The Octoroon Melting Pot

If the present ratio were to remain permanent, the inevitable product of the melting pot would be approximately an octoroon. It should not be necessary to stress the significance of this point. We know that under Mendelian law the African strain is hereditarily predominant. In other words, one drop of negro (sic) blood makes the negro (sic). We also know that no higher race has ever been able to preserve its culture, to prevent decay and eventual degeneracy when tainted, even slightly, with negro (sic) blood. Sixty centuries of history establish this rule. Since the first page of recorded fact, history can show no exception. Were the American people to become an octoroon race, it would mean their sinking to the level of Haiti and Santo Domingo

John Powell, “Music and the Individual,” The Rice Institute Pamphlet, Volume 10, Number 3 (July 1923), p. 135.

Tags: