This has been emphasized in an able and lucid discussion of this question by Dr. Hans Hagen, "Sittliche Werturteile," Mutterschutz, Heft I and II, 1906. Such recognition of popular morals, he justly remarks, is needed not only for the sake of the people, but for the sake of law itself.

Grabowsky, in criticizing Hiller's book, Das Recht über sich Selbst (Archiv für Kriminalanthropologie und Kriminalistik, Bd. 36, 1809), argues that in some cases immorality injures rights which need legal protection, but he admits it is difficult to decide when this is the case. He does not think that the law should interfere with homosexuality in adults, but he does consider it should interfere with incest, on the ground that in-breeding is not good for the race. But it is the view of most authorities nowadays that in-breeding is only injurious to the race in the case of an unsound stock, when the defect being in both partners of the same kind would probably be intensified by heredity.