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 Carl Brigham was an associate professor of psychology at Princeton University in 1923 when he published his influential book on the Army IQ tests, A Study of American Intelligence. Brigham had played a minor role in administering the army tests. His book argued the test scores were clear indicators of innate intelligence, and that the test results proved the superior intelligence of the "Nordic Race." The book was used by Harry Laughlin in the 1924 congressional debates on immigration, and played a key role in the creation of immigration restriction legislation.
Remarkably, Brigham would have a complete change of heart, and in 1930, would publicly reject his earlier "race hypothesis." As Stephen Jay Gould states, "Brigham paid his personal debt, but he could not undo what the tests had accomplished. The quotas stood, and slowed immigration from southern and eastern Europe to a trickle. Throughout the 1930s, Jewish refugees, anticipating the holocaust, sought to emigrate, but were not admitted." (Gould, p. 233)
Brigham's legacy in the testing arena is still with us today: He took the army tests back to Princeton and created the SAT.
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