Carrie Buck, left, with her mum.
In 1927, the Court in Buck v. Bell, 274 U.S. 200, upheld a statute
instituting compulsory sterilisation of the unfit, including the mentally
retarded, "for the protection and health of the state." It was
largely seen as an endorsement of negative eugenics—the attempt to improve the
human race by eliminating "defectives" from the gene pool.
Carrie Buck was a perfectly normal 18 year-old, young woman. Her grandmother had mental and emotional
problems. Her mother had the mind of an
8 year-old and a history of prostitution and "immorality." Carrie had
been put up for adoption. In her teens,
she became pregnant. Her family and
physician claimed that she was "feeble-minded" and had her
instituionalised in the state mental hospital.
It was learned latter that Carrie had been raped by her adopted mother's
nephew and the family had her institutionalised to "save the family's
reputation."
Alice Dobbs holding Carrie's baby. It appears that Mrs. Dobbs is
holding a coin in front of Vivian's face in an attempt to catch her
attention. The baby looks past her, staring into the distance,
apparently failing the test. Estabrook described that moment during his
testimony at trial a few days later: "I gave the child the regular
mental test for a child of the age of six months, and judging from her
reaction to the tests I gave her, I decided she was below the average."
Once Virginia SB 281, the “Eugenical Sterilization Act,” passed, the
state and state doctors were looking for a case to test the law. Carrie was it. She lost through the state courts and her
lawyers were granted cert by SCOTUS.
Carrie's lawyers argued that involuntary sterilisation violated the
protections of the 14th Amendment and 5th Amendment. They contended that the
due process clause guarantees all adults the right to procreate which was being
violated. They also made the argument that the equal protection clause in the
14th Amendment was being violated since not all similarly situated people were
being treated the same. The sterilisation law was only for the
"feeble-minded" at certain state institutions and made no mention of
other state institutions or those who were not in an institution.
In a landmark 8-1 decision, the Court upheld the involuntary
sterilisation law and this opened the floodgates. the Court accepted that she, her mother and
her daughter were "feeble-minded" and "promiscuous," and
that it was in the state's interest to have her sterilised.
In the infamous words of Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, writing for
the majority:
"We have seen more than once that the public welfare may call
upon the best citizens for their lives. It would be strange if it could not
call upon those who already sap the strength of the State for these lesser
sacrifices, often not felt to be such by those concerned, to prevent our being
swamped with incompetence. It is better for all the world, if instead of
waiting to execute degenerate offspring for crime, or to let them starve for
their imbecility, society can prevent those who are manifestly unfit from
continuing their kind. The principle that sustains compulsory vaccination is
broad enough to cover cutting the Fallopian tubes…Three generations of
imbeciles are enough."
She was sterilised and lived into her 80s, was a perfectly normal
woman of average intelligence, manners, morality, and mother to the child of
the rape until the little girl, an honours' student, died from the measles. In fact, there never were "three generations of imbeciles." Evidently, "three generations, no imbeciles, but a mandate" was, instead, enough.
Carrie Buck and William Eagle, 1932
"I am married and getting along alright so far. I
married Mr. Eagle a man I had been going with for three years. . . . He
is a good man. I thought it was best for me to marry. . . . Tell my
mother I will send her something when I can."
- Carrie Buck Eagle, Bland, Virginia
It is estimated that close to 100,000 Americans were forced to undergo
sterilisation against their will.
In Skinner v. Oklahoma, 316 U.S. 535 (1942), the Court ruled that
compulsory sterilisation could not be imposed as a punishment for a crime
because the Oklahoma law excluded white-collar crimes, which did not also carry
sterilisation penalties. Obviously, this
produced equal protection problems and headaches.
The Oklahoma law allowed for a person convicted of three or more
crimes "amounting to felonies involving moral turpitude". Skinner had been convicted twice of bank
robbery and one for stealing chickens.
It was a common belief during that era was that "criminality"
was possibly a hereditary trait that needed to be weeded out of the human gene
pool via eugenics.
Section 195 of the law made the following exception: offences arising out of the violation of the
prohibitory laws, revenue acts, embezzlement, or political offenses, shall not
come or be considered within the terms of this Act."........in other
words, "white and middle/upper class" people.
Justice William O. Douglas, writing for the majority:
"Oklahoma makes no attempt to say that he who commits larceny by
trespass or trick or fraud has biologically inheritable traits which he who
commits embezzlement lacks. We have not the slightest basis for inferring that
that line has any significance in eugenics, nor that the inheritability of
criminal traits follows the neat legal distinctions which the law has marked
between those two offenses. In terms of fines and imprisonment, the crimes of
larceny and embezzlement rate the same under the Oklahoma code. Only when it
comes to sterilization are the pains and penalties of the law different. The
equal protection clause would indeed be a formula of empty words if such
conspicuously artificial lines could be drawn."
and...
"The power to sterilize, if exercised, may have subtle,
far-reaching and devastating effects. In evil or reckless hands it can cause
races or types which are inimical to the dominant group to wither and
disappear. There is no redemption for the individual whom the law touches. Any
experiment which the State conducts is to his irreparable injury. He is forever
deprived of a basic liberty. We mention these matters not to reexamine the
scope of the police power of the States. We advert to them merely in emphasis
of our view that strict scrutiny of the classification which a State makes in a
sterilization law is essential, lest unwittingly, or otherwise, invidious
discriminations are made against groups or types of individuals in violation of
the constitutional guaranty of just and equal laws."
Skinner is often mistaken as having overturned Buck and declared
forced sterilisations to be unconstitutional.
THIS IS UNTRUE. The case turned
on the Equal Protection argument and the disparate treatment for classes of
criminals.
Jack Skinner worked as a prison clerk…. He had attended college, and
despite his prison career, he had hopes of being a responsible parent
with children of his own when he left the penitentiary.
SKINNER IS STILL GOOD LAW.
FORCED STERILISATIONS HAVE NEVER BEEN HELD TO BE UNCONSTITUTIONAL AND
AROUND 25,000 MEN AND WOMEN UNDERWENT STERILISATION AFTER SKINNER.
The last known forced sterilisation occurred in Oregon in 1984, but
there is nothing to stop the government from beginning this horror in the
future. That should make the hearts of
Tom Friedman, Paul Krugman, Ezekiel Emanuel, John Holdern, etc., go
aflutter. One child policy???
As a libertarian, these cases are close to my heart. The State should never be able to do things
like this to anyone. The sad chapter of
American eugenics and forced sterilisation was born in an evil, which
eventually was adopted by Nazi Germany.
" ...the weak members of civilised societies propagate their kind. No one
who has attended to the breeding of domestic animals will doubt that
this must be highly injurious to the race of man. It is surprising how
soon a want of care, or care wrongly directed, leads to the degeneration
of a domestic race; but excepting in the case of man himself, hardly
any one is so ignorant as to allow his worst animals to breed."
- Charles Darwin, The Descent of Man, and Selection in Relation to Sex, 1871
As Michael Egnor has written in Evolution News, "each February, admirers of Charles Darwin celebrate his birthday. 'Darwin Day' is a celebration of secularism and of materialistic
science, and particularly a celebration of Darwin's theory of evolution.
Some particularly enthusiastic Darwinists compare Darwin Day to
Lincoln's birthday. Their motto (I'm not making this up): 'Lincoln freed the slaves; Darwin freed our minds.'
I agree. Considering Darwin's perverse impact on medicine, perhaps, we should stop, pause and reflect on Darwin's influence on American medicine and society every 2nd of May -- the anniversary of Buck v Bell -- when the Supreme Court of the United States ruled that the government could sterilise Americans against their will.
Related Reading:
'Carrie Buck, "Three Generations, No Imbeciles, But A Mandate'
'War Against the Weak--Eugenics and America's Campaign to Create a Master Race'
Progressivism, Eugenics, and the Jewish Butcher of Buchenwald
Progressives' Dirty, Little Secret
When It Comes To Abortion, Progressives Can Be Counted On To Fully Reveal Their Racism And Ignorance
'Being A Progressive Means Never Having To Admit That You Were Wrong Or Saying You're Sorry.'
How Progressives Killed Robert Goldstein Through Censorship, Police State Tactics, Unconstitutional Laws, & Railroading All The Way Into A Cattlecar On The Road To A Nazi Concentration Camp
Sterilisation in America
Eugenics And The Nazis — The California Connection
The Left’s Lie About Fascism Will Outlive Cockroaches In A Nuclear Winter
The Nation's Top 50 Progressives… and Socialists and Communists
Killing Babies No Different From Abortion, Experts* Say ... Alternative Title: Leftists Demand The Resurrection of the Nazi Aktion T4 Programme
I Love Abortion....Ban Adoption!
Life Is Not Sacred: Why Killing Someone is Morally Acceptable But Disabling Them Is Immoral
The Left's War on Fertility
Declaring War on Newborns
George Bernard Shaw Favours Euthanasia
Taking Life: Humans
'Carrie Buck, "Three Generations, No Imbeciles, But A Mandate'
'War Against the Weak--Eugenics and America's Campaign to Create a Master Race'
Progressivism, Eugenics, and the Jewish Butcher of Buchenwald
Progressives' Dirty, Little Secret
When It Comes To Abortion, Progressives Can Be Counted On To Fully Reveal Their Racism And Ignorance
'Being A Progressive Means Never Having To Admit That You Were Wrong Or Saying You're Sorry.'
How Progressives Killed Robert Goldstein Through Censorship, Police State Tactics, Unconstitutional Laws, & Railroading All The Way Into A Cattlecar On The Road To A Nazi Concentration Camp
Sterilisation in America
Eugenics And The Nazis — The California Connection
The Left’s Lie About Fascism Will Outlive Cockroaches In A Nuclear Winter
The Nation's Top 50 Progressives… and Socialists and Communists
Killing Babies No Different From Abortion, Experts* Say ... Alternative Title: Leftists Demand The Resurrection of the Nazi Aktion T4 Programme
I Love Abortion....Ban Adoption!
Life Is Not Sacred: Why Killing Someone is Morally Acceptable But Disabling Them Is Immoral
The Left's War on Fertility
Declaring War on Newborns
George Bernard Shaw Favours Euthanasia
Taking Life: Humans
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