and protected childhood in many ways. It also exalted the place of woman in the family, though leaving her subject to her husband. The veneration of the Virgin tended particularly to give women an honored place socially and religiously. Only by the advocacy and practice of ascetic doctrines may the early church be said to have detracted from the social valuation of the family. On the whole the reconstituting of the family by the church must be regarded as its most striking social work. But the thing for us to note particularly is that the type of the family life created by the church was what we might call a semipatriarchal type, in which the importance of husband and father was very much out of proportion to all the rest of the members of the family group. It was this semipatriarchal family which persisted down to the nineteenth century.

SELECT REFERENCES

For brief reading:

DE COULANGES, The Ancient City, Chaps. I-X. LECKY, History of European Morals, Chap. V. SCHMIDT, Social Results of Early Christianity, Chap. II.

For more extended reading:

HEARN, The Aryan Household. HOWARD, History of Matrimonial Institutions. GROTE, History of Greece. MOMMSEN, The History of Rome.

On the early Hebrew family:

MCCURDY, History, Prophecy, and the Monuments, Vol. II. ROBERTSON SMITH, Kinship and Marriage in Early Arabia.

On the early German family:

GUMMERE, Germanic Origins.



CHAPTER VII

THE PROBLEM OF THE MODERN FAMILY

Passing over the changes which affected the family during the Middle Ages and the still more striking changes which came through the Reformation, we must now devote ourselves to the study of the problems of the family as it exists at present. The religious theory of the family which prevailed during the Middle Ages, but which was more or less undermined by the Reformation, gave away entirely in those great social changes which ushered in the nineteenth century. Again, the view that marriage was a private contract came to prevail among the mass of the people, and even to be embodied in a great many of the constitutions and laws of the nineteenth century. At the same time profound economic changes tended largely to individualize society, and these were reflected in the democratic movement toward forms of popular government, which have tended on the whole to make the individual the political unit. The nineteenth century was, then, in all respects a period of great social change and unrest. Moreover, the growth of wealth has favored, in certain classes at least, lower moral standards and increasing laxity in family relationships. Thus it happens that we find the family life at the beginning of the twentieth century in a more unstable condition than it has been at any time since the beginning of the Christian era. The instability of the modern family is, indeed, so great that many have thought that the family, as an institution, in its present form at least, of permanent monogamy, will pass away. There can be no doubt, at any rate, that the whole problem of the modern family centers in the matter of its instability, that is, in divorce. The study of the divorce movement, then, will throw more light upon the condition of the modern family than the study of anything else. The instability of the modern family has been most evident in the United States. Hence, it is particularly American conditions that will concern us, although undoubtedly the disintegration of the family is not a peculiarly American phenomenon; rather it has characterized more or less all modern civilization, but is especially in evidence in America because American society has exaggerated the industrialism and individualism which are characteristic of Western civilization in general.

Without devoting too much time to the consideration of divorce statistics in their technical aspects, let us note, then, some of the main outlines of the modern divorce movement in this and other civilized countries.

Statistics of Divorce in the United States and Other Civilized Countries.—For a long time the United States has led the world in the number of its divorces. Already in 1885 this country had more divorces than all the rest of the Christian civilized world put together. These statistics of the number of divorces granted in different civilized countries in 1885 (taken from Professor W. F. Willcox's monograph on The Divorce Problem) are of sufficient interest to cite at length:

United States...................... 23,472 France............................. 6,245 Germany............................ 6,161 Russia............................. 1,789 Austria............................ 1,718 Switzerland........................ 920 Denmark............................ 635 Italy.............................. 556 Great Britain and Ireland.......... 508 Roumania........................... 541 Holland............................ 339 Belgium............................ 290 Sweden............................. 229 Australia.......................... 100 Norway............................. 68 Canada............................. 12

It will be noted that in this particular year (1885), when the United States had 23,472 divorces, all the other countries mentioned together had only 20,131. For 1905, twenty years later, the following statistics are available:

United States...................... 67,976 Germany............................ 11,147 France............................. 10,860 Austria-Hungary.................... 5,785 Switzerland........................ 1,206 Belgium............................ 901 Holland............................ 900 Italy (1904)....................... 859 Great Britain and Ireland.......... 821 Denmark............................ 549 Sweden............................. 448 Norway............................. 408 Australia.......................... 339 New Zealand........................ 126 Canada............................. 33

It is evident from the above figures that the United States has more than kept its lead over the rest of the world in this matter of dissolving family ties, for it would seem probable from these figures that in 1905, when the United States had nearly 68,000 divorces, all the rest of the Christian civilized world put together had less than 40,000. Moreover, the divorce rates of the different countries tell the same story. In 1905 in France, there was only one divorce to every thirty marriages; in Germany, but one to every forty-four marriages; in England, but one to every four hundred marriages. Even in Switzerland, which has the highest divorce rate of any country of Europe, there was only one divorce in 1905 to every twenty-two marriages. Let us compare these rates with that of the United States, and particularly with the rates of several of the states that lead in the matter of divorces. In 1905 there was in the United States about one divorce to every twelve marriages, but the State of Washington had one divorce to every four marriages; Montana, one divorce to every five marriages; Colorado, Texas, Arkansas, and Indiana all had one divorce to every six marriages; California and Maine had one divorce to every seven marriages; New Hampshire, Missouri, and Kansas, one divorce to every eight marriages. While these rates are those of the states in which divorces are most numerous, yet, nevertheless, the number of states in which the divorce rates range from one to every six marriages to one to ten marriages are so numerous that they may be said to be fairly representative of American conditions generally. Some cities and localities have, of course, even higher divorce rates than any of the states that have been named. According to the United States Census Bulletin No. 20, there was in 1903 one divorce in Kansas City, Missouri, to every four marriages, and one divorce in the city of San Francisco to every three marriages.

Increase of Divorces in the United States. Not only does the United States lead the world in the number of its divorces, but apparently divorces are increasing in this country much more rapidly than the population. In 1867, the first year for which statistics for the country as a whole were gathered, there were 9937 divorces in the United States, but by 1906, the last year for which we have statistics, the total number of divorces granted in this country, yearly, had reached 72,062. Again, from 1867 to 1886 there were 328,716 divorces granted in the United States, but during the next twenty years, from 1887 to 1906, the number reached 945,625, or almost a total of 1,000,000 divorces granted in twenty years. Again, from 1867 to 1886 the number of divorces increased 157 per cent, while the population increased only about 60 per cent; from 1887 to 1906 the number of divorces increased over 160 per cent, while the population increased only slightly over 50 per cent. Thus it is evident that divorces are increasing in the United States three times as fast as the increase of population. It becomes, therefore, a matter of some curious interest to speculate upon what will be the end of this movement. If divorces should continue to increase as they have during the past forty years, it is evident that it would not be long before all marriages would be terminated by divorce instead of by death. In 1870, 3.5 per cent of all marriages were terminated by divorce; in 1880, 4.8 per cent were terminated by divorce, and in 1900, about 8 per cent. Professor Willcox has estimated that if this increasing divorce rate continues, by 1950 one fourth of all marriages in the United States will be terminated by divorce, and in 1990 one half of all marriages. Thus we are apparently within measurable distance of a time when, if present tendencies continue, the family, as a permanent union between husband and wife, lasting until death, shall cease to be. At least, it is safe to say that in a population where one half of all marriages will be terminated by divorce the social conditions would be no better than those in the Rome of the decadence. We cannot imagine such a state of affairs without the existence alongside of it of widespread promiscuity, neglect of childhood, and general social demoralization. Without, however, stopping at this point to discuss the results or the effects of the divorce movement upon society, let us now consider for a moment how these divorces are distributed among the various elements and classes of our population.

Distribution of Divorces. It is usually thought by those who have observed the matter most carefully that divorce especially characterizes the wealthy classes and the laboring classes, but is least common among the middle classes. We have no statistics to bear out this belief, but it seems probable that it is substantially correct. The divorce statistics which we have, however, indicate certain striking differences in the distribution of divorces by classes and communities.

(1) The divorce rate is higher in the cities than in their surrounding country districts. We have just noted, for example, that the divorce rate in Kansas City, Missouri, is one divorce to every four marriages, while in the state as a whole it is one to every eight marriages. There are, however, certain exceptions to this generalization.

(2) A curious fact that the census statistics show is that apparently the divorce rate is about four times as high among childless couples as among couples that have children. This doubtless does not mean that domestic unhappiness is four times more common in families where there are no children than in families that have children, but it does show, nevertheless, that the parental instinct, is now, as in primitive times, a powerful force to bind husband and wife together.

(3) While we have no statistics from this country telling us exactly what the distribution of divorces is among the various religious denominations, still we know that because the Roman Catholic Church is strongly against divorce, divorces are very rare in that denomination. In Switzerland, where the number of divorces among Protestants and Catholics has been noted, it is found that divorces are four times as common among Protestants as among Catholics. Some observers in this country have claimed that divorces are most common among those of no religious profession, next most common among Protestants, next among Jews, and least common among Roman Catholics.

(4) From this we might expect, as our statistics indicate, that the divorce rate is much higher among the native whites in this country than it is among the foreign born, for many of the foreign born are Roman Catholics, and, in any case, they come from countries where divorce is less common than in the United States.

(5) For the last forty years two thirds of all divorces have been granted on demand of the wife. This may indicate, on the one hand, that the increase of divorces is a movement connected with the emancipation of woman, and on the other hand it may indicate that it is the husband who usually gives the ground for divorce.

(6) The census statistics show three great centers of divorce in the United States. One is the New England States, one the states of the Central West, and one the Rocky Mountain and Pacific Coast states. These three centers are also typical centers of American institutions and ideas. The individualism of the New England, the Central West, and the Rocky Mountain and Pacific Coast regions has always been marked in comparison with some other sections of the country. But during the last twenty years divorce has also been increasing rapidly in the Southern states, and we now find such states as Texas, Arkansas, and Oklahoma well up toward the front among the states with a high divorce rate.

This distribution of divorces among the various elements and classes of the country suggests something as to the causes of divorce, and this will come out fully later in a discussion of the causes of the increase of divorce.

The Grounds for Granting Divorce.—There are no less than thirty-six distinct grounds for absolute divorce recognized by the laws of the several states, ranging from only one ground recognized in New York to fourteen grounds recognized in New Hampshire. For this reason some have supposed that many of the divorces in this country are granted on comparatively trivial grounds. Several states have, for example, what is known as an "Omnibus Clause," granting divorce for mere incompatibility and the like. But the examination of divorce statistics shows that very few divorces are granted on trivial grounds. On the contrary, most divorces seem to be granted for grave reasons, such as adultery, desertion, cruelty, imprisonment for crime, habitual drunkenness, and neglect on the part of the husband to provide for his family. These are usually recognized as grave reasons for the dissolution of the marriage tie. None of them at least could be said to be trivial. Professor Willcox showed that for the twenty year period, 1867 to 1886, over ninety-seven per cent of all divorces were granted for these six principal causes. Moreover, he also showed that over sixty per cent were granted for the two most serious causes of all,—adultery and desertion. Again, of the one million divorces granted from 1887 to 1906 over ninety-four per cent were granted for the six principal causes and over fifty-five per cent for adultery and desertion, while in still other cases adultery and desertion figured in combination with other causes (a total of over sixty-two per cent in all). Therefore, it seems probable that in nearly two thirds of the cases the marriage bond had already practically been dissolved before the courts stepped in to make the dissolution formal. We must conclude, therefore, that divorce is prevalent not because of the laxity of our laws, but rather because of the decay of our family life; that divorce is but a symptom of the disintegration of the modern family, particularly the American family.

In other words, divorce is but a symptom of more serious evils, and these evils have in certain classes of American society apparently undermined the very virtues upon which the family life subsists. This is not saying that vice is more prevalent to-day than it was fifty years ago. We have no means of knowing whether it is or not, and there may well be a difference of opinion upon such a subject. It is the opinion of some eminent authorities that there has been no growth of vice in the United States along with the growth of divorce, but this would seem to be doubtful. The very causes for which divorce is granted suggest a demoralization of certain classes. While there may not have been, therefore, any general growth of vice in the United States along with the growth of divorce, it is conceivable that it may have increased greatly in certain classes of American society. Be this as it may, it is not necessary to assume that there has been any growth of vice in the American population, for if actual moral practices are no higher than they were fifty years ago that alone would be a sufficient reason to explain considerable disintegration of our family life. It is an important truth in sociology that the morality which suffices for a relatively simple social life, largely rural, such as existed in this country fifty years ago, is not sufficient for a more complex society which is largely urban, such as exists at the present time. Moreover, recognized moral standards within the past fifty years have largely been raised through the growth of general intelligence. It follows that immoral acts, which were condoned fifty years ago and which produced but slight social effect, to-day meet with great reprobation and have far greater social consequences than a generation ago. This is particularly true of the standards which the wife imposes upon the husband. For centuries, as we have already seen, the husband has secured divorce for adultery of the wife, but for centuries no divorce was given to the wife for the adultery of the husband; and this is even true to-day in modern England, unless the adultery of the husband be accompanied by other flagrant violations of morality. Conduct on the part of the husband, which the wife overlooked, therefore, a generation ago, is to-day sufficient to disrupt the family bonds and become a ground for the granting of a divorce. Even if vice, then, has not increased in our population, if moral practices are no higher to-day than fifty years ago, we should expect that this alone would have far different consequences now than then. The growth of intelligence and of higher and more complex forms of social organization necessitates realization of higher standards of conduct if the institutions of society are to retain their stability.

But there are grave reasons for believing that there has been in certain classes of society a decay of the very virtues upon which the family rests, for the family life requires not only chastity, but even more the virtues of self-sacrifice, loyalty, obedience, and self-subordination. Now there is abundant evidence to show that these particular virtues which belong to a self-subordinating life are those which have suffered most in the changes and new adjustments of modern society. We have replaced these virtues largely by those of self-interest, self-direction, and self-assertiveness.

Causes of the Increase of Divorce in the United States.—Let us note somewhat more in detail the causes of the increased instability of the American family during the past four or five decades. We have already in a rough way indicated some of these causes in studying the distribution of divorce and the grounds upon which it is granted. But the causes of the instability of the family so affect our whole social life and all of our institutions that they are well worth somewhat more detailed study.

(1) As the first of these causes of the increase of divorce in the United States we should put the decay of religion, particularly of the religious theory of marriage and the family. As we have already seen, no stable family life has existed anywhere in history without a religious basis, but within the last few decades religious sentiments, beliefs, and ideals have become largely dissociated from marriage and the family, and the result is that many people regard the institutions of marriage and the family as a matter of personal convenience. This decay of the religious view of the marriage bond has, however, had other antecedent causes, partially in the moral and intellectual spirit of our civilization, partially in our industrial conditions.

(2) We should put, therefore, as a second cause of the increase of divorces in this country the growing spirit of individualism. By individualism we mean here the spirit of self-assertion and self-interest, the spirit which leads a man to find his law in his own wishes, or even in his whims and caprices. Now, this growing spirit of individualism is undoubtedly more destructive of the social life than anything else. It makes unstable all institutions, and especially the family, because the family must rest upon very opposite characteristics. Our democratic government, the development of our industry, and our education have all been responsible to some extent for making the individual take his own interests and wishes as his law.

(3) Moreover, this individualism has spread within the last fifty years especially among the women of the population, and a great movement has sprung up which is known as the "Woman's Rights Movement," or simply the "Woman's Movement." Now this woman's movement has accompanied and in part effected the emancipation of women legally, mentally, and economically. The result is that women, as a class, have become as much individualized as the men, and oftentimes are as great practical individualists.

No one would claim that the emancipation of woman, in the sense of freeing her from those things which have prevented the highest and best development of her personality, is not desirable. But this emancipation of woman has brought with it certain opportunities for going down as well as for going up. Woman's emancipation has not, in other words, meant to all classes of women, woman's elevation. On the contrary, it has been to some, if not an opportunity for license, at least an opportunity for self-assertion and selfishness not consistent with the welfare of society and particularly with the stability of the family. We may remind ourselves once more that the Roman women achieved complete emancipation, but they did not thereby better their social position. On the contrary, the emancipation of woman in Rome meant woman's degradation, and ultimately the demoralization of Roman family life. While this is not necessarily an accompaniment of woman's emancipation, still it is a real danger which threatens, and of which we can already see many evidences in modern society. As in all other emancipatory movements, the dangers of freedom are found for some individuals at least to be quite as great as the dangers of subjection.

That the woman's movement has had much to do with the growth of divorce in this country gains substantiation from the fact that many of the leaders of that movement, like Miss Susan B. Anthony and Mrs. Elizabeth Cady Stanton, advocated free divorce, and their inculcation of this doctrine certainly could not have been without some effect.

But the woman's movement would have perhaps failed to develop, or at least failed of widespread support, if it had not been for the economic emancipation of woman through the opening to her of many new industrial callings and the securing for her a certain measure of economic independence. This, again, while perhaps a good thing in itself, has, nevertheless, facilitated the growing tendency to form unstable family relations. But this economic independence of woman, we need hardly remark, is the necessary and, indeed, inevitable outcome of modern industrial development.

(4) The growth of modern industrialism must, then, be regarded as one of the fundamental factors which has brought about the increase of divorce in the United States. By industrialism we mean manufacturing industry. As we have already noticed, the growth of manufacturing industry has opened a large number of new economic callings to woman and has rendered her largely economically independent of family relations. Moreover, the labor of women in factories has tended to disrupt the home, particularly in the case of married women, as we have already seen. For the laboring classes it has tended to make the home only a lodging place, with little or no development of a true family life. Again, such labor has set the sexes in competition with each other, has tended to reduce their sexual differences and to stimulate immensely their individualism. Finally, inasmuch as modern industrialism has tended to destroy the home, the result has been the production of unsocialized children, and especially of those that had no tradition of a family life. Girls, for example, through industrialism, have failed to learn the domestic arts, failed to have any training in homemaking, and therefore when they came to the position of wife and mother, they were frequently not fitted for such a life, and through their lack of adjustment rendered the homes which they formed unstable.

(5) Closely connected with the growth of modern industrialism is the growth of modern cities, and, as we have already seen, divorce is usually much more common in the cities than in the rural districts. The growth of the cities, in other words, has been a cause of the increase of divorce. City populations, on account of the economic conditions under which they live, are peculiarly homeless. A normal home can scarcely exist in the slums and in some of the tenement districts of our cities. Again, in the city there is perhaps more vice and other immorality, less control of the individual by public opinion, and more opportunity, on account of close living together and high standards of living, for friction, both within and without the domestic circle.

(6) The higher standards of living and comfort which have come with the growth of our industrial civilization, especially of our cities, must also be set down as a cause of increasing instability of the family. High standards of living are, of course, desirable if they can be realized, that is, if they are reasonable. But many elements of our population have standards of living and comfort which they find are practically impossible to realize with the income which they have. Many classes, in other words, are unable to meet the social demands which they suppose they must meet in order to maintain a home. To found and maintain a home, therefore, with these rising standards of living, and also within the last decade or two with the rising cost of living, requires such a large income that an increasingly smaller proportion of the population are able to do this satisfactorily. From this cause, undoubtedly, a great deal of domestic misery and unhappiness results, which finally shows itself in desertion or in the divorce court.

It is evident that higher standards of taste and higher standards of morality may also operate under certain circumstances to render the family life unstable in a similar way.

(7) Directly connected with these last mentioned causes is another cause,—the higher age of marriage. Some have thought that a low age of marriage was more prolific in divorces than a relatively high age of marriage. But a low age of marriage cannot be a cause of the increase of divorce in the United States, because the proportion of immature marriages in this country is steadily lessening, that is, the age of marriage is steadily increasing, and all must admit that along with the higher age of marriage has gone increasing divorce; and there may possibly be some connection between the two facts. As we have already seen, the higher standards of living make later marriage necessary. Men in the professions do not think of marriage nowadays until thirty, or until they have an independent income. Now, how may the higher age of marriage possibly increase the instability of the family? It may do so in this way. After thirty, psychologists tell us, one's habits are relatively fixed and hard to change. People who marry after thirty, therefore, usually find greater difficulty in adjusting themselves to each other than people who marry somewhat younger; and every marriage necessarily involves an adjustment of individuals to each other. This being so, we can readily understand that late marriages are more apt to result in faulty adjustments in the family relation than marriages that take place in early maturity.

(8) Another cause of the increase of divorce in the United States that has been given is the popularization of law which has accompanied the growth of democratic institutions. Law was once the prerogative of special classes, and courts were rarely appealed to except by the noble or wealthy classes; but with the growth of democratic institutions there has been a great spread of legal education, especially through the modern newspaper, and consequently a greater participation in the remedies offered by the courts for all sorts of wrongs, real or imagined. Many people, for example, who would not have thought of divorce a generation ago, now know how divorce may be secured and are ready to secure it. However, it would seem as though this cause of the increase of divorce might have operated to a greater extent twenty-five or thirty years ago than it has during the last two decades, for it cannot be said that since the nineties there has been much increase of legal education among the masses, or much greater popularization of the law.

(9) Increasing laxity of the laws regarding divorce and increasing laxity in the administration of the laws has certainly been a cause of increasing divorce in the United States, though back of these causes doubtless lie all the other causes just mentioned, and also increasing laxity in public opinion regarding marriage and divorce. To assume that laxity of the laws and of legal administration has no influence upon the increase of divorce in a population is to go contrary to all human experience. The people of Canada and of England, for example, are not very different from ourselves in culture and in institutions, yet there is almost no divorce in England and in Canada as compared with the United States. Canada has a few dozen divorces annually, while we have over seventy thousand. Unquestionably the main cause of this great difference between Canada and the United States is to be found in the difference of their laws. This is not saying, however, that instability of the family does not characterize Canada and England as well as the United States, even though such instability does not express itself in the divorce courts.

Interesting statistics have been collected in numerous places in the country to show the laxity of the administration of the divorce laws. In many of the divorce courts of our large cities, for example, it has repeatedly been shown that the average time occupied by the court in granting a divorce is not more than fifteen minutes. In other words, divorce cases are frequently rushed through our divorce courts without solemnity, without adequate investigation, with every opportunity for collusion between the parties, so as to favor a very free granting of divorces. On the other hand, about one fourth of all the applications for divorce which come to trial are refused by the courts, showing that the courts are not so lax in all cases as they are sometimes pictured to be.

Moreover, the divorce courts have two excuses for their laxity. First, the divorce courts are always greatly overburdened with the number of cases before them; and, secondly, public opinion, which the courts as well as other phases of our government largely reflect, favors this laxity. This is shown by the fact that public opinion stands back of the lax divorce statutes of many states, all efforts to radically change these statutes having failed of recent years.

(10) Our study of the family has accustomed us to the thought that the family is an institution which, like all other human institutions, undergoes constant changes. Now at periods of change in any institution, periods of transition from one type to another, there is apt to be a period of confusion. The old type of institution is never replaced at once by a new type of institution ready-made and adjusted to the social life, but only gradually does the new institution emerge from the elements of the old. In the meantime, however, there may be a considerable period of confusion and anarchy. This social principle, we may note, rests upon a deeper psychological principle, that old habits are usually not replaced by new habits without an intervening period of confusion and uncertainty. In other words, in the transition from the old habit to the new habit there is much opportunity for disorganization and disintegration. It is exactly so in human society, because social institutions are but expressions of habit.

Now, the old semipatriarchal type of the family, which prevailed down to the beginning of the nineteenth century, the type of the family which we might perhaps properly call the monarchical type, has been disappearing for the past one hundred years,—is in fact already practically extinct, at least in America, but we have not yet built up a new type of the family to take its place. The old semipatriarchal family of our forefathers has gone, but no new type of the family has yet become general. A democratic type of the family in harmony with our democratic civilization must be evolved. But such a democratic type of the family can be stable only upon the condition that its stability is within itself and not without. Authority in various coercive forms made the old type of the family stable, but a stable basis for a new type of the family has not yet been found, or rather it has not been found by large elements of our population. Unquestionably a democratic ethical type of the family in which the rights of every one are respected and all members are bound together, not through fear or through force of authority, but through love and affection, is being evolved in certain classes of our society. The problem before our civilization is whether such a democratic ethical type of the family can become generalized and offer a stable family life to our whole population. It is evident that in order to do this there must be a considerable development, not only of the spirit of equality, but even more, a considerable development of social intelligence and ethical character in the minds of the people. To construct a stable family life of this character, however, which is apparently the only type which will meet the demands of modern civilization,—is not an impossibility, but is a delicate and difficult task which will require all the resources of the state, the school, and the church. There is, however, no ground as yet for pessimism regarding the future of our family life; rather all its instability and demoralization of the present are simply incident, we must believe, to the achievement of a higher type of the family than the world has yet seen. Such a higher type, however, will not come about without effort and forethought on the part of society's leaders.

Remedies for the Divorce Evil.—That the instability of the family and divorce, so far as it is an expression of that instability, is an evil in society is implied in all that has thus far been said concerning the origin, development, and functions of the family as an institution. We shall not stop, therefore, to argue this point since all preceding chapters amount to an argument upon this question. It may be added, however, that in so far as observations have been made of the results of divorce upon children, that the argument has been substantiated, for apparently the children of separated or divorced parents are much more apt to drift into poverty, vice, or crime, that is, into the unsocialized classes, than children who do not come from such disrupted homes. Assuming, then, without further argument that divorce, or rather the instability of the family, is an evil in modern society, the question arises, how can it be remedied?

If, as has already been implied, the real evil is not so much divorce as the decay of the family life, then it at once becomes evident that legislation can do little to correct the real evil. That it can do nothing, and that an attitude of laissez-faire is justified upon this question, is, of course, not implied. As we have already noted, the difference between the few divorces of the Dominion of Canada and the many divorces of the United States is largely due to a difference of laws; nevertheless, we cannot assume from this that there is a like difference in the state of the family life of the two countries. Unquestionably, however, legislation can do something even in the way of setting moral ideals before a people. Divorce laws should not be too lax if we do not wish a state to set low moral standards for its citizens. It is not too much to say, therefore, that the lax divorce laws of many of our states are a crime against civilization, even though making these laws much stricter might not of itself greatly check the decay of the family. Again, reasonable restrictions upon the remarriage of divorced parties might very well be insisted upon by law for the sake of public decency if nothing more. Present laws in many states permit the remarriage of divorced parties immediately upon granting of divorce. It would seem that a law requiring the innocent party to wait at least six months, and the guilty party to wait from two to five years and then give evidence of good conduct before being permitted to remarry, would work a hardship upon no one. Again, a uniform federal divorce and marriage law might have some good effects upon the family life of the nation. Divorce and marriage are of such general importance that they should be controlled by federal statutes rather than by state laws. If such an amendment to our present federal constitution were enacted, it might not result in greatly decreasing the number of divorces in this country, but it would result in bringing about uniformity in the different states in the matter of marriage as well as in the matter of divorce, which, from many points of view, is desirable. Moreover, if divorce were under federal control this would throw all divorce cases into the federal courts, and would, perhaps, secure a stricter administration of divorce laws.

But it is evident that the main reliance in combating the evils which have given rise to the present instability of our family life must be placed upon education rather than upon legislation. Legislation, we may here note, has many shortcomings as an instrument of social reconstruction or reform. Legislation is necessarily external and coercive. It fails oftentimes to change the habits of individuals, and very generally fails to change their opinion. Education, on the other hand, alters human nature directly, changing both the opinions and habits of the individual. Neither education nor legislation can be neglected in social reconstruction. Both are necessary, but supplement each other. But from the time of Plato down all social thinkers have perceived the fact that education is a surer and safer means of reorganizing society than legislation. While, therefore, I would not oppose education to legislation, I would say that emphasis in all social reform should be laid upon education rather than coercive legislative action, and especially in this case of relaying the foundations for a stable family life in our country. The main reliance, then, in this matter must be placed upon the education which the school, the church, and the home can give to the rising generation. Until children are taught to look upon the family as a socially necessary and therefore sacred institution, until they are taught to look upon marriage as something other than an act to suit their own convenience and pleasure, we must expect that our family life will be unstable. The reconstruction of our family life, indeed, practically involves the reconstruction of our whole social life. Things in industry, in business, in politics, in the conventions and ideals and general spirit of our people, that are opposed to stability in family relations, must be remedied before we can strike at the root of the evil. All of this may be taken for granted; but it would seem that the moral education of the young is the key to the situation in any event. The importance of a pure and wholesome family life in society should, therefore, be emphasized by our whole system of public education, while the responsibility which rests upon the church in this connection is especially obvious; but the home itself must, it may be admitted, be the chief means of inculcating in the young the sacredness of the family. Inasmuch as this cannot be done in homes that are already demoralized, the main hope must be that such education will be given to children in homes that are as yet relatively pure and stable. Movements toward such education already exist in society, and, as we have already said, there is no reason for pessimism, if we take a long view of the situation. But it is nevertheless evident that the instability of the family must be regarded as the greatest of our social problems to-day.

Summary Regarding the Influence of Industrial Conditions upon the Present Instability of the Family.—As we have already seen, the development of modern industry is one of the chief causes of the decay of modern family life. Certain aspects of our industrialism, such as the labor of women and children in factories, the growth of cities, and the loss of the home through the slum and the tenement, the higher standards of living and comfort, and the resulting higher age of marriage,—all of these have had, to a certain extent at least, a disastrous effect upon the family. Some of these things, like the growth of cities, seem inseparable from modern industrial development. The problem must be, therefore, how to overcome the evil effect of these tendencies in industry upon the home. There is no reason for believing that such evil effects cannot be overcome, although the problem is a difficult one. Our aim should be, not to stop industrial development, but to guide it and control it in the interest of the higher development of the family. That this is entirely feasible may already be seen from what has been accomplished in the way of regulating the labor of women and children and in the way of providing better conditions in the homes of the working population.

There is, however, nothing in evidence in the causes of increasing divorce in the United States which warrants the belief that American industrial development is alone responsible for the increasing instability of our family life. The industrial development of America is less peculiar in many ways than its political and social development. Divorce and instability of the family, as we have seen, characterize the American people more than any other civilized population. This fact, then, cannot be explained entirely in terms of American industrial development, but we must look also, as has already been emphasized, to certain peculiarities in American character, American institutions, and American ideas and ideals. The divorce movement in the United States affords no proof of the theory of economic determinism.

SELECT REFERENCES

For brief reading:

WILLCOX, The Divorce Problem: A Study in Statistics. ADLER, Marriage and Divorce, Lecture II. Special Report on Marriage and Divorce, 1867-1906, Bureau of the Census.

For more extended reading:

HOWARD, History of Matrimonial Institutions. LICHTENBERGER, Divorce: A Study in Social Causation. WOLSEY, Divorce and Divorce Legislation. WRIGHT, First Special Report of United States Commissioner of Labor: Marriage and Divorce, 1891.



CHAPTER VIII

THE GROWTH OF POPULATION

Mass is a factor in the survival of a social group. Other things being equal, that society will stand the best chance of surviving which has the largest population. Moreover, the larger the mass of a given group the greater can be the industrial and cultural division of labor in that group. Hence, other things being equal, a large population favors the growth not only of a higher type of industry, but also of a higher type of culture or civilization in a given society. The questions which center around the growth of population, therefore, are among the most important questions which sociology has to deal with.

The growth of population is, of course, more or less indirectly connected with the family life, since the growth of population in the world as a whole is dependent upon the surplus of births over deaths. But population has so long been looked at as a national question that perhaps it will be best to study it from the standpoint of the national group. The population of modern national groups, the influences which augment and deter the growth of the population of these groups, and the laws of population in general, will be what will concern us in this chapter.

Population Statistics of Some Modern Nations.—The following table of statistics will show the status of the populations of the largest nations of Europe and America in the nineteenth century:

Population, Population, Increase per 1801. 1901. Year, per cent.

Russia (in Europe) ... 40,000,000 106,159,000 1.36 Germany .............. 24,000,000 56,367,000 1.39 France ............... 26,800,000 38,961,000 0.12 Great Britain and Ireland .............. 16,300,000 41,605,000 1.21 Austria .............. 25,000,000 45,310,000 0.91 Italy ................ 17,500,000 32,449,000 0.73 Spain ................ 10,500,000 18,000,000 0.32 United States ........ 5,308,000 76,303,000 2.09

This table shows, that while the population of nearly all of these nations has increased rapidly within the nineteenth century, that the increase is relatively unequal in some cases. If we project Russia's increase of population to the year 2000 A.D., we shall find that its probable population will be in the neighborhood of 300,000,000; Germany's probable population, say 167,000,000; Great Britain and Ireland's probable population, 135,000,000; while France's probable population in the year two thousand, if it continues to increase only at its present slow rate, will be but 45,000,000. While these forecasts of population cannot be considered certain in any sense, still they are sufficient to show that the growth of modern nations in population is relatively unequal. Inasmuch as the mere element of numbers is one of the greatest factors for the future greatness of any nation, this is a highly important matter. A nation of only 40,000,000 a century hence, it is safe to say, will be no more important than Holland and Belgium are now. On the other hand, it is very probable that a century hence the civilized nations that lead in population will also lead in industrial and cultural development. Many other factors, of course, enter into the situation, but the factor of mere numbers should not be neglected, as all practical statesmen recognize.

A century hence it is probable that the population of continental United States will be about 300,000,000. It would be considerably more than this if the present annual rate of increase were to continue, but inasmuch as that is not likely, an estimate of 300,000,000 is sufficiently high. [Footnote: The official estimate by the Census Bureau is 200,000,000; but this for many reasons seems too low.] We have already seen that it is probable that Russia's population may equal 300,000,000 by the year 2000. It seems probable, therefore, that the United States and Russia may be the two great world powers a century hence, particularly if Russia emerges from its present social and political troubles and takes on fully Western civilization, while the other nations may tend to ally themselves with the one or the other of these great world powers. Of course, China is the X—the unknown quantity—in the world's future. Should its immense population become civilized and absorb Western ideas, this would certainly bring into the theater of the world's political evolution a new and important factor.

The population and vital statistics of the various civilized countries show:—

(1) The population of all civilized countries, with one or two exceptions, has been increasing rapidly since the beginning of the nineteenth century. Previous to that time we have no statistics that are reliable, but it seems probable that the population of Europe stood practically stationary during the Middle Ages and increased only slowly down to the nineteenth century; but during the nineteenth century the population of the leading industrial nations has increased very rapidly. This is due primarily, without doubt, to improved economic conditions, which has made it possible for a larger population to subsist within a given area. Back of these improved economic conditions, however, has been increased scientific knowledge in ways of mastering physical nature, and accompanying them has been a very greatly decreased death rate, due in part at least to the advance of medical science.

(2) This increase in population has been due, not to an increase in birth rate, but to a decreased death rate. During the nineteenth century the death rate decreased markedly in practically all civilized countries. As we have already noted, this is due primarily to improved living conditions, particularly in the food, clothing, and shelter for the masses, but it has also been due in no small part to the advance in medical science, and especially that branch of it which we know as "public sanitation." Because the death rate decreases with improved material, and probably also with improved moral conditions, it is a relatively good measure, at least of the material civilization or progress of a people. We may note that the death rate is measured by the number of deaths that occur annually per thousand in a given population. The death rate of the countries most advanced in sanitary science and in industrial improvement apparently tends to go down to about fifteen or sixteen per thousand annually.

(3) The birth rate of civilized countries has also fallen markedly during the nineteenth century, especially during the latter half. On the whole, this is a good thing. The birth rate should decrease with the death rate. This leaves more energy to be used in other things; but when the birth rate falls more rapidly than the death rate or falls beyond a certain point, it is evident that the normal growth of a nation is hindered, and even its extinction may be threatened. While an excessively high birth rate is a sign of low culture on the whole, on the other hand an excessively low birth rate is a sign of physical and probably moral degeneracy in the population. When the birth rate is lower than the death rate in a given population, it is evident that the population is on the way to extinction. In order that a birth rate be normal, therefore, it must be sufficiently above the death rate to provide for the normal growth of the population. On the whole, it seems safe to conclude that we have no better index of the vitality of a people, that is, of their capacity to survive, than the surplus of births over deaths. Such a surplus of births over deaths is also a fairly trustworthy index of the living conditions of a population, because if the living conditions are poor, no matter how high the birth rate may be, the death rate will be correspondingly high, and the surplus of births over deaths, therefore, relatively low.

Vital statistics are, therefore, an indication of more than the mere health or even the material condition of a given population. Probably there are no social facts from which we may gather a clearer insight into the social conditions of a given population than vital statistics.

Without going into the vital statistics of modern nations in any detail, the following table of birth rates and death rates will serve to illustrate the decrease in the death rates and the birth rates of the three leading European nations, the birth rate being computed the same as the death rate, that is, the number of births per thousand annually of the population:

DEATH RATE

1871-1890 1893-1902 1904

England ................... 20.3 17.6 16.2 Germany ................... 26.0 21.5 19.6 France .................... 22.8 20.8 19.4



BIRTH RATE

1871-1890 1893-1902 1904

England ................... 34.0 29.3 28.0 Germany ................... 38.1 35.9 35.2 France .................... 24.6 22.8 20.9

From the above table it is evident that while birth rates and death rates have been declining in all civilized peoples, the decline has been unequal in different peoples. Both England and Germany in the above table show still a good surplus of births over deaths; in the case of England in 1904 this surplus being 11.8 per thousand of the population annually, while in the case of Germany it was 15.6. In the case of France, however, the surplus of births over deaths for a number of years has been very insignificant, and in the year 1907 there were actually about 20,000 more deaths than births in all France (773,969 births against 793,889 deaths). France's population has, therefore, been practically stationary for a number of years, while within the last year or two it seems to be actually declining.

The causes of the stationary population of France are probably mainly economic, although all the factors which influence the family life in any degree must also influence birth rate. For a number of years the economic conditions of France have not been favorable to the growth of a large population, and at the same time the law necessitating the equal division of the family's property among children has tended to encourage small families. Unquestionably, however, other factors of a more general social or moral nature are also at work in France as well as in all other populations that are decreasing in numbers.

The Decrease in the Native White Stock in the United States. Certain classes in the United States also show a very slight surplus of births over deaths and in some cases absolutely declining numbers. In general the United States Census statistics seem to indicate that the native white stock in the Northern states is not keeping up its numbers. This is suggested by the decreasing size of the average family in the United States. The average size of the family in the United States in 1850 was 5.6 persons; in 1860, 5.3; in 1870, 5.1; in 1880, 5.0; in 1890, 4.9; and in 1900, 4.7. Moreover, if we include only private families in 1900, the average size of the family was only 4.6. Thus, between 1850 and 1900 the size of the average family in the United States decreased by nearly one full person. This decrease is most evident in the North Atlantic and North Central states. In Maine, Vermont, and New Hampshire, for example, the average size of the family in 1900 was 4.1 persons.

Moreover, the vital statistics kept by the state of Massachusetts for a number of years show conclusively that the native white stock in that state is tending to die out. In 1896, for example, in Massachusetts the native born had a birth rate of only 16.58, while the foreign born had a birth rate of 50.40. Again, the following table of birth rates and death rates for 1890 in the city of Boston [Footnote: Taken from Bushee's Ethnic Factors in the Population of Boston, Publications American Economic Association, Vol. IV., No, 2, 1903.] for the native born and sections of the foreign born shows conclusively that the native-born element is not keeping up its numbers:

Birth Rate Death Rate

Native born ..................... 16.40 17.20 Irish ........................... 45.60 25.20 Germans ......................... 48.00 15.00 Russian Jews .................... 94.60 15.90 Italians ........................ 104.60 25.30

It is evident from this table that the foreign born are increasing in Boston very rapidly in numbers through birth, while the native born are apparently not even holding their own. The high birth rate of the foreign born is, of course, in part to be explained through the fact that the foreign-born population is made up for the most part of individuals in the prime of life, that is, in the reproductive age. Nevertheless, while this explains the excessively high birth rate of some of these foreign elements, it does not explain the great discrepancy between their birth rate and that of the native born. If the present tendencies continue, it is apparently not difficult to foresee a time in the not very distant future when the old Puritan New England families will be replaced in the population of Boston entirely by the descendants of recent immigrants.

Moreover, so far as vital statistics concerning different classes can be gathered in the northern tier of the states, practically everywhere the same tendencies are manifest, that is, everywhere we find the native-born white population failing to hold its own alongside of the more recent immigrants. Apparently, therefore, we must conclude that the birth rate in the native whites in the United States is declining to such an extent that that element in our population threatens to become extinct if present tendencies continue. Only the Southern whites present an exception to this generalization. The Southern white people, from various causes not well understood,—partially, perhaps, from family pride, partially, perhaps, from racial instinct, but even more probably on account of certain economic conditions,—keep up their numbers, increasing more rapidly even than the negro population which exists alongside of them.

Causes of the Decrease in Birth Rate in the Native White Stock in the United States. What, then, are the causes of this decrease in the birth rate of the native white stock in the United States? It is worth our while to inquire briefly into these causes, for they illustrate the factors which are at work in favoring or deterring the growth of population.

(1) Economic conditions are without doubt mainly at the bottom of the decreasing birth rate in the native white American population. Certain unfavorable economic conditions have developed in this country of recent years for this particular element; especially have higher standards of living increased among the native white population in the United States more rapidly than their income. This has led to later marriages and smaller families. Again, more intense competition along all lines has forced certain elements of the native stock into occupations where wages are low in comparison with the standard of living. This has, perhaps, especially come about through the increased competition which the foreign born have offered to the native white element. The foreign born have taken rapidly all the places which might be filled by unskilled labor and many of the places filled by skilled labor. The native born have shrunk from this competition and have retired for the most part to the more socially honorable occupations, such as clerkships in business, the professions, and the like. In many of these occupations, however, as we have already said, the wages are low as compared with the standards of living maintained by that particular occupational class; hence, as we have already said, later marriages and fewer children. Rising standards of living and rising costs of living have, therefore, impinged more heavily upon the native born than upon the foreign born. It is difficult to suggest a remedy for this condition of affairs. No legislator can devise means of encouraging a class to have large families when by so doing that class would necessarily have to sacrifice some of its standards of living. However, it may be that the native born can be protected to some extent from the competition of the foreign born through reasonable restrictions upon immigration, and it may also be that unreasonable advances in standards of living may be checked, but both of these propositions seem to be of somewhat doubtful nature.

(2) No doubt the pressure of economic conditions is not responsible for small families in some elements of the native white population in the United States, for oftentimes the smallest families are found among the wealthy, among whom there could be no danger of a large family lowering the standards of living or pressing upon other economic needs. We must accept as a second factor in the situation, therefore, the inherent selfishness in human nature which is not willing to be burdened with the care of children. In other countries, and apparently in all ages, the wealthy have been characterized by smaller families than the poor. The following table from Bertillon, [Footnote: Quoted by Newsholme, Vital Statistics, p. 75.] showing the number of births per thousand women between fifteen and fifty years of age in Paris, Berlin, and London among the various economic classes, shows conclusively that it is not altogether the pressure of economic wants which leads to the limiting of a population:

BIRTHS PER THOUSAND WOMEN PER ANNUM

Paris Berlin London.

Very poor ....... 108 157 147 Poor ............ 95 129 140 Comfortable ..... 72 114 107 Rich ............ 53 63 87 Very rich ....... 34 47 63

(3) Besides economic conditions and individual selfishness we must unfortunately add another cause of decreasing birth rate in our population which has been definitely ascertained, and that is vice. Vice cuts the birth rate chiefly through the diseases which accompany it. About 20 per cent of American marriages are childless, and medical authorities state that in one half of these childless marriages the barrenness is due to venereal diseases. According to Dr. Prince A. Morrow, in his Social Diseases and Marriage, 75 per cent of the young men in the United States become impure before marriage. This serves to disseminate venereal diseases among the general population, especially among innocent women and children. The consequence is, on the one hand, a considerable number of sterile marriages and on the other hand a high infant mortality. It need not be assumed, as we have already said, that vice is more prevalent to-day than in previous generations, but on account of the conditions of our social life diseases which accompany vice are now more widely disseminated than they have been at any time in our previous history; therefore, even the physical results of vice are different to-day than they were a generation or more ago.

(4) Education has been alleged as a cause of decreasing birth rate in the native white American stock. This, however, is true only in a very qualified sense. While it is a fact, as collected statistics have shown, that if Harvard and other universities depended on children of their alumni for students their attendance would actually decrease in numbers, it is not true that college graduates have had a lower birth rate than the economic and social classes to which they belong. So far as statistics have been collected, indeed, they seem to indicate that the wealthy uneducated are producing fewer children than the educated classes who associate with them. The influence decreasing the birth rate among the educated is, therefore, not education itself, but the high standards of living and the luxury of the classes with whom they associate.

On the other hand, the higher education of women seems to be, down to the present time, operating as a distinct influence to lessen the birth rate among the educated classes for the reason that apparently a majority of educated women do not marry. The higher education has not yet gone far enough, however, to give us any definite facts with which to judge what the ultimate effect of woman's higher education will be. If the higher education of woman is going to lead to a large per cent of the best and most intellectual women in society leading lives of celibacy, then, of course, ultimately the higher education of woman will be disastrous to the race. But probably the relative infrequency of marriage among women who are college graduates is a transitory phenomenon due to the fact that neither women nor men are as yet adjusted to the higher education of women.

(5) Some phases of the "woman's movement" have without doubt tended to lessen the birth rate in certain sections of American society. Some of the leaders of the woman's movement have advocated, for example, that women should choose a single life, while others have advocated that families should not have more than two children. Mrs. Ida Husted Harper, indeed, has gone so far as to claim that if families would have but two children this would be a cure-all for many social troubles. Indeed, this ideal of two children in the family has been so widely disseminated in this country that it is often spoken of as the "American Idea." Of course, such teachings could not be without some effect. Without attempting to reply to the advocates of this theory of but two children to a family, it will be sufficient to remark that for a population simply to remain stationary three children at least must be born to each family on the average; otherwise, if only two children are born, as one of the children is apt to die or fail to marry, the population will actually decrease in numbers. Under the best modern conditions one out of three children now born either fails to live to maturity or fails to reproduce. There must be, therefore, more than three children born to the average family for a population to grow. From the sociological point of view the ideal family would seem to be one in which from three to six children are born.

(6) Finally, not all of the childless and small families in the native American stock are due by any means to voluntary causes, or even involuntary causes of the kind that we have mentioned. There are also certain other obscure physiological causes at work producing sterility in American women. The sterility of American women is greater than that of any other civilized population, even apart from the causes which have just been mentioned. Some say this is due to physical deterioration in the native white American stock, and there are other things which seem to point in that direction. It may be, however, that this deterioration is in no sense racial, but only individual, affecting certain individuals who lead a relatively unnatural life. Our American civilization puts a great strain upon certain elements of our population, and this strain in many cases falls even more upon the women than upon the men. The social life of the American people, in other words, is oftentimes such as to produce exhaustion and physical degeneracy, and this shows itself in the women of a population first of all in sterility. It is evident that the remedy for this cause is a more natural and more simple life on the part of all, if it is possible to bring this about.

Thus, the causes which influence birth rate are evidently very complex. In the main they are doubtless economic causes among all peoples, but there is no reason to believe that these economic causes act alone in determining birth rate, nor is there any reason to believe that the other psychological and biological causes may be in any way derived from the economic. So far as we can see, then, industrial conditions are mainly responsible for the lessened birth rate in the native white American stock. But mingled with these industrial conditions, operating as causes, are certain psychological (or moral) and biological factors that have to be considered as in the main independent. It is furthermore evident that the causes which lead to the decline and extinction of any population, whether civilized or uncivilized, are complex. All efforts to explain the extinction of peoples of antiquity, or modern nature peoples, such as the North American Indians and the Polynesians, through any single set of causes, must be looked at as unscientific. It can readily be shown that in all these cases the causes of the decline of the birth rate and the ultimate extinction of the stock are numerous and are not reducible to any single set of causes.

Causes which Influence the Death Rate. Before we can fully understand the causes of the growth of a population, that is, of the surplus of births over deaths, we must understand something also about the things which influence the death rate as well as the things which influence the birth rate, because, let it be borne in mind, the growth of a given population (excluding immigration always) is due to the combined working of these two factors.

Within certain limits the death rate is more easily controlled than the birth rate. It is very difficult for society deliberately to set about to increase the birth rate, but it is comparatively easy for it to take deliberate measures to decrease the death rate, because all individuals have a selfish interest in decreasing the death rate; but the increase of the birth rate does not appeal to the self-interest of individuals. Modern medical science, as we have seen, has done much to decrease the death rate in civilized countries, and it promises to do even more. Fifty years ago a death rate of fifty or sixty per thousand population in urban centers was not unusual, but now a death rate of thirty to forty in a thousand in the same communities is considered an intolerable disgrace, and the time will shortly come, no doubt, when even a death rate of twenty per thousand of the population will be considered disgraceful to any community. As we have already seen, the normal death rate of the most enlightened European and American communities tends to establish itself around fifteen or sixteen.

Of course the sanitary and hygienic conditions which influence the death rate are so numerous that we cannot enter into and discuss them. We can only mention some of the more general social influences which are often overlooked and are of particular interest to the sociologist.

(1) The effect of war upon the death rate, particularly of the victorious, is not so great as many people suppose. Considerable wars are apparently often waged without very greatly increasing the number of deaths in a given population. This is, however, only true, as has already been said, of the victorious side. With the defeated it is far different. The death rate among the defeated in a modern war is oftentimes very greatly raised, but this is due not so much to the large number killed in battle as to the fact that the defeated have their territory invaded, their industries disturbed, and their general industrial and living conditions depressed. The vital statistics of France and Germany in the Franco-Prussian War of 1870-1871 illustrate this point. In Germany the death rate in 1869, the year before the war, was 28.5; in 1870, the first year of the war, 29; and in 1871, the culminating year of the war, 31. These figures include the armies in the field. For France, however, the defeated party, the figures were far different. In 1869 the death rate in France was 23.4; in 1870, 28.3; in 1871, 34.8. Thus, while Germany had its death rate increased by the Franco-Prussian War merely 2.5 per thousand of the population, France had its death rate increased 11.4. From this it is plain that it is the economic disturbances which accompany war, and particularly those which are manifest among the defeated, which cause a very large part of the higher death rate.

(2) As already implied, then, economic depression exercises a very considerable influence upon death rate, particularly when economic depression causes very high prices for the necessities of life and even widespread scarcity of food. This cause produces far more deaths in modern nations than war. The doubling of the price of bread in any civilized country would be a far greater calamity than a great war. While modern civilized peoples fear famine but little, there are many classes in the great industrial nations that live upon such a narrow margin of existence that the slightest increase in the cost of the necessities of life means practically the same as a famine to these classes. Statistics, therefore, of all modern countries, and particularly of all great cities, show an enormous increase in sickness and death among the poorer classes in times of economic depression.

(3) Climate and season are rather constant factors in the death rate of all communities. The rule here is that in northern countries the death rate is higher in winter, while in southern countries and in great cities the death rate is higher in summer. Taking 100 as an arbitrary standard, in Sweden in February deaths rise to 113, in August they go down to 79; while in Italy in February deaths are at 106 as compared with the standard, and in August at 111,—the period of minimum death rate in Italy being in the spring and autumn. In a great city like Berlin, if 100 be taken as the standard, deaths are 88 in February and 144 in August, owing very largely to the higher death rate of children in the summer months in great cities.

(4) The biological fact of sex also influences death rate. Males in general are shorter-lived than females. This is in part due to the fact that in human populations men are more exposed to the dangers of industry in earning a livelihood, while women are more secluded in the home. But this does not explain entirely the discrepancy in the death rate of the two sexes, for boy babies under the same conditions die more frequently than girl babies. As we have already seen, the female organism is the more stable, biologically, and hence females, while having less physical strength, have more vitality than males. In Great Britain the death rate (1872-1880) for the males was 22.7 per thousand of the male population annually, while the death rate for the females was 20.2 per thousand of their population annually.

(5) Conjugal condition is also a factor which affects death rate. The differences between the death rates of the married and unmarried have long been noted. The following table of the death rates of males and females of different conjugal classes between the ages of forty and fifty years (in Germany, 1876-1880), taken from Professor Mayo-Smith's Statistics and Sociology, illustrates this:

Single males ....................... 26.5 per thousand Married males ...................... 14.2 " " Widowed males ...................... 29.9 " "

Single females ..................... 15.4 " " Married females .................... 11.4 " " Widows ............................. 13.4 " "

It will be seen from these figures that the death rate among the single is in all the more advanced years of life higher than among the married. The probable explanation of this, however, is not that the married state is better physiologically, as has been so often claimed, but that it is better socially. These figures are a testimony, in other words, to the social advantages of the home. Single persons, particularly in the more advanced years of life, who are without homes, are more liable to fall sick, and when sick are less liable to receive proper care. That these figures show the great social advantage of the home in preserving life is evident from the fact that among the widowed males, whose homes have been broken up, the death rate is higher even than among the single males. Moreover, in interpreting such statistics we must bear in mind that the unmarried in the higher ages of life are made up very often of those who are relatively abnormal, either physically or mentally, that is, of the biologically unfit. Inasmuch as the single persons include many of this class, and also lack the comforts of home, it is not surprising that the death rate is much higher among them.

(6) Infantile mortality is one of the most interesting phases of vital statistics. We have already said that the death rate is a good rough measure of a people's civilization. Even more can we say that the death rate among children, particularly those under one year of age, is an index to a people's sanitary and moral condition. Taking the world as a whole, it is still estimated that one half of all who are born die before the age of five years. This represents an enormous waste of energy. Even in many of the most civilized countries the death rate among children, and especially among infants under one year of age, is still comparatively high. Most of this death rate is unnecessary, could be avoided, and, as we have already said, represents a waste of life. Dr. Newman [Footnote: In his work on Infant Mortality.] gives the following statistics for different civilized countries for the ten-year period of 1894-1903. These statistics, we may note, are based on the percentage of deaths among children under one year of age and not upon the one thousand of their population. In Russia, 27 per cent of all children born during the ten-year period of 1894-1903 died the first year; in Germany, 19.5 per cent; in Italy, 17 per cent; in France, 15.5 per cent; in England, 15 per cent; in Ireland, 10 per cent; in Norway, 9.4 per cent; in New Zealand, 9.7 per cent; while in the United States in 1900, according to the census, 16.2 per cent of all children born in the registration area died the first year.

The Laws of the Growth of Population.—Can the growth of population be reduced to any principle or law? This is a problem which has puzzled social thinkers for a long time. Many have thought that the growth of population can be reduced to one or more relatively simple laws, but we have seen from analyzing the statistics of birth rate and death rate that this is hardly probable. A formula that would cover the growth of population would have to cover all of the variable causes influencing birth rate and death rate and so entering into the surplus of births over deaths. It is evident that these causes are too complex to be reduced to any such formula among modern civilized peoples. In the animal world and among uncivilized peoples, however, conditions are quite different, and the growth of population is regulated by certain very simple principles or laws. Thus it is probable that for centuries before the whites came, the Indians of North America were stationary in their population, for the reason that under their stationary condition of culture a given area could support only so many people. In conditions of savagery, and even of barbarism, therefore, we can lay down the principle that population will increase up to the limit of food supply, will stop there and remain stationary until food supply increases. This is the condition which governs the growth of the population of all animal species, and, as we have already said, of the savages and barbarians among the human species. But among civilized men who have attempted the control of physical nature, and to some extent even the control of human nature, many other factors enter in to influence both birth rate and death rate, and so the growth of the population.

Nevertheless, many social thinkers of the past have conceived, as has already been said, that the growth of population might be reduced to very simple and definite laws. Among the first who proposed laws governing population was an English economist, Thomas Robert Malthus, whose active career coincides with the first quarter of the nineteenth century. In 1798 Malthus put forth a little book which he entitled An Essay on the Principle of Population as it affects the future improvement of society. This essay went through numerous editions and revisions, and in it Malthus elaborated his famous economic theory of the growth of population. Inasmuch as this theory of Malthus has been the storm center of sociological and economic writers for the past one hundred years, it is worth our while to note very briefly what Malthus's theory was, and why it is inadequate as a scientific statement of the laws governing the growth of population.

Malthus's Theory of Population. In the first edition of his essay Malthus contended that population tends to increase in geometric ratio, while food at best will increase only in arithmetical ratio; and that this means that constant discrepancies between population and food supply would appear, with the result that population would have to be cut down to food supply. Later Malthus saw how crude this statement of his theory was and abandoned any attempt at mathematical statement, presenting substantially the following theory: (1) Population is necessarily limited by food; (2) Population always increases where food increases and tends to increase faster than food; (3) The checks that keep population down to food supply may be classified as positive and preventive. Positive checks are those which increase the death rate, such as famine, poverty, vice, disease, and the like. Preventive checks are those that decrease the birth rate, such as late marriage and prudence in the birth of children. Inasmuch as Malthus believed that the positive checks must always operate where the preventive checks did not, he advocated the use of the preventive checks as the best means to remedy human misery. The inherent tendency of population to outstrip food supply, Malthus believed to be the main source of human misery in all of its forms.

Criticisms of Malthus's Theory. (1) It is evident that Malthus's theory applies only to a stationary society, that is, a non-progressive society, because in a progressive society human invention and, therefore, food supply, may far outstrip any increase of population. This has been the case in practically all civilized countries during the nineteenth century, where improvements in machinery and agriculture have greatly increased the food supply. If it be replied that this increase of food is but temporary, and that sooner or later Malthus's theory must operate, then it may be said, on the other hand, that as yet we see no limit of man's mastery over nature, and that apparently we are just entering upon the stage of material progress. Moreover, so far as any given country is concerned, wealth is potential food supply, and in the United States during the last fifty years wealth has increased four times as fast as the population. Malthus, of course, did not foresee the inventions and agricultural progress of the nineteenth century. Still, it is evident that his theory is a static one and cannot be made to apply to any progressive society.

(2) Similarly, the theory makes no allowance for the increased efficiency which may come with increased population, because increase of population makes possible better coperation. As we have already seen, coperation and division of labor in a society depend upon the size of the group to a certain extent, that is, the larger the group there is for organization the better can be the organization and division of labor in that group. Every increase of population, therefore, opens up new and superior ways of applying labor; and coperation and the division of labor make it possible for men to do more as a group than they could possibly accomplish working as individuals. Improved means of coperation, therefore, operate very much the same way in human society in controlling nature as new inventions.

(3) The theory of Malthus makes no allowance for the general law of animal fertility, which is that as the rate of individual evolution increases the rate of reproduction decreases. Of course, Malthus's theory antedates this law of animal fertility, which was first stated by Herbert Spencer. Some scientists declare that this law does not apply within the human species, and it must be admitted that it is not yet certain that it does. As we have already seen, however, the lower and less individualized classes in human society reproduce much more rapidly than the upper or more individualized classes. Increase of food supply, of wealth, and so on, does not necessarily mean increase of population, and the fatal error in Malthus's theory is that he assumes that wherever food increases population always increases also.

(4) The overpopulation which Malthus feared, so far from being an evil, has been shown by the labors of Darwin to be the condition essential to the working of the process of natural selection in the human species. Overpopulation, at least until artificial selection arrives, is not an evil, but a good in human society. Without it there would not be sufficient elimination of the unfit in human society to prevent wholesale social degeneration. Even with artificial selection, however, some overpopulation would be necessary for the working of any scheme of selection. We must conclude, then, that Malthus's theory, either as an explanation of the growth of modern populations or as an implied practical ethical doctrine, is of no value whatever.

This is not saying, of course, that Malthus's theory may not have some elements of truth in it. Undoubtedly Malthus's theory does apply to stationary, non-progressive peoples, like savages and barbarians in certain stages of culture, and also perhaps to certain classes in modern society who fail to participate in modern social progress. But these lower classes or elements in human society are constantly decreasing, especially in America, where the tendency to individual improvement is so marked. Again, Malthus's theory, so far as it depends upon the economic law of diminishing returns in agriculture, has also certain elements of truth in it, and in so far as it merely asserts that the struggle for existence in human society is, in the last analysis, a struggle for food. Finally, Malthus meant his theory chiefly as a criticism of socialistic and communistic schemes, which would equalize wealth and do away with competition in society. Unquestionably any such scheme to equalize wealth and do away with competition in society would result in the enormous increase of the lower and more brutal element of society—those that have not yet participated in modern culture. Malthus's theory as a criticism of socialistic schemes that would do away with competition (this, however, does not apply to modern scientific socialism) is unquestionably as good to-day as when it was written.

Most modern economists and sociologists recognize the failure of Malthus to formulate a successful theory of population, and so many have attempted to form theories independent of Malthus; but it must be said regarding most of these attempts that they have succeeded no better than Malthus. For example, a French economist and sociologist, Arsne Dumont, has formulated the theory that society is like a sponge so far as population is concerned,—that it will take up just as many new individuals as it has industrial room for, and that population will in all cases expand to meet these increased economic opportunities. Dumont's theory is that population will increase so far as what he calls the power of social capilarity extends. The law of population is, then, the capilarity of society. Where there are new economic opportunities population will increase; where there are no new economic opportunities there will be no increase. France has no new economic opportunities, so the population will not increase. The same is true of certain classes in the United States. This theory tries to make population depend even more entirely upon economic conditions than Malthus's theory. At first it appears more plausible than Malthus's theory, but this is probably because it is more vague. Economic influences are powerful influences, as we have already seen, in determining the growth of a population, but they are not the only ones. The factors which make up the surplus of births over deaths are so complex that they cannot possibly be lumped together and called collectively economic conditions. Dumont's theory of the growth of population has no more scientific value than Malthus's theory.