Proto-Eugenic Thinking Before Galton. Washington: Christoph Irmscher (Indiana University Bloomington) and Maren Lorenz (University of Hamburg/German Historical Institute Washington), 25.09.2008-27.09.2008.

Reviewed by Christoph Irmscher

Published on H-Soz-u-Kult (December, 2008)

In the preface to the revised edition of his his‐ precirculated, and participants were asked to give tory of , In the Name of Eugenics, Daniel only brief summaries of their main arguments. Kevles suggests that the heyday of eugenics is The frst panel addressed “The Genealogy of over. Where there was eugenics, there is genetics. Eugenic Thought.” SABINE KALFF examined the And there is no chance, he says, that “the revolu‐ proposals for human improvement in two early tion in human molecular genetics will be turned modern Italian utopian texts, Tommaso Cam‐ to eugenic ends.” Kevles’ preface was written in panella’s La Città del Sole (1600-1603) and 1995. Since then, the new challenges posed by pre‐ Francesco Patrizi’s Città Felice (1553). Foucault re‐ natal diagnostics, the human genome project, and peatedly used the metaphor of the shepherd tak‐ cloning have put paid to his prediction. They have ing care of his fock as a paradigm for the ruler’s also changed the parameters of the academic de‐ spiritual hold over the souls of his state, but Kalf bate about eugenics, extending not only its tradi‐ insisted on the literal importance of this popular tional geographical scope but also its convention‐ model for early modern writers. Both Campanella al temporal framework. Pace the common notion and Patrizi relied on the contemporary practices of eugenics as a phenomenon of the late 19th and of animal husbandry to make suggestions for hu‐ early 20th centuries, scholars have now realized man improvement. But while in Campanella’s ide‐ that concepts of "human breeding" or of the "per‐ al state the moment of conception itself had to be fection of the human race" were being developed regulated - to the extent that intercourse after din‐ throughout Western Europe long before Francis ner had to be avoided because the “spirits” were Galton, designated the “founder of the faith” in still busy digesting - Patrizi, in a kind of pre- Kevles’s book, published Hereditary Genius in Lamarckian mode, expressed his belief that the 1869. mother’s temperament (as well as her mental When we convened the workshop, our hope state during pregnancy, physical exercise and en‐ was that we could nudge the study of human vironment) had an infuence on the embryo’s de‐ breeding from its traditional anglocentric empha‐ velopment, too. sis in the direction of a more unabashedly multi‐ JOHN WALLER’s paper gave an overview of a national (and less temporally limited) model. To larger, historically oriented study he is currently that end, we also wanted to leave as much time writing, in which he traces elements of eugenic for conversations as possible: all the papers were thoughts throughout western history, as refected, for example, in the medieval concern for lineage. H-Net Reviews

Galton, stated Waller, was only “recapitulating an The second panel (“Debating the Hybrid”) fo‐ elitist attitude that had already pervaded Euro‐ cused on the bête noir (no pun intended) of all pean social thought for millennia.” Of course, as those eager proponents of racial purity, the hy‐ was pointed out after Waller’s paper, the vast ar‐ brid. At the heart of SARA FIGAL EIGEN’s paper chive such a comprehensive topic demands was a conundrum. Drawing on multiple eigh‐ makes generalizations virtually impossible. Nev‐ teenth-century sources, among them the travel ertheless, the undeniable heuristic force of writer Jean Chardin, Figal delved into the geneal‐ Waller’s argument generated an animated ex‐ ogy of the label “Caucasian,” that monolithic- change of views. Waller’s “long view” of eugenics seeming racial category that would come to be served to highlight what, arguably, was so dismal‐ used as a yardstick by which self-appointed racial ly innovative about the nineteenth-century inter‐ theorists determined the inferiority of other est in racial purity: the ability and willingness of races. But, as Figal claimed, the original European the state to interfere actively (through legislation was not European at all but the racially ambigu‐ and prosecution) in the reproductive decisions of ous Circassian woman. Figal’s paper elicited a its citizens. lively debate, chock-full of suggestions as to how SANDER GLIBOFF concluded the panel by of‐ this paradox might be “tamed.” fering a more uplifting view of nineteenth-centu‐ Figal’s comments on the “hybrid” origin of ry thinking about racial multiplicity, a legacy he modern racial classifcations provided a useful claimed had been suppressed or distorted by transition to CHRISTOPH IRMSCHER’s contribu‐ twentieth-century historians. Framing his paper tion on the role of the “halfbreed” in the science as a defense of the great late nineteenth-century of Louis Agassiz, once the world’s most famous evolutionary biologist and philosopher, Ernst scientist. Using Agassiz’s correspondence with the Haeckel, Glibof set out to rehabilitate nineteenth- physician and abolitionist Samuel Gridley Howe century morphology. Concentrating on the work and the papers of the American Freedmen’s In‐ of three leading morphologists, Johann Friedrich quiry Commission, Irmscher attempted to show Meckel, the Younger, Heinrich Georg Bronn, and that the mixed-race black remained was the void Haeckel himself, Glibof explained that for them at the center of American antebellum racial dis‐ improvement or “Vervollkommnung” did not course, inaccessible to both a polygenist racist like mean a single, vertical path towards perfection of Agassiz and a freedom-fghting abolitionist like the species but “Mannigfaltigkeit,” i.e., many lines Howe. On behalf of the American Freedmen’s In‐ of diferentiation and complex interdependencies quiry Commission, Howe later traveled to Canada, among the disparate routes of development. where he found ailing mulattoes and their ailing Clearly, the eugenics movement did not initially ofspring, further proof to him that, “in the strug‐ adopt the same pluralistic conceptions of progress gle for life,” some must and will fall by the way‐ and improvement; neither did it value diferentia‐ side. Unlike Agassiz, the anthropologist Henry tion, diversity, and interdependence. Questions Lewis Morgan did not reject amalgamation per se, about Glibof’s paper centered on Haeckel’s dif‐ as BRAD HUME pointed out in the paper that con‐ cult concept of race that, to some participants, did cluded the panel. Morgan remained committed to retain traces of hierarchical order, as seemed evi‐ the idea of the controlled interbreeding of Native dent in Haeckel’s graphs. But Glibof argued that and Euro-Americans, because he was convinced the placement of certain races on Haeckel’s evolu‐ that such unions would improve both the mental tionary tree did not imply value and seemed to and the physical make-up of the whites. However, shift in subsequent revisions. while Morgan denied the “hereditary legitimacy”

2 H-Net Reviews of slavery, he also defnitively excluded blacks Johann Peter Frank’s multivolume Medizinische from the racial enhancement he envisioned. Polizey (1779-1819) - provided her with a frame‐ The frst day of the conference ended with a work within which to address similar debates in panel devoted to “Intercultural Perspectives on early nineteenth-century America, where contrib‐ Proto-Eugenics.” Extending our time frame, utors to medical and phrenological journals FRANK STAHNISCH talked about the personal and seemed to be concerned early on with the degen‐ academic connections between European psychi‐ eracy of the white race and called for marriage atrists working at the end of the nineteenth centu‐ laws, which were sporadically implemented in ry (notably Alfred Ploetz, an early friend of writer the latter half of the nineteenth-century (e.g. the , who shared his eugenicists laws against consanguineal or frst-cousin mar‐ beliefs) and American doctors, and he proposed riage in Ohio and Kansas). Lorenz noted the sur‐ that we view psychiatry’s struggle for indepen‐ prising absence of a sustained discourse on race dence in the broader context of theories about the and racial mixing in the more specialized medical degeneration of the brain that spanned the conti‐ journals; writers in the antebellum area seemed nents. GRAHAM BAKER likewise was interested in more concerned with frst-cousin marriages, idio‐ transatlantic connections, comparing the infu‐ cy, and the “purity” of whites, arguing (as Samuel ence of proto-eugenic thinking on Christian chari‐ Gridley Howe did in 1848) that “nature, outraged ties in England and the , specifcally in the persons of the parents, exacts her penalty the New York City Mission Society and the London from the parents to the children.” The provocative City Mission. Mining the copious written archives question that ended Lorenz’s talk - why there left by both organizations, Baker revealed how wasn’t, despite universal agreement about the easily orthodox Christian theology and eugenics need to perfect the white race, more widespread co-existed. However, the missionaries’ hope that eugenic legislation in nineteenth-century America spiritual devotion could engender physical - led to a lively debate, during which participants strength on a national level - a Lamarckian con‐ commented mostly on the diferences between viction they shared with other prominent eugeni‐ the professionalization of science in the European cists of the nineteenth century - remained curi‐ and the American (postcolonial) context. ously at odds with their belief in the “corrupt na‐ In his contribution to the panel, SEAN QUIN‐ ture of man.” PAVLA VESELA then revisited the LAN dealt with books and pamphlets published in connections between utopia and eugenic ideolo‐ postrevolutionary France that were meant to gies discussed at the beginning of the workshop, counteract the perceived decadence of the French pointing out that the Russian utopian novels left population and mixed human breeding projects, the topic of sexual relations, so eagerly monitored sex advice, patriotism, and family values. The ba‐ and restricted by all those proto-eugenicists writ‐ sic idea behind these publications was that by be‐ ing utopian texts in the west, pretty much un‐ ing devoted spouses (which meant taking their touched - that is, until Stalin came along. duties in the bedroom seriously) and loving par‐ The workshop reconvened the next day to ents, readers could still think of themselves as en‐ ponder the connections between proto-eugenics gaged citizens. Critiquing Foucault’s concept of and nation-building. MAREN LORENZ, in a wide- biopower (the technologies used by the state to ranging survey of sources from both sides of the control the bodies of its citizens), Quinlan pointed Atlantic, emphasized the need for more compara‐ out that we know little about how people in fact tive studies on nineteenth-century proto-eugenic understood these books and used them in their theory and practice. The German model - notably daily lives. The ensuing conversation focused on Quinlan’s concept of authorship and returned to

3 H-Net Reviews questions of genre and authorship that had come we acknowledged that more work needed to be up earlier during the workshop, especially in con‐ done on proto-eugenics, the workshop partici‐ nection with utopian writing. How does the form pants agreed that our conversations had yielded of a source infuence its content? What role does one important result: paying attention to the his‐ authorship play in the history of writing on eu‐ tory and practice of eugenic thinking before Gal‐ genics? ton makes evident that hereditarianism is not use‐ BERNHARD DIETZ shifted the discussion of ful as a model for understanding eugenics. We nationhood and eugenics to mid-nineteenth-cen‐ also agreed that future scholarly treatments will tury Britain, probing the connections between have to fnd a way of incorporating the voices of ideologies of national degeneracy (often related to the victims of eugenic planning. studies of human poverty) and human improv‐ At the end of my report, I would therefore ability, a source of Galton’s thought that demands like to invoke the spirit of Asa Tenney from New more attention than it has hitherto received. In Hampshire, an old man often described as severe‐ the discussion, participants refected on the per‐ ly mentally impaired. He was the frst close friend verse attraction of poverty as a subject in Victori‐ and teacher of Laura Bridgman, the deaf and an writing - an interdisciplinary connection that blind girl later rescued (or so he thought) by the was also of importance to the workshop’s fnal pa‐ nineteenth-century physician, Samuel Gridley per, KYLA SCHULLER’s observations on the Or‐ Howe. Rejecting Howe’s attempts to “civilize” phan Train Riders, which centered on the ambiva‐ Bridgman, with whom Tenney had roamed the lent fgure of Charles Loring Brace, a cousin of New Hampshire countryside, Tenney associated Harriet Beecher Stowe and Catherine and Henry himself with the Indians, people who had already Ward Beecher. Loring developed his plan to re‐ been purged out of this part of New England. Here move urban children from the noxious infuences is what Tenney, liberated from the tyranny of of their neighborhoods and families under the in‐ spelling, wrote to Howe on 17 September 1839: fuence of the Transcendentalists as well as evolu‐ The indain chief that I have seen in this vil‐ tionary theory (he had encountered Darwin lage, when the younger indian spoke of talking by through Asa Gray). Schuller explained how Dar‐ signs, said the chief held the opinnon there was win’s theory of the gemmule (pre-genetic latent one language that was universal, and he could forces inherited from one’s ancestors) and a fuzzy talk that language. Laura was improving in that kind of Lamarckism joined forces in Loring’s verry language as well as knitting work before worldview with a syrupy sentimentalism derived leaveing home. from popular fction (such as Susan Warner’s nov‐ As Tenney observed, in the only letter he has el The Wide Wide World, about an orphaned city left us, the only improvement Laura needed - girl embracing Christianity when sent to work in learning a simple language of signs - was the one the country). Loring focused on girls because she had already embarked on herself. He feared boys, in his view, inherited, to an unusually high that in Howe’s fancy institute she would miss him degree “the human tendencies to evil.” dreadfully (as she did). Others might think of him In the workshop’s fnal panel, participants and her as defcient. Old Asa Tenney, the man ru‐ identifed the topics we had not covered: we had mored to have been born with a crack in his skull, not consistently paid attention to the importance knew better. of the human-animal relationship, we had barely Conference Overview: focused on scientifc writing, and the relevance of legal discourse had remained unexplored. While Panel I: The Genealogy of Eugenic Thought

4 H-Net Reviews

Chair: Maren Lorenz (Universität Hamburg / Maren Lorenz (GHI Washington) GHI Washington) From Medical Police to Phrenology and Intermar‐ Sabine Kalf (Humboldt University ) riage: Fighting against Degeneracy by Policing Human Breeding Sciences in Early Modern Utopia Matrimony in and the USA Sean M. Quinlan (University of Idaho) John C. Waller (Michigan State University) Human Breeding, Sex Manuals, and Family Poli‐ Bred in the Bone: Genealogical Obsessions in Late tics in Post-Revolutionary France, ca. 1799-1815 Medieval and Early Modern Europe Bernhard Dietz (GHI London / Roehampton Uni‐ Sander Glibof (Indiana University) versity) The Meanings of Vervollkommnung: Improve‐ Degeneration and National Decline: Racial and ment, Progress, and Perfection in German Biology National Hereditarianism and Eugenic Thought in from Meckel to Haeckel Mid-Victorian Britain Panel II: Debating the Hybrid Kyla Schuller (University of California, San Diego) Orphan Training: Better Breeding and the Origins Chair: Richard Wetzell (GHI) of U.S. Foster Care Sara Eigen Figal (Vanderbilt University) The Caucasian Slave Race: Racial Improvement by Final Discussion Racial Mixing Christoph Irmscher (Indiana University) A Pint of Ink Difused in a Lake: Racial Mixing and Proto-Eugenics in the Works of Louis Agassiz and Samuel Gridley Howe Brad Hume (University of Dayton) The Blood of Peoples: Racial Mixing and Progress in the Works of Lewis Henry Morgan Panel III: Intercultural Perspectives on Proto- Eugenics Chair: Christoph Irmscher (Indiana Universi‐ ty) Frank Stahnisch (Hotchkiss Brain Institute, Cal‐ gary) Proto-Eugenic Thought and the Emergence of Pro‐ fessional Psychiatry: Conceptual Transfers and Personal Relations in the German-American Con‐ text Graham Baker (University of Oxford) Eugenic Roots in Christian Missionary Agencies, London and New York, ca. 1865-1940 Pavla Vesela (Univerzita Karlova v Praze) Eugenics and Utopia, East and West Panel IV: “Nation-Building”: New Endeavors Chair: Jessica Berman (University of Mary‐ land, Baltimore County)

5 H-Net Reviews

If there is additional discussion of this review, you may access it through the network, at http://hsozkult.geschichte.hu-berlin.de/

Citation: Christoph Irmscher. Review of Proto-Eugenic Thinking Before Galton. H-Soz-u-Kult, H-Net Reviews. December, 2008.

URL: https://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=28381

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.

6