



By Teryn Bouche and Laura Rivard

The United States has an imperfect history. Some of our darker chapters include slavery, the decimation of Native American populations, and atrocities committed during our various wars. A quick survey will reveal that most Americans have learned about or at least heard of these events. However, ask the average person about the “ eugenics movement” and you are likely to get blank stares. We at Genetics Generation believe it is time to raise awareness of this tragic time in our country’s history.

Hereditary Genius (1869): “Consequently, as it is easy, ….. to obtain by careful selection a permanent breed of dogs or horses gifted with peculiar powers of running, or of doing anything else, so it would be quite practicable to produce a highly-gifted race of men by judicious marriages during several consecutive generations.”

The eugenics movement took root in the United States in the early 1900‘s, led by Charles Davenport (1866-1944), a prominent biologist, and Harry Laughlin, a former teacher and principal interested in breeding. In 1910, Davenport founded the Eugenics Record Office (ERO) at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory on Long Island “to improve the natural, physical, mental, and temperamental qualities of the human family” (Norrgard 2008). Laughlin was the first director. Field workers for the ERO collected many different forms of “data”, including family pedigrees depicting the inheritance of physical, mental, and moral traits. They were particularly interested in the inheritance of “undesirable” traits, such as pauperism, mental disability, dwarfism, promiscuity, and criminality. The ERO remained active for three decades.

Eugenics was not only the purview of academics, and it became a popular social movement that peaked in the 1920s and 30s. During this period, the American Eugenics Society was founded, in addition to many local societies and groups around the country (PBS 1998). Members competed in “fitter family” and “better baby” competitions at fairs and exhibitions (Remsberg 2011). Movies and books promoting eugenic principles were popular. A film called The Black Stork (1917), based on a true story, depicted as heroic a doctor that allowed a syphilitic infant to die after convincing the child’s parents that it was better to spare society one more outcast.

The English eugenics movement, championed by Galton, promoted eugenics through selective breeding for positive traits. In contrast, the eugenics movement in the US quickly focused on eliminating negative traits. Not surprisingly, “undesirable” traits were concentrated in poor, uneducated, and minority populations. In an attempt to prevent these groups from propagating, eugenicists helped drive legislation for their forced sterilization (Norrgard 2008). The first state to enact a sterilization law was Indiana in 1907, quickly followed by California and 28 other states by 1931 (Lombardo n.d.). These laws resulted in the forced sterilization of over 64,000 people in the United States (Lombardo n.d.). At first, sterilization efforts focused on the disabled but later grew to include people whose only “crime” was poverty. These sterilization programs found legal support in the Supreme Court. In Buck v. Bell (1927), the state of Virginia sought to sterilize Carrie Buck for promiscuity as evidenced by her giving birth to a baby out of wedlock (some suggest she was raped). In ruling against Buck, Supreme Court Justice Wendell Holmes opined, “It is better for all the world, if instead of waiting to execute degenerate offspring for crime, or to let them starve for imbecility, society can prevent those who are manifestly unfit from continuing their kind....Three generations of imbeciles is enough” (Black 2003). This decision legitimized the various sterilization laws in the United States. In particular, California’s program was so robust that the Nazi’s turned to California for advice in perfecting their own efforts. Hitler proudly admitted to following the laws of several American states that allowed for the prevention of reproduction of the “unfit” (Black 2003).

The US eugenics movement began to lose power in the 1940s and was completely discredited following the horrors of Nazi Germany. With modern advances in genetic testing, it is important to keep America’s eugenics history in mind. Yet, can we avoid repeating this dark chapter, if so many in our country don't know about it?

Please take our simple poll below and then consider leaving a longer answer to the following question in our comments section: “Why aren’t most people taught about the American Eugenics Movement as part of US History?”.

References

Black, Edwin. "The Horrifying American Roots of Nazi Eugenics." History News Network. N.p., Sept. 2003. Web. 07 May 2014. <http://hnn.us/article/1796>.

"Eugenics Movement Reaches Its Height 1923." Public Broadcasting Service (PBS). N.p., 1998. Web. 06 May 2014.

Galton, Francis. Hereditary Genius: An Inquiry Into Its Laws and Consequences. London: Macmillan, 1869. Print.

Lombardo, Paul. "Eugenic Sterilization Laws." Eugenics Archived. N.p., n.d. Web. 07 May 2014. <http://www.eugenicsarchive.org/html/eugenics/essay8text.html>.

Norrgard, K. (2008) Human testing, the eugenics movement, and IRBs. Nature Education 1(1):170.

Remsberg, Rich. "Found In The Archives: America's Unsettling Early Eugenics Movement." National Public Radio. N.p., 01 June 2011. Web. 07 May 2014.

Image credit to Gennie Staford (Via Flickr)