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A Century of Eugenics in America
From the Indiana Experiment to the Human Genome Era
Edited by Paul A. Lombardo
Contributions by Maxwell J. Mehlman, Angela Logan, Jason Lantzer, Alexandra M. Stern, Gregory Dorr, Edward McCabe, Linda McCabe, Johanna Schoen, Elof Axel Carlson and Molly Ladd-Taylor
Published by: Indiana University Press
268 Pages
- eBook
- 9780253004987
- Published: January 2011
$9.99
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In 1907, Indiana passed the world's first involuntary sterilization law based on the theory of eugenics. In time, more than 30 states and a dozen foreign countries followed suit. Although the Indiana statute was later declared unconstitutional, other laws restricting immigration and regulating marriage on "eugenic" grounds were still in effect in the U.S. as late as the 1970s. A Century of Eugenics in America assesses the history of eugenics in the United States and its status in the age of the Human Genome Project. The essays explore the early support of compulsory sterilization by doctors and legislators; the implementation of eugenic schemes in Indiana, Georgia, California, Minnesota, North Carolina, and Alabama; the legal and social challenges to sterilization; and the prospects for a eugenics movement basing its claims on modern genetic science.
Contents
Preface and Acknowledgments
Introduction: Looking Back at Eugenics / Paul A. Lombardo
Part 1. The Indiana Origins of Eugenic Sterilization
1. The Hoosier Connection: Compulsory Sterilization as Moral Hygiene / Elof Axel Carlson
2. The Indiana Way of Eugenics: Sterilization Laws, 1907–74 / Jason S. Lantzer
Part 2. Eugenics and Popular Culture
3. From Better Babies to the Bunglers: Eugenics on Tobacco Road / Paul A. Lombardo
4. "Quality, Not Mere Quantity, Counts": Black Eugenics and the NAACP Baby Contests / Gregory Michael Dorr and Angela Logan
Part 3. State Studies of Eugenic Sterilization
5. From Legislation to Lived Experience: Eugenic Sterilization in California and Indiana, 1907–79 / Alexandra Minna Stern
6. Eugenics and Social Welfare in New Deal Minnesota / Molly Ladd-Taylor
7. Reassessing Eugenic Sterilization: The Case of North Carolina / Johanna Schoen
8. Protection or Control? Women's Health, Sterilization Abuse, and Relf v. Weinberger / Gregory Michael Dorr
Part 4. Eugenics in the Human Genome Era
9. Are We Entering a "Perfect Storm" for a Resurgence of Eugenics? Science, Medicine, and Their Social Context / Linda L. McCabe and Edward R. B. McCabe
10. Modern Eugenics and the Law / Maxwell J. Mehlman
List of Contributors
Index
Paul A. Lombardo is Professor of Law at Georgia State University College of Law. He is author of Three Generations, No Imbeciles: Eugenics, the Supreme Court, and Buck v. Bell.
"As a nation with lofty ambitions, the United States has had a mixed relationship with eugenics. The first country to prohibit procreation by criminals and 'idiots' — in the state of Indiana in 1907 — today it embraces the Human Genome Project and the possibility of genetic enhancement. Law professor Paul Lombardo examines US legislation and attitudes to human selection in the past century, and the likelihood of such pressures arising again in modern genetics."
~Nature
"In 1907, Indiana became the first state to pass a sterilization law. The last sterilization of an Indiana resident took place in 1971. Thus, the state has the dubious honor of being the first and one of the last states to sterilize a US citizen forcibly in hopes of protecting the fit from the unfit. The subjects of this essay collection include the definitions of those two terms, the legality of the process, the culture that would rationalize such a procedure, and the uneasiness engendered in many persons by the neo-eugenic language used by supporters of the Human Genome Project. A noted historian of the eugenics movement, editor Lombardo (Georgia State Univ.) has divided this book into essays that focus upon the history of sterilization in Indiana; additional state studies, including California, which sterilized more persons than any other state; and two chapters that examine sterilization as portrayed in popular culture. The final two essays are perhaps the most important, as they look at the implications for contemporary medicine and law regarding the renewed interest in 'better breeding' as a result of the Human Genome Project. Summing Up: Recommended. All academic levels/libraries. —Choice"
~D. O. Cullen, Collin College
"Valuable and welcome . . ."
~BULLETIN HISTORY OF MEDICINE
"[T]here are indeed valuable lessons to be learnt from . . . this book; the editor was probably wise to confine its scope to the narrower brief of American compulsory sterilisation . . . .Nov. 2011"
~Human Genetics
"Valuable and welcome . . .Vol. 85.4 Winter 2011"
~BULLETIN HISTORY OF MEDICINE
"A noted historian of the eugenics movement, editor Lombardo has divided this book into essays . . . The final two essays are perhaps the most important, as they look at the implications for contemporary medicine and law regarding the renewed interest in 'better breeding' as a result of the Human Genome Project. . . . Recommended.October 2011"
~Choice
"Paul Lombardo has assembled a compelling argument for close monitoring of modern genetic policies in the Human Genome Era . . . It is essential reading. April 20, 2011"
~The Internet Review of Books
"A groundbreaking achievement in the historiography of American eugenics."
~Joanne Woiak, University of Washington
"A most important volume and a significant contribution to the field, [the book] will serve both experts and the general public in parsing the difficult issues raised by a transformed eugenics in the 21st century."
~Steven Selden, University of Maryland
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