The theory of Nordic superiority, on which the present immigration laws are based, was exploded in a scientific test conducted by Dr. Nathaniel M. Hirsch, formerly a fellow of the National Research Council, according to the Sunday Magazine supplement of the New York "World." The tests showed that if intellectual superiority matters, the prize must go not to Nordics but to Polish Jews.
Dr. Hirsch tested 5,500 New England school children of foreign horn parents of many different races.
Polish Jews averaged the highest in intelligence, the next in order being Swedes, English, Russian Jews, Germans, Americans, Lithuanians, Irish, British Canadians, Russians, Poles, Greeks, Italians, French Canadians, Negroes and Portuguese. The children tested were all attending public schools in four factory towns of Massachusetts with the exception of 449 Negro children from Tennessee.
"The intelligence of the national groups showed that there is no connection between high intelligence and the possession of so-called Nordic blood," said Dr. Hirsch. "The eight national groups that were superior in intelligence consisted of two national groups that have been called Nordic, the English and Swedes; two groups that have been thought to possess 60 per cent or more of Alpine blood, the Germans and Lithuanians; two quasi-national groups of Jews; one quasi-national group of so-called Mediterranean blood, the Irish, and one national group that is a composite of all four bloods, Americans."
Dr. Hirsch points out that during the past 3,000 years migrations and intermarriages have blended the three distinct European racial types, the fair, long-headed Nordic, the brown-haired, round-headed Alpine and the dark-haired, long headed Mediterranean; so that in no part of Europe today is there even approximately a race of one of these pure types. The differences among Europeans of today are more national than racial, he finds. Each national group has a distinct personality, as a result of its culture and its heredity, and the different nations show marked differences in intelligence.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
