Forces Adverse to Reproduction
“It is clear also, however, that forces adverse to reproduction had invaded and were operating, not only in many of the older countries of the world, some of which have had to face the problem of over-population, but also in the other States of the Australian Commonwealth and New Zealand, which resemble New South Wales in never having felt the stress of too many inhabitants.”
“The benefits of large families to the members of those families and to the nation composed of them cannot be over-estimated.”
“This mass of evidence amply proves that the practice of preventing conception, no matter what method is adopted, is the cause of many dire evils, far worse than any bad consequences that could naturally result from the bearing and rearing of a family.”
— NSW Royal Commission, 1904
Declining Australian fertility? Led by cities? Amidst declining global fertility? Driven by “selfishness” and women who want comfort, luxury, and to “avoid the physical discomfort of lactation”? Welcome to 1904. A Royal Commission in NSW found a 30% drop in births and blamed it on godlessness, gossip, and contraception propaganda.
Maybe it’s due to a decline in the quality of women? Nope.
There is no proof that any decadence has occurred in the physique of women in New South Wales, as suggested by the Government Statist of Victoria. On the other hand, from the evidence before us, and from our own knowledge, we are of opinion that there has been no physical deterioration of the female population.
The Commission concluded that the decline must be due to a force over which people have control. Medical consensus was that women were preventing conception and inducing miscarriage — and that the practice was spreading across all classes, married and unmarried alike.
When I asked Tyler Cowen why fertility was declining around the world, he basically said it’s a wonder it ever worked at all. I think this report supports that claim. Women have borne children forever out of a mix of violent realities (male brutishness, high infant mortality), boredom, lack of alternatives, lack of birth control, and social technologies. All of these have unwound over the past century.
People didn’t believe they could afford more kids then either — a concern the Commission dismissed.
VI. — THE DESIRE TO RESTRICT FERTILITY.
(82.) The desire to keep fertility within such limits as each one for himself deems reasonable
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