146 Section II. L. Querton.
*
En résumé, nous pensons que l’organisation pratique et continue de
l’action eugénique par des institutions locales permettrait de réaliser l’éduca
tion des particuliers et des pouvours publics en même temps qu’elle assure
rait l’efficacité de l’application des lois relatives à la protection et à l’instruc
tion de l’enfance.
Elle faciliterait la réunion des documents indispensables à la connaisance
scientifique des faits d’hérédité et elle renseignerait d’une façon précise sur
l’action réelle des diverses institutions sociales sur la transformation de la
race. THE PRACTICAL ORGANIZATION OF EUGENIC ACTION.
By Dr. Louis Querton,
Professor to the University of Brussels.
The study of the physiology and hygiene of the reproduction of the human
race has, for some years, demanded the special attention of numbers of
scientists. The proofs of degeneracy, systematically received, have made us
appreciate the practical importance of this study, which has, up to the
present, been greatly neglected owing to customs and prejudices which
caused the function of reproduction in human beings to be considered as
presenting special characteristics, rendering the study of it, outside medical
circles, difficult.
To-day we can approach, even before the general public, the examination
of questions relative to the hygiene of reproduction, as we approach the
examination of questions concerning the hygiene of nutrition or the hygiene
of labour. The International Congress of Eugenics, following the
Congress of genetics (Paris, 1911), and the Congress for the study of
genealogy and heredity (Giessen, April, 1912), shows plainly the interest
which the problem of the amelioration of the human race is actually arousing
in all countries.
We can foresee now the moment when the struggle against degeneracy
and for the amelioration of the race will be systematically organized.
We may ask ourselves how it would be possible to bring about the
practical organization of eugenic action. The object of which should be at
the same time (1) the study of causes which it would be possible to bring
under social contiol, and which would be capable of improving or impairing
the racial qualities of future generations; (2) the knowledge of the facts of
heredity; and (3) the action of social institutions on the development of the
race j in fine, the spread and application of the knowledge acquired.
