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About The Conservative (Nebraska City, Neb.) 1898-1902 | View Entire Issue (Feb. 22, 1900)
I'ft ft Conservative * actual consumptives , is the strongest factor in the causation of human con sumption. It prepares the soil in which the bacillus lives and thrives. So of every constitutional weakness. The altruistic tendencies of society are to foster and inbrced constitutional weak ness. Thus we constantly increase and bury still deeper "the submerged tenth" in the billows of overpowering ina bility. To use a paradox , this might be termed the might of inability to bury itself. More truly it is the weakness of inability , attempting to cure weaknesses by multiplying them. This is one of the , if not the strongest , examples , of the antagonism between what is mistakenly thought to be individual welfare and the prosperity of the race. It is breeding self destruction slowly , but surely , it is undermining national integrity. Speak ing with apparent harshness , but no less truly , the most humane , the most chari table , the most philanthropic people , is the nation most likely to undergo in ternal degeneration. The strong ten dencies to social discontent are the log ical result of this mistaken philanthropy. The principle is dangerous to the state , no matter what benefit the methods may be to the individual. The only correct thing is to face the truth. While we must continue philanthropic methods in relation to the individuals in the "sub merged tenth , " we can and must pre vent our being engulfed in the same maelstrom by applying the principle of fitting might to marriage , and prevent ing the marriage of those unfit to main tain themselves. The Right to Marry. While the purpose of marriage is sel dom intelligent procreation , the result is multiplication of the species. This is a period of insane devotion to ideal rights. No such thing as an ideal right exists , except in the crazy brain of some emotional reformer. There is no such thing as a natural right , though might is right , being the basis of all rights Few ever think of "children's rights. " In that respect we have not advanced much beyond the day of patriarchal monopoly. Parents still own their chil dren. Society tries to hold them re sponsible for their economical well being , but has not a word to say about responsibility for their physical and mental well-being. If there is a right that should be sacred , that is "founded on divine law , " that stands impregnable in Nature , it is a right incomparably above any right of parents , woman's rights , or any right , it is that Every Child Has a Right to he TVell-lIrctl. By that is meant that every child should be born physically and mentally fit to maintain itself in its environment when it arrives at maturity. No fitter example could illustrate the principle that might is right or that weakness can mil , nnt " 'i never establish or maintain a right ; hence Might Makes Right. No child can enforce its right to be well-born. That depends on parental and ancestral conditions pre-potent to its very existence. No babe can estab lish its right to be born of parents capable of maintaining it. No babe can establish or maintain a right to be nourished by a healthy mother. No child can establish or maintain a right to the education that will best fit to maintain itself in the future straggle for existence. Therefore , not having the might to establish a single right , the child has no rights. If might is not right , if might does not make right , what does ? An answer is demanded from those who have indignantly de manded that ' -THE CONSERVATIVE" be stopped , for "upholding such inhuman and unsafe principles. " The Right Is Where the Might Is. The might is in that aggregation of individuals which is termed society. In socialism lies the foundation of all rights. "In union is strength , " that is might. The principle , though often wrongly applied , is pretty generally recognized , that the child belongs more to society than to its parents. The mis take is made that the principle is only applied post-natally , whereas it should be applied pre-conceptionally. Society should guarantee to the child the right of being well-bred as well as being well born. Why ? To protect itself. Society , by its laws of marriage , seeks to protect itself , individually , from being respon sible for the birth and support of chil dren indiscriminately. It goes no farther. It takes no steps to protect itself from the care of those children after they are born , except that it im perfectly seeks to make parents respon sible for their maintenance. It oc casionally clads itself in its might and asserts its right to protect itself against pauperism , etc. , by assuming its right to take a child away from unsuitable parents. It "unlocks the door after the horse has been stolen. " The time to protect itself is to prevent such a child being born by the state control of mar riage. There is no other way to untie this Gordian-knot of the "submerged tenth. " FKANK S. BILLINGS. Sharon , Mass. 1 > R. KLIPHAI-ET NOTT. I have in the course of my life , says W. J. Stillrnan in the February Atlantic , become more or less acquainted with many able men , and Dr. Nott was the most remarkable of all the teachers I have ever known , considering the limit ation of his position and profession , that of a Presbyterian clergyman in a time when sectarian differences ran high , and his sect had no lead in public opin ion. His own position , to which he had attained by the force of his character unaided by any patronage , in a time when institutions were forming and no thing was settled in the character of so ciety , that is , the beginning of this century , was due to his extraordinary tact and eloquence. . . . No one but a pupil could ever have fairly estimated his force of character , and no pupil whose intercourse with him was not arried into the post-graduate years could measure the ability with which he advised , especially in political mat ters , with his old pupils. In the dayd of his activity , no institution in the country furnished so large an element to the practical statesmanship of the United States as did Union. Seward was one of his favorite pupils , anl it is well known that up to the period of the American civil war he never took a step in politics without the advice of the doctor. . . . The doctor's reading of character and detective powers were barely short of the miraculous , and his management of refractory students be came so well known that many who had been expelled from the other universi ties were sent to Union , and graduated with credit , so that the college acquired the nickname of "Botany Bay. " . . . In entering the Church , Dr. Nott had de prived the world of a statesman of no ordinary calibre ; but in the eyes of the Protestant as of the Catholic church , in the country which had its precedents to make as in that which had precedents a thousand years old , the maxim , "Once a priest , always a priest , " kept him in the pulpit , to which he had no irresisti ble call , and to which the accident of his career only had led him. . . . In this insufficiency of interest for an ac tive and influential life , there was only the educational calling loft to satisfy his enormous mental activity , and in this he found his place. The future which may look for his record in libraries , erin in the results of research , scientific or literary , will not find him. to occupy a position. He had , however , great me chanical inventive powers , as well as a marvelous knowledge of human nature : the former solved the problem , among others , of anthracite coal combustion for American steamers ; in the latter lay his qualifications as the greatest teacher of young men of his generation. "Why , " asks the St. Paul Pioneer Press ( rep. ) , "should the Minneapolis millers , the New England and Southern cotton spinners , and the manufacturers of shoes and agricultural implements the country through be burdened with a tariff on their exports to Puerto Rico , for the benefit of the few tobacco , sugar , and fruit-raisers , who have found a bugaboo in the proposition of free trade with the island ? "
