Page 86 - The Social Weapon: Darwinism
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Evolutionists in the 19th and early 20th cen-
turies held almost totally racist views. Many scien-
tists had no hesitation about openly expressing
such opinions. Books and articles written at the
time offer the most concrete proof. In Outcasts from
Evolution: Scientific Attitudes of Racial Inferiority,
John S. Haller, a professor of history at Southern
Illinois University, describes how all 19th-century
evolutionists falsely believed in the superiority of
the white race and that other races were inferior.
One article in American Scientist magazine calls
Haller's book:
... extremely important... documenting as it does
what has long been suspected: the ingrained, firm,
and almost unanimous racism of North American
men of science during the 19th (and into the 20th)
century... Ab initio, Afro-Americans were viewed
by these intellectuals as being in certain ways unre-
deemably, unchangeably, irrevocably inferior. 38
Another article in Science magazine made the
following comment about some of Haller's claims:
What was new in the Victorian period was
Darwinism... Before 1859, many scientists had
questioned whether blacks were of the same
species as whites. After 1859, the evolutionary
schema raised additional questions, particularly
whether or not Afro-Americans could survive com-
petition with their white near-relations. The mo-
mentous answer was a resounding no. … The
African was inferior because he represented the
“missing link” between ape and Teuton. 39
The Social Weapon: Darwinism