z:\ ambedkar\vol-02\vol2-04.indd MK SJ+YS 21-9-2013/YS-8-11-2013 269
ON MEASURES FOR BIRTH-CONTROL 269
Norway … … … 16.3 Australia … … … 16.4 Switzerland … … … 16.7 New Zealand … … … 17.1 United States … … … 17.3 France … … … 17.3
Among the three lowest countries are Austria, which is entirely Catholic, and Germany, which is one-third Catholic.
The following figures, the birth-rates of important cities, illustrate the very point. They are all for 1927 or 1928 : —
London … … … 16.1 Cologne … … … 16.0
Geneva … … … 14.6 Milan … … … 14.5 Turin … … … 13.2 Prague … … … 12.5
Munich … … … 12.0 Vienna … … … 10.6
With the exception of London, all the above towns are solidly Roman Catholic, yet they all have a lower birth-rate than London. Three of them are in Mussolini’s Italy.
It will be thus seen that the fear, that other communities will neglect birth-control and will thus become stronger in numbers, is altogether a baseless one.
Speeches of statesmen, who are responsible for wars, clearly show that economic difficulties, due to pressure of population, are at the root of most of the modern wars, Bernhardt, the Kaiser, Hitler, Mussolini and Gooring have often stressed this point in no ambiguous words. For instance, Adolf Hitler says in his book, Mein Kampf :
“Through the mad multiplication of the German people before the war, the question of providing the necessary daily bread came in an ever sharper manner into the foreground of all political and economic thought and action.”
Further on he says :
“Only an adequate amount of room upon this earth secures to a nation the freedom of its existence—The National Socialist movement must endeavour to do away with the disproportion between our numbers and our territory ….. Ground and territory must be the object of our foreign politics.” (pp. 728-35).
In his recent historic speech, delivered on the 12th of September 1938, Hitler says :
“They expect Germany, where 140 persons are squeezed into a square kilometre, to keep her Jews, whereas the powers with only a few persons per kilometre do not want them ………”