William H. Tucker, The Cattell Controversy: Race, Science and Ideology, University of Illinois Press, 2010, 254 pp.

Although he was not well known to the public, Raymond Cattell (1905–1998) was one of the most influential research psychologists of the 20th century. He wrote 56 books and more than 500 journal articles in the fields of personality, intelligence, and multivariate analysis. He designed 30 standardized tests for measuring intelligence and personality, some of which are still in use.

During the course of this remarkably productive career, Cattell received many honors and awards, and in 1997, the American Psychological Association (APA) announced it would present him with the association's Gold Medal Award for Life Achievement. The 92-year-old Cattell traveled to Chicago from Hawaii, where he lived in retirement, to receive the honor, but two days before the ceremony the APA announced that the award was to be "postponed."

The reason? Two professional "racism"-hunters — Barry Mehler of Ferris State University and Abraham Foxman of the ADL — had written the association complaining about Cattell's political views. The APA announced it would withhold the award until a Blue Ribbon Panel had looked into "the relationship between Dr. Cattell's scientific work and his views on racial segregation." This caused a furor, in the midst of which Cattell withdrew his name from consideration. The panel disbanded and issued no report; a few months later, Cattell died.

The Cattell Controversy is a book-length account of Cattell's career, with special emphasis on his little-known political writings that so exercised the anti-"racists." The author, William Tucker of Rutgers University-Camden, is himself a professional anti-"racist," who supported the witch hunt, and who assures us that Cattell's views were so appalling that the APA would have disgraced itself by giving him its top honor. Instead, it is University of Illinois Press that has disgraced itself by publishing a volume of transparent dishonesty.

A remarkable scientist

Despite his obvious hatred for Cattell, Prof. Tucker admits that "almost everyone who had worked with him, even for a short time, regarded Cattell with a mixture of awe and gratitude for his brilliance, his prodigious work ethic, and his ability to inspire others." Prof. Tucker also concedes that Cattell was admired for "his good manners, sense of humor, and ability to treat everyone with respect, no matter their status or background," but warns us that even Nazi exterminators could be loving husbands and fathers, and that "it is hardly unusual to find considerable personal charm and kindness coupled with monstrous beliefs."

Prof. Tucker also recognizes that Cattell was brilliant. He graduated at age 19 from London University with top honors in chemistry and physics. His interests changed, however, after attending a lecture by Cyril Burt on Sir Francis Galton, the father of eugenics. As a boy, Cattell had been deeply moved by the colossal massacre of the First World War and the poverty of London slums, and came to the early belief that such horrors could be alleviated by eugenics. He came of age at a time of great enthusiasm for the view that by understanding and controlling evolution mankind could enter a golden age. Cattell therefore abandoned the physical sciences for the social sciences which, he believed, would be at the forefront in guiding evolution in fruitful directions.

Cattell threw himself into the study of personality because he understood that evolution works on all aspects of personality, not just intelligence, and that any scientific eugenics program would have to make careful choices about which traits to encourage and which to discourage. His Sixteen Personality Factor Questionnaire was first published in 1950 and quickly became a standard instrument for assessing personality. What are now known as "the big five" personality traits — openness to experience, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, neuroticism — though not developed specifically by him, are derived from his work.

Cattell also made important contributions in the study of intelligence. He recognized the need to measure innate ability independent of cultural influence, and his Culture Fair Intelligence Scales are still used today.

Cattell believed that if the traits and abilities of people could be measured at an early age, each citizen could be given the place in society in which he would be happiest and most productive, and that this would put an end to unearned privilege and class conflict. As the great British psychologist Charles Spearman put it, "perfect justice is about to combine with maximum efficiency."

Personality assessment had other uses. Cattell believed it could chart the progress of mental therapy, with patients taking periodic tests to see if they were becoming more normal. He also thought that if someone showed the qualities of a great research scientist, for example, he should be given considerable laboratory resources even before he had produced anything important. He believed it was possible to measure groups on