PART B
Directions: Read the text and study the graphic on the following pages, answer the
multiple choice questions, and write a response based on the situation described below.
You may use the margins to take notes as you read and scrap paper to plan your response.
The Situation: As part of a unit on social ethics, your Global History class is
preparing to have a debate on the existence of social class systems. In
preparing for the discussion, your teacher has asked you to write an essay on
the theory and practices of Social Darwinism. Be sure to indicate whether or
not Social Darwinism is an ethically valid practice.
Your Task: Using relevant information from both documents, write an essay for your
Global History class in which you discuss various interpretations and uses of Social
Darwinism while also discussing its ethical validity.
Guidelines:
Be sure to
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Tell your audience what they need to know about how the frameworks
of Social Darwinism have been applied to various people and
situations.
Use specific, accurate, and relevant information from the text and
the graphic to support your discussion.
Use a tone and level of language appropriate for your English
class.
Organize your ideas in a logical and coherent manner.
Indicate any words taken directly from the text by using quotation
marks or referring to the author.
Follow the conventions of standard written English.
Herbert Spencer
Andrew Carnegie, already a titan of the business world, was sitting
with friends on the moors of Scotland when the group took up the question
of which author they would take with them if stranded on a deserted
island. One said Shakespeare, another chose Dante. Carnegie didn’t
hesitate. “Herbert Spencer,” he said.
Of all the writers that Carnegie read and studied throughout his
life, he said that the English philosopher Herbert Spencer was the one who
influenced him most. Spencer’s writings provided the philosophical
justification for Carnegie’s unabashed pursuit of personal riches in the
world of business, freeing him from the moral reservations about financial
acquisition that he had inherited from his egalitarian Scottish relatives.
In his “Autobiography,” Carnegie wrote about the dramatic effect
of reading both the naturalist Charles Darwin and Spencer.
“I remember that light came as in a flood and all was clear,”
Carnegie wrote. “Not only had I got rid of theology and the supernatural,
but I had found the truth of evolution. ‘All is well since all grows better’
became my motto, and my true source of comfort.”
Spencer adapted Charles Darwin’s notion of natural selection and
applied the theory to human society in a philosophy that become known as
“Social Darwinism.” It was Spencer who coined the term “survival of the
fittest,” using it to apply to the fate of rich and poor in a laissez faire
capitalist society. Spencer argued that there was nothing unnatural – and
therefore wrong – with competing and then rising to the top in a cut-throat
capitalist world.
“Spencer told [Carnegie] that it was a scientific fact that somebody
like him should be getting to the top,” says historian Owen Dudley
Edwards. “That there was nothing unnatural about it, wrong with it, evil
about it.”
Not only was competition in harmony with nature, Spencer
believed, but it was also in the interest of the general welfare and progress
of society. Many successful capitalists of the late 19th century embraced
Spencer’s philosophy. These captains of industry used his words as
justification to oppose social reform and government intervention. As
Spencer said, these would interfere with the natural – and beneficial – law
of survival.
“The concentration of capital is a necessity for meeting the
demands of our day, and as such should not be looked at askance, but be
encouraged,” Carnegie wrote, paraphrasing Spencer. “There is nothing
detrimental to human society in it, but much that is, or is bound to
become, beneficial.”
Yet Carnegie did not follow all of Spencer’s teachings, especially
Spencer’s call for unfettered laissez faire capitalism. Carnegie argued, for
example, that if workers were to have an eight-hour day, the state would
have to regulate it – something that Spencer never would have approved.
Carnegie also ignored Spencer’s complete opposition to philanthropy, as
the American business tycoon was one of the great philanthropists of his
day. Spencer held that the poor were the unfit who would not survive;
Carnegie, however, believed that the poor (such as himself) were often the
ones who grew up to become “the epoch-makers.”
Carnegie not only admired Spencer; he also sought out his
friendship. Carnegie was in England at the time he learned of Spencer’s
scheduled tour of America, where the Englishman’s popularity was
greatest. The steel magnate made hurried plans to return to the States on
the same ship as Spencer and even managed to win a place in the same
dining table with Spencer.
… During the voyage, Carnegie used all his powers to convince
Spencer to include Pittsburgh on his itinerary. The business tycoon argued
that Edgar Thomsom Bessemer steel plant was evidence of the industrial
order that Spencer had declared as the next and final stage of man’s social
evolution. Spencer finally agreed to the stop, and when he arrived in
Pittsburgh, Carnegie and his partners met him at the station.
Spencer, however, was not as impressed with Pittsburgh as was
Carnegie. This visitor complained about the smoky, polluted air. The
heat and noise of the mills almost forced the sickly Spencer to collapse at
one point. When the tour was over and Spencer was about to leave, he
gave his verdict of Pittsburgh, one that must have hurt the city’s
champion: “Six months residence here would justify suicide.”
… At the end of the American tour, Carnegie picked up Spencer
on the day he was honored at a farewell dinner at Delmonico’s in New
York City. Carnegie saw that the great man was worried about the
evening. Wrote Carnegie: “He could think of nothing but the address he
was to deliver. I believe he had rarely before spoken in public.” Some of
the most important businessmen of the day made toasts to the philosopher.
Interestingly enough, when it was Spencer’s turn to speak, he did not
encourage the gathered to continue to wage the competitive battle.
Instead, Spencer, exhausted by his visit (Spencer was a fragile man and a
hypochondriac), suggested that Americans learn how to find time to enjoy
their leisure.
Many who had contact with Spencer judged his trip a failure, since
Spencer spent much of his time complaining about hosts and avoiding the
press. Yet the visit was salvaged in Carnegie’s mind while the men were
on deck of the ship that would take Spencer back across the Atlantic.
Spencer, in a gesture uncommon to him, held the hands of Carnegie and
editor Edward Youmans and said, “Here are my two best American
friends.” It was a gesture that Carnegie would recall often and obviously
cherish.
TABLE
SOCIAL DARWINISM
PRINCIPLES OF SOCIAL DARWINISM
WERE USED TO JUSTIFY…
Slavery
Colonialism and Imperialism
Military Action
Capitalism
Eugenics Movement and Forced
Sterilization
HOW PRINCIPLES OF SOCIAL
DARWINISM WERE APPLIED
People of color were considered an inferior
race physically, mentally, and spiritually.
Slavery is for the good of the inferior race.
Native peoples were viewed as weaker and
more unfit to survive. Therefore, the
conquering people were justified in taking
the inferior people’s land and resources.
In conflict, the strongest military will win
and is therefore the most fit.
The poor are in the economic situation they
are in because they are not strong and they
are unfit to survive in the current
environment. Regardless of what anyone
does to help the poor, they will not be able
to prosper.
Eugenics is the use of artificial selection to
alter the characteristics of a species and
usually refers to selective breeding in
humans. Only the fittest members of a
species should be allowed to reproduce.
Those people deemed unfit can be
surgically sterilized so that they cannot
have offspring.
Multiple Choice Questions
Directions (1 – 10): Select the best suggested answer to each question and write its number in the
space provided on the answer sheet. The questions may help you think about ideas and information
you might want to use in your writing. You may return to these questions any time you wish.
1
How did Herbert Spencer’s ideas justify
Carnegie’s business practices?
(1) Spencer’s ideas supported Carnegie’s charity
(2) Spencer’s ideas allowed Carnegie to feel that
he was supposed to be succeeding
(3) Spencer’s ideas showed Carnegie that he had
chosen the right area for his business.
(4) Spencer’s ideas illustrated how the supernatural
was responsible for Carnegie’s success
2 Spencer adapted which of Charles Darwin’s theories
to become Social Darwinism?
(1) evolutionary theory
(2) survival of the fittest
(3) eugenics
(4) natural selection
3 Why did Spencer feel competition was important?
(1) It would drive prices down
(2) It would allow more people to hold jobs
(3) It would allow only the strongest to prosper
(4) It would stop government intervention in big
business
4 With which of Spencer’s ideas did Carnegie disagree?
(1) unregulated capitalism
(2) opposition to social reform
(3) need for competition
(4) concentration of capital
5
The word that can best describe how Carnegie felt
toward Spencer is
(1) envious
(2) respectful
(3) amused
(4) adoring
6 British imperialists used this principle to justify their
actions because native people were not suited to
the environment
(1) survival of the fittest
(2) adaptation
(3) natural selection
(4) assimilation
7 During military conflict, the
victorious army may use
Social Darwinism to justify
what outcome of war?
(1) support from the home front
(2) destruction of lands
(3) casualties on the side of the victorious
(4) casualties on the side of the defeated
8 Those who were in favor of slavery
would use Social Darwinism as a
justification because…
(1) one race would want another to
take a leadership role
(2) the stronger race would make the
best workers
(3) the superior race would naturally
take control of the inferior race
(4) the superior race would be able to
elevate others out of their inferior
status
9 According to Social Darwinism and the
Eugenics movement, which kind of
individual should be allowed to reproduce?
(1) a majority member of the lower class
(2) a minority member of the lower class
(3) a minority member of the middle class
(4) a majority member of the middle class
10 Because the lower class was thought to be
unfit to survive in their current environment,
many capitalists would argue which of the
following
(1) distinctions between social classes are
too rigid
(2) the poor are not at fault for their situation
(3) social reform is pointless
(4) the upper class has an obligation to
help the poor