Compulsory sterilization

From Free net encyclopedia

Compulsory sterilization programs are government policies which attempt to force people to undergo surgical sterilization. In the first half of the twentieth century, many such programs were instituted in many countries around the world, usually as part of eugenics programs intended to prevent the reproduction of members of the population considered to be carriers of undesireable genetic traits.

Usually such programs advocated sterilization by means of vasectomy in males and salpingectomy or tubal ligation in females, as they were not operations which significantly affected sexual drive or the personality of the individuals operated upon (unlike, for example, castration). It has been argued that this increased the seemingly innocuous nature of the operations, adding a veneer of scientific objectivity and detachment. Some of these operations were carried out not only against the will of the patient, but without their knowledge, at the same time as other operations.

Today compulsory sterilization programs are usually seen as overly coercive and blunt attempts at genetic engineering which focused disproprotionately on poor and disenfranchized groups. The most well-known compulsory sterilization programs were those of Nazi Germany (which sterilized over 400,000 individuals in the 1930s and 1940s), the United States (which sterilized over 64,000 individuals from 1900s through the 1970s), and many Scandinavian countries (Sweden, for example, sterilized around 62,000 individuals from the 1930s through the 1970s).

Plans for forced sterilization for the purposes of avoiding overpopulation are sometimes, but not usually, directly related to a eugenic intent. (See population control for more information on this type of sterilization.)

1 United States
2 Germany
3 Other countries
4 Notes
5 External links

[edit]

United States

Image:Sterilization states.jpg

The first country to concertedly undertake compulsory sterilization programs for the purpose of eugenics was the United States. The principal targets of the American program were the mentally retarded and the mentally ill, but also targeted under many state laws were the deaf, the blind, the epileptic and the physically deformed. Some sterilizations also took place in prisons and other penal institutions, targeting criminality, but they were in the relative minority. In the end, over 65,000 individuals were sterilized in 33 states under state compulsory sterilization programs in the United States.<ref>An overview of U.S. eugenics and sterilization is in Daniel Kevles, In the name of eugenics: Genetics and the uses of human heredity (New York: Knopf, 1985).</ref>

The first state to introduce compulsory sterilization legislation was Michigan, in 1897 but the law failed to garner enough votes by legislators to be adopted. Eight years later Pennsylvania's state legislators passed a sterilization that was vetoed by the governor. Indiana became the first state to enact sterilization legislation in 1907 followed closely by Washington and California in 1909. Sterilization rates across the country were relatively low (California being the sole exception) until the 1927 Supreme Court case Buck v. Bell which legitimized the forced sterilization of patients at a Virginia home for the mentally retarded. The number of sterilizations performed per year increased until another Supreme Court case, Skinner v. Oklahoma, complicated the legal situation by ruling against punitive sterilization in 1942.<ref>On the legal history of eugenic sterilization in the U.S., see Paul Lombardo, "Eugenic Sterilization Laws," essay in the Eugenics Archive, available online at http://www.eugenicsarchive.org/html/eugenics/essay8text.html.</ref>

Most sterilization laws could be divided into three main categories of motivations: eugenic (concerned with heredity), therapeutic (part of an even-then obscure medical theory that sterilization would lead to vitality), or punitive (as a punishment for criminals), though of course these motivations could be combined in practice and theory (sterilization of criminals could be both punitive and eugenic, for example). Buck v. Bell asserted only that eugenic sterilization was constitutional, whereas Skinner v. Oklahoma ruled specifically against punitive sterilization, for example. Most operations only worked to prevent reproduction (such as severing the vas deferens in males), though some states (Oregon and North Dakota in particular) had laws which called for the use of castration. In general, most sterilizations were performed under eugenic statutes, in state-run psychiatric hospitals and homes for the mentally disabled.<ref>Philip Reilly, The surgical solution: a history of involuntary sterilization in the United States (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1991).</ref> There was never a federal sterilization statute, though eugenicist Harry H. Laughlin, whose state-level "Model Eugenical Sterilization Law" was the basis of the statute affirmed in Buck v. Bell, proposed the structure of one in 1922.<ref>A copy of Harry Laughlin's "Model Eugenical Sterilization Law" (including the federal proposal) is available online at: http://www.people.fas.harvard.edu/~wellerst/laughlin/.</ref>

After World War II, public opinion towards eugenics and sterilization programs became more negative in the light of the connection with the genocidal policies of Nazi Germany, though a significant number of sterilizations continued in a few states until the early 1960s. The Oregon Board of Eugenics, later renamed the Board of Social Protection, existed until 1983, with the last forcible sterilization occurring in 1981.<ref>Julie Sullivan, "State will admit sterilization past", Portland Oregonian (November 15, 2002). Available online at http://www.open.org/~people1/eugenics/eugenics_article_6.htm.</ref> The U.S. commonwealth Puerto Rico had a sterilization program as well. Some states continued to have sterilization laws on the books for much longer after that, though they were rarely if ever used. California sterilized more than any other state by a wide margin, and was responsible for over a third of all sterilization operations. Information about the California sterilization program was produced into book form and widely disseminated by eugenicists E.S. Gosney and Paul B. Popenoe, which was said by the government of Adolf Hitler to be of key importance in proving that large-scale compulsory sterilization programs were feasible.<ref>On California sterilizations and their connection to the Nazi program, see: Stefan Kühl, The Nazi connection: Eugenics, American racism, and German National Socialism (New York: Oxford University Press, 1994); Alexandra Stern, Eugenic nation : faults and frontiers of better breeding in modern America (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2005); and Wendy Kline, Building a better race: gender, sexuality, and eugenics from the turn of the century to the baby boom (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2001).</ref>

In recent years, the governors of many states have made public apologies for their past programs beginning with Virginia and followed by Oregon and California. None have offered to compensate those sterilized, however, citing that few are likely still living (and by definition would have no affected offspring) and that inadequate records remain by which to verify them. At least one compensation case, Poe v. Lynchburg Training School & Hospital (1981), was filed in the courts on the grounds that the sterilization law was unconstitutional. It was rejected because the law was no longer in effect at the time of the filing. However, the petitioners were granted some compensation as the stipulations of the law itself, which required informing the patients about their operations, had not been carried out in many cases.

[edit]

Germany

Image:Wir stehen nicht allein.jpg The most infamous sterilization program of the 20th century took place under the most infamous regime of the 20th century: the Third Reich. One of the first acts by Adolf Hitler after achieving total control over the German state was to pass the Law for the Prevention of Hereditarily Diseased Offspring (Gesetz zur Verhütung erbkranken Nachwuchses) in July 1933. The law was signed in by Hitler himself, and over 200 eugenic courts were created specifically as a result of the law. Under the German law, any doctor in the Reich was required to report patients of theirs who were mentally retarded, mentally ill (including schizophrenia and manic depression), epileptic, blind, deaf, or physically deformed, and a steep monetary penalty was imposed for any patients who were not properly reported. Individuals suffering from alcoholism or Huntington's Chorea could also be sterilized. The individual's case was then presented in front of a court of Nazi officials and public health officers who would review their medical records, take testimony from friends and colleagues, and eventually decide whether or not to order a sterilization operation performed on the individual, using force if necessary. Though not explicitly covered by the law, 400 mixed-race "Rhineland Bastards" were also sterilized beginning in 1937.<ref>Robert Proctor, Racial hygiene: Medicine under the Nazis (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1988), and Gisela Bock, "Nazi sterilization and reproductive policies" in Dieter Kuntz, ed., Deadly medicine: creating the master race (Washington, D.C.: United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, 2004).</ref>

By the end of World War II, over 400,000 individuals were sterilized under the German law and its revisions, most within its first four years of being enacted. When the issue of compulsory sterilization was brought up at the Nuremberg trials after the war, many Nazis defended their actions on the matter by indicating that it was the United States itself from whom they had taken inspiration.

[edit]

Other countries

Even years and decades after the large-scale forced sterilization programs had ceased to exist in the US, many countries maintained post-WWII sterilization campaigns lasting well into the 70s, most notoriously Sweden and Canada. Dozens of countries around the world, especially in Europe, also had similar programs, and in 1997 it was disclosed that Sweden in particular had a strong sterilization program, sterilizing around 62,000 individuals over a period of 40 years until 1976. Other countries that had notably active sterilization programs include Canada, Australia, Norway, Finland, Estonia, Slovakia, Switzerland, Iceland, and some countries in Latin America (including Panama).<ref>Gunnar Broberg and Nils Roll-Hansen, eds., Eugenics And the Welfare State: Sterilization Policy in Demark, Sweden, Norway, and Findland (Michigan State University Press, 2005).</ref> In the United Kingdom, Home Secretary Winston Churchill introduced a bill that included forced sterilization. Writer G.K. Chesterton led a successful effort to defeat that clause of the 1913 Mental Deficiency Act. The Roman Catholic Church has been a notable opponent of eugenics and sterilization programs.

The Soviet Union imposed forced sterilization to female workers deported from Romania to Soviet labor camps. This occurred after World War II, when Romania was supposed to supply reconstruction workforce (according to the armistice convention).<ref>A link to the testimony of such a deportee [1] (in Romanian).</ref> India and China have also at various times implemented sterilization campaigns as a population control policy, though only the latter has made any previous overtures towards any potential eugenic motivations.

[edit]