CHAPTER III


HIGH BIRTH-RATES NOT THE CAUSE OF HIGH DEATH-RATES


Section 1. POVERTY AS NOW EXISTING

The second contention of birth controllers is that a high birth-rate, by
increasing poverty, causes a high death-rate. In the first place, there is
no doubt that poverty, necessary features of which are mal-nutrition or
insufficient food and bad housing, is directly associated with a high
death-rate, although this view was once shown by the _Lancet_ to need
important qualifications.

"With respect to the greater mortality amongst the poor than the rich,
we have yet to learn that the only hope of lessening the death-rate
lies in diminishing the birth-rate. We have no _proof_ as yet that the
majority of the evils at present surrounding the poor are necessarily
attendant upon poverty. We have yet to see a poor population living in
dry, well-drained, well-ventilated houses, properly supplied with pure
water and the means of disposal of refuse. And we have yet to become
acquainted with a poor population spending their scant earnings
entirely, or in a very large proportion, upon the necessities of life;
for such is not the case when half the earnings of a family are thrown
away to provide adulterated alcoholic drinks for one member of it.
Until reforms such as these and others have been carried out, and the
poor are able and willing to conform to known physiological laws, it is