_Subject._ Vital Statistics.
_Gist._ "The vitality of the Negro may well be considered the most
important phase of the so-called race problem, for it is a fact which
can and will be demonstrated by indisputable evidence that of all races
for which statistics are obtainable and which enter at all into the
consideration of economic problems as factors the Negro shows the least
power of resistance in the struggle for life."[18]
DEATH RATE.
Statistics are collected from ten of the largest cities with the result
that the death rate among the whites is 20.12 per 1000, and among the
blacks 32.61. It is acknowledged that the great bulk of this excess in
the colored death rate is due to infant mortality. This fact of itself
would suggest that the real cause is condition rather than race traits.
This truth shall be established out of the mouth of Mr. Hoffman's own
witness. "Fifty per cent of the (Negro) children who die never receive
medical attention."[19]
"The indifference to medical attendance in cases of illness of their
children is due to ignorance."[20] To the ordinary mind this would imply
the most unfortunate condition.
BIRTH RATE.
But the death rate is only one factor in the vital equation. The birth
rate is equally important. Mr. Hoffman concedes, with reluctant
reservation, that the colored birth rate may be greater than that of the
whites. "That the birth rate of the Negroes is in excess of that of the
white population is probably true even at the present time, at least as
compared with the native whites."[21] This is indeed a very feeble
admission of a very obvious fact. Mr. Hoffman contends that the death
rate of the Negro race is much greater than that of the whites. It has
already been shown that, leaving immigration out of account, the
increase in the Negro population is greater than that of the white race.
How can these two facts be accounted for except it be on the basis of a
higher birth rate for the blacks? Mr. Hoffman will have either to alter
his estimates or mend his logic.
Direct testimony on this subject must have been known to Mr. Hoffman. Of
course no one is qualified to write on vital statistics in America who
is not familiar with the investigation of Dr. Billings. Let the reader
compare the following quotation as to the relative birth rate of the
races, and, noting date of data upon which the conclusion is based,
decide for himself as to the ingenuousness of Mr. Hoffman's reluctant
admission: "Dr. Billings, in his luminous report on the vital statistics
of the United States (1886) shows that 1000 colored women (age from 15
to 49) give birth to 164 children, and 1000 white women to only 127,
yearly; that is to say, three colored women have as many children as
four white."[22]
IS THE NEGRO THREATENED WITH EXTINCTION.
Before Mr. Hoffman's conclusion as to the threatening aspect of the high
death rate of the Negro race can be accepted, several questions must be
answered by him.
1. Is the death rate of the colored race higher than that of a
corresponding class of whites subject to the same moral and social
environment? The general opinion is that it is not; nor does the author
attempt to prove the contrary. In discussing this question Dr. John S.
Billings states: "If we could separate the vital statistics of the poor
and ignorant whites, the tenement house population of our Northern
cities, from those of the mass of the white population we should
undoubtedly find a high rate of mortality in this class, and especially
in infancy and childhood."[23]
2. Is the high death rate for the cities sustained throughout the
country at large? Luckily the census of 1880 gives a complete answer to
this question. The death rate of the United States in 1880 was 15.09 per
1000; South Carolina 15.80; Alabama 14.20; Mississippi 12.89; Georgia
13.97; Massachusetts 18.59; New York 17.38; Pennsylvania 14.92; New
Jersey 16.33. This shows plainly that the Southern states with the
largest Negro contingent do not show any higher death rate than the
Northern states where the Negro is not a considerable factor. There is
no evidence, certainly none brought forward by the author, to show that
the death rate of the Negro in the country at large is much in excess of
that of the whites. "In the rural districts the mortality of the Negro
is not excessive; it is in the cities and towns where he is brought into
close contact with the evils and vices of civilization that he dies so
rapidly."[24]
3. Is the death rate, even in the cities, so great as to foreshadow
extinction? Nothing is great or small except by comparison. The death
rate among the Negroes in the large cities at present is not as great as
it was among the whites forty years ago; that is, if we may rely upon
the statistics which Mr. Hoffman himself has presented.
_Mortality among Whites in Southern Cities._[25]
City. Period. Death rate.
Mobile, Ala. 1852-1855 54.39
Charleston, S. C. 1851-1860 29.79
Savannah, Ga. 1856-1860 37.19
New Orleans, La. 1849-1860 59.60
Under improved sanitary regulations these rates have been lowered until
at present they are not at all alarming. May not the same improvement in
his environment effect similar changes in the death rate of the Negro?
Let us compare the death rate of the Negro race with that of the Germans
as presented in the census of 1880.
Colored
City. death rate. City. Death rate.
Washington 32.60 Konigsberg 31.50
Baltimore 32.81 Munich 33.40
Richmond 28.48 Breslau 31.60
Louisville 30.73 Cologne 27.00
New Orleans 30.42 Strasburg 29.60
This high death rate of the American Negro does not exceed that of the
white race in other parts of the civilized globe. If race traits are
playing such havoc with the Negroes in America, what direful agent of
death, may we ask the author, is at work in the cities of his own
fatherland?
4. Does the death rate among Negroes show a tendency to increase? In the
District of Columbia there has been a gradual decline in the death rate
of the Negro population from 40.78 in 1876 to 29.54 in 1896.[26]
Again, Mr. Hoffman's statistics will show a steady improvement in
Southern cities for the last twenty years.
_Death rate among Negroes in Southern Cities._[27]
Death Death
City. Periods. rate. Periods. rate.
Mobile, Ala. 1876-1880 39.74 1891-1893 30.91
Charleston, S. C. 1876-1885 43.83 1886-1894 44.06
Savannah, Ga. 1876-1880 51.66 1891-1894 32.26
New Orleans, La. 1880-1884 52.35 1890-1894 39.42
A recent report of the Labor Bureau throws much light on the subject.
_Annual Death Rate of the Colored Race for three quinquennial
periods._[28]
City. 1880-1885. 1885-1890. 1890-1895.
Atlanta 37.96 33.41 32.76
Baltimore 36.15 30.52 32.47
Charleston 44.08 46.74 41.43
Memphis 43.01 29.35 21.11
Richmond 40.34 38.83 34.91
This table shows an unmistakable decrease in the death rate for the
successive quinquennial periods.
All of which tends to prove that this high death rate is due to
condition and is subject to sanitary check and control.
In further confirmation of the fact that the death rate among Negroes is
on the decline, the Army records will afford valuable testimony.
_Death rate of Colored Soldiers in the U. S. Army._[29]
Average from 1883 to 1892 9.07
Average in 1894 6.26
Average in 1895 5.03
In 1895 it is lower than that of the white soldiers. The same general
law of a gradually decreasing death rate is here revealed.
If the death rate of the Negro population in cities is not higher than
that of corresponding classes of whites; if the records of the census
for the country at large do not show it to be in excess of other
classes; if the highest rates are not above those of the whites a half
century ago, nor higher than those of other civilized communities of the
Caucasian race at the present time; and if this rate is constantly
decreasing under more favorable sanitary appliances--it is hard to
justify the author's position as to the low vital powers of the race, or
to reach the conclusion that extinction will be its ultimate fate.
THE NORTHERN NEGROES.
In further proof of the low vitality of the Negro race the author shows
at great length that the race cannot thrive in the North. For every
Northern community for which statistics are available it appears that
the death rate is in excess of the birth rate. It does not seem to have
occurred to the author that economic and social environment may lead to
this deplorable result. Dr. Walker, in a publication which has already
been referred to, states: "The industrial _raison d'etre_ of the Negro
is here (in the South) found at its maximum. In the Northern states this
_raison d'etre_ wholly disappears. There is nothing, aside from a few
kinds of personal service, which the Negro can do which the white man
cannot do as well or perhaps better."[30]
In the North the Negro race lives in industrial and social captivity;
not being in sufficient numbers to form an independent constituency,
they whine and pine over certain abstract principles of equality and
brotherhood, but which, alas, fade into impalpable air under the
application of a concrete test. They sit in the shadow of the tree of
liberty and boast of its protecting boughs, but must not aspire to
partake of the fruit thereof. The undershrubbery purchases shade and
protection at too dear a price when it sacrifices therefor the
opportunity of the glorious sunlight of heaven. No healthy, vigorous
breed can be produced in the shade. No wonder, then, that the productive
sensitiveness of the Northern Negro is affected by his industrial and
social isolation among an overshadowing people who regard him with a
feeling composed in equal parts of pity and contempt.
CONSUMPTION AMONG NEGROES.
The author enters into the causes of mortality and points out that in
addition to infant mortality, which has already been noticed,
consumption, pneumonia, and vicious taints of blood are the most
alarming ones. With gloomy forebodings we are reminded that: "Its (the
Negro race) extreme liability to consumption alone would suffice to seal
its fate as a race."[31]
The following citation will express the truth of the situation as
clearly as it is possible to do: "From close personal observation,
embracing a professional life of nearly forty years among the Negroes
and from data obtained from professional brethren in different sections
of the South, I have no hesitancy in declaring that insanity and
tuberculosis were rare diseases among the Negroes of the South prior to
emancipation. Indeed, many intelligent people of observation and full
acquaintance of the Negro have stated to me that they never saw a crazy
or consumptive Negro of unmixed blood until these latter years. The fact
of their comparative exemption from these ailments prior to emancipation
is so well established..."[32]
"Man is an organized being, and is subject to certain laws which he
cannot violate with impunity. These laws affect him in the air he
breathes, the food he eats, the clothes he wears, and (in) every
circumstance surrounding his habilitation. In the wholesale violation of
these laws after the war, as previously stated, was laid the foundation
of the degeneration of the physical and mental condition of the Negro.
Licentiousness left its slimy trail of sometimes ineradicable disease
upon his physical being, and neglected bronchitis, pneumonia, and
pleurisy lent their helping hand toward lung degeneration."[33]
It will be noticed that Dr. Miller accepts all the facts alleged by our
author, but places the causes squarely upon the ground of conditions,
habits and circumstances of life. He does not seem to be acquainted with
Mr. Hoffman's discovery of "race traits." The fact that under the
hygienic and dietary regime of slavery, consumption was comparatively
unknown among Negroes, but that under the altered conditions of
emancipation it has developed to a threatening degree, would persuade
any except the man with a theory, that the cause is due to the radical
changes in life which freedom imposed upon the blacks, rather than to
some malignant, capricious "race trait" which is not amenable to the law
of cause and effect, but which graciously suspended its operation for
two hundred years, and has now mysteriously selected the closing decades
of the nineteenth century in which to make a trial of its direful power.
No people who work all day in the open air of a mild climate and who
sleep at night in huts and cabins where crack and crevice and skylight
admit abundant ventilation, will be subject to pulmonary weakness. Now
take the same people and transplant them to the large cities of a colder
climate, subject them to pursuits which do not call for a high degree of
bodily energy, crowd them into alley tenements where the windows are
used only for ornament and to keep out the "night air," and a single
door must serve for entrance, exit, and ventilation, and lung
degeneration is the inevitable result. The cause of the evil suggests
the remedy. The author in a previous chapter points out the threatening
evil of crowding into the cities; a counter movement which would cause a
return to the country, or would at least stay the mad urban movement,
would not only improve the economic status of the race but would also
benefit its physical and moral health. Here is an open field for
practical philanthropy and wise Negro leadership.
The increase in consumption among Negroes is indeed a grave matter, but
it is possible to exaggerate its importance as sociological evidence. If
we listen to the alarmists and social agitators, we would find a hundred
causes, each of which would destroy the human race in a single
generation. The most encouraging evidence on this subject from the
Negro's point of view is afforded by the last report of the Surgeon
General of the United States Army. The statistics thus furnished are the
most valuable for comparative study, since they deal with the two races
on terms of equality, that is, the white and colored men are of about
the same ages and initial condition of health, they receive the same
treatment and are subject to the same diet, work, and social habits. "It
is to be noted, also," says the Surgeon General, "that during the past
two years the rates for consumption among the colored troops have fallen
so as to be much lower than those for the whites, whereas formerly they
were much higher."[34]
The following table prepared by Mr. Hershaw, shows plainly the gradual
decrease of the death rate from consumption in Southern cities for the
past fifteen years.
_Death rate per 1000 among Negroes from Consumption._[35]
City. Period. Rate. Period. Rate. Period. Rate.
Atlanta 1882-1885 50.20 1886-1890 45.88 1891-1895 43.48
Baltimore 1886 58.65 1887 55.42 1892 49.41
Charleston 1881-1884 72.20 1885-1889 68.08 1890-1894 57.66
Memphis 1882-1885 65.35 1886-1890 50.30 1891-1895 37.78
Richmond 1881-1885 54.93 1886-1890 41.63 1892-1895 34.74
It appears that the total death rate as well as that due to consumption
among Negroes reached the maximum about 1880 and has been on the gradual
decline ever since.
Consumption is only one of the contributing causes of the total death
rate. It has been shown that the death rate from all causes does not
necessarily point to the extinction of the race. This being so, there is
no need of unnecessary alarm over a single factor; for in sociology, as
in mathematics, we cannot escape the fundamental truth that the whole is
greater than any of its parts.
VITAL CAPACITY AND ECONOMIC EFFICIENCY.
The author's proposition as to the low vitality of the Negro and its
effect upon his economic efficiency is contrary alike to the traditional
and prevalent belief. The whole fabric of slavery rested upon the
assumption that the Negro was better able to resist the trying condition
of the southern climate than the white laborer. The industrial
reconstruction of the South is building upon the same foundation. No one
doubts that the Negro is able to resist certain miasmatic and febrific
diseases which are so destructive to the white race in the tropical
regions of the earth. Science and wise hygienic appliances have improved
the condition of the white race in this respect, it is true, but will
not the same appliances benefit the Negro in the same degree?
Dr. Daniel H. Williams, surgeon-in-chief of the Freedmen's Hospital, at
Washington, D. C., informs me that during his professional experience he
has performed upward of 3000 surgical operations, one-fourth of which at
least were upon white patients, and that he has found unmistakable
evidence of higher vital power among the colored patients. I am also
informed that this is the general opinion of the medical profession.
Although the author treats exhaustively the whole catalogue of diseases
and the numerous ills which flesh is heir to, it can be safely claimed
that he does not establish his main proposition set forth in the
beginning of the chapter, and that at least a Scotch verdict is
demanded: "not proven."